Austin Stambaugh
Magnolia Sessions
(Anti-Corporate Music)
4.5/5
If Johnny Cash’s most introspective musical moments and Irish pub folk singer Johnny Duhan’s most morose songs got drunk on a lonely winter night and joined hands, Nashville-based folk singer Austin Stambaugh’s Magnolia Sessions would be the introspective, sad, soul-feeding result.
This music on this album—the latest in a series of singer/songwriter, bluegrass, and dark country releases recorded live outside in Nashville—is real, and what is real feeds the soul. The songs here don’t try to be anything other than what they are—a commentary on the fear, sadness, madness, and piety facing secular society.
One of the most difficult things for a song to be is complex in its simplicity, and the leading track on this album, “God Please Save My Soul,” is that and so much more. “Do Your Best With What You Have Now” is a humbling reminder to cherish bad days, while “Every Bit of Your Luck” captures the helplessness of being.
The Otis Taylor-like picks to kick off “I Still Wander” combat the sadness to this outstanding album, keeping me on my toes the entire time.