This week’s top effort is an Album of the Year contender from Kip Moore.
Jason Isbell
Foxes in the Snow
A few lines that scan too much like clunky, purple prose draw attention to themselves: They’re the one uneven window box hanging loose and in need of repair on the dollhouse. Beyond that, it’s an incisive and raw divorce record with some career-best singing and guitar work.
Caylee Hammack
Bed of Roses
A triumph of resilience over both external and self-inflicted hardships, and Hammack, who should’ve been a massive star so many times by now, sells every second of it. A few lapses in lyrical quality control aside, this captures a major talent in near-peak form.
Mackenzie Carpenter
Hey Country Queen
She’s got something here, but the album’s so scattershot that Carpenter lacks a real identity. The best moments are those when she sings in her natural voice and goes for ribald humor, but there are just as many unpleasant mainstream country Pick Me affectations.
Redferrin
Some City, Somewhere [EP]
The worst vocalist in modern country makes Morgan Wallen sound like Roy Orbison on a cliché-addled set of songs that, at a scant 20 minutes, feels like an exercise in time dilation as a form of torture. Just godawful.
JD Clayton
Blue Sky Sundays
The 70s-styled country rock aesthetic feels rote in a way that does at least something of a disservice to his distinctive songwriting. This is a good record, sure, but his is an interesting perspective that really demands less affected singing and roots-rock licks.
Hannah McFarland
Broken Hearts [EP]
Tons of promise here, with songwriting that shows a savviness with genre tropes and a strong, clear singing voice. The uniform midtempo, melancholy aesthetic supports a thematically coherent EP, but it raises some questions of her range. Bring on a full album.
Edwin McCain
Lucky
Had he released this exact record concurrent with his pal Darius Rucker’s mainstream country pivot, he’d likely have gotten a hit or two off of this. But in 2025, it sounds like a relic of 2010 Music Row. His voice has held up great, to his credit.
The Lumineers
Automatic
I mean, it does sound that way. Fundamentally unchanged from their Stomp-Clap-Hey-day, there’s nary a note here to disappoint their still-considerable fanbase nor to convert those of us who’ve always been non-believers.
Kip Moore
Solitary Tracks
His magnum opus in every way, an album of deeply-felt, melancholy heartland rock. He remains one of mainstream country’s biggest missed opportunities this century, but his thoughtfulness and introspection continue to challenge genre’s gendered norms.
At 23 songs x 90 minutes, the biggest surprise is that the tracks are so uniformly good-to-great that the only obvious edit is the *very good* pre-release track that includes a “burn it down like California,” lyric that scans as distasteful at this exact moment in time.
Chase Matthew
CHASE
His EP was one of the 3 or 4 worst things I listened to in 2024, and here he is again already, with an album that’s exactly as repellent but about 726 times longer. Doesn’t even have novel insights into the psyche of this lost generation of aggrieved, entitled white men.
Cash & Skye
Just a Stranger
Rilo Kiley is in their literal bloodline, and the twangy SoCal country-rock of early RK is all over this winning debut. The vocals need coaching– especially his– to take them farther, but the tunes sure are good, with a wry humor and gift for melody.
Justin Wells
Cynthiana
Tremendous. Of the current bumper crop of gifted Kentucky artists, Wells may be the purest narrative songwriter, and the production here leans into his home state’s musical traditions without pulling focus from his most personal and incisive writing to date.
I’ve become a fan of Kip Moore in the last couple of years. I never really given him much notice until Kevin’s review of “Good Life”, which introduced me to such a fun song! So, I started listening to his music and found that I really enjoy him. I’m really glad that he released this album. It’s very good.
My favorite of the Isbell album is te title track and “Don’t Be Tough.”
I loved reading such a positive review of the Kip Moore album as well. I have been a rabid fan of his since “Beer Money.” His career arc is fascinating; I feel he has many unexpected fans. I am insanely excited to listen to it. It is truly shocking that Nashville couldn’t leverage any aspect of his wide appeal to its own advantage.
Kip appeared at my county fair in 2012. I went in with a chip on my shoulder because I didn’t like “Something ‘Bout a Truck”. About halfway through the concert that was a pleasant surprise, I conceded to myself that “this guy ain’t bad”. I’ve been a fan since. The fact that Chris Janson and Dylan Scott have outlasted him on radio says everything we need to know about Nashville’s inability to leverage the right people to maximize their product appeal.
Were your ears burning, Mark? Tom asked just a couple of album review posts back where you’ve been!
Glad to see you back around these parts! And yes, the idea that Dylan Scott would outlast Kip Moore at radio? Abhorrent.
Nice to hear I’ve been missed. I’ve actually been casually perusing the posts here all along but just got through the busiest period of the year at work, an international visitor, and the flu so I haven’t commented much lately.
I’ll definitely be commenting regularly again when the #1s of the 2000s emerge. It’s harder for me to keep up with the new stuff so I read the reviews and often give them a sampling, but always feel like I need to hear songs at least a few times before being able to review it.
Yes. I wasn’t a fan of Kips early music either. That’s why I was surprised when Kevin gave “Good Life” such a good review until I heard it myself and I’ve been a fan of his subsequennt music since then.
…while working on a cover story on kip moore right now ahead of his forthcoming gig in switzerland at the end of may, i’ve been listening to his new album – and the previous ones again – quite a bit. “solitary tracks” is rather something in so many departments. one of my approaches to these rather sprawling offerings these days is to just randomly click on songs and hear what i stepped in. in this case, you end up a lot more often than not on a really good one. personally, i find myself pressing repeat on “only me” regularly. bryan adams meets jackson browne and later bowie with a pinch of rod stewart for the gravelling part. i’m sold. young steve earle might have liked “tough enough” perhaps quite a bit and bryan adams might feel this would be so me.
fun fact, for a guy with so many songs with women at the heart of it, he seems in real life like the guy, who invented the relationship status “complicated”. then again, his “last shot” and the clip by pj brown that goes with it is still one of the very best videos in all of country music – and humanity, perhaps.
this chase matthew guy – is there something on the market that makes one diggin’ him? there must be something available in nashville, or is it simply again one of those mysteriously divine ways a heathen like me just doesn’t get.
Can I just say how delighted I am to see these comments in favor of the Kip Moore album? There’s been so little attention paid to this project that I’m sure it’s going to end up overlooked, and that would be such a shame. Glad the CU community is on board with this one!
I will have to give Kip Moore a second chance with this album. I’ve disregarded him as an artist and performer ever since I saw him at a songwriters’ round in London a few years ago, where he was drunk and obnoxious, dominating the event, even talking over the other artists. And his fans were worse. Not someone I ever expected to put out something of this quality.
The first single of Moore’s that I really liked was “I’m to Blame,” which was well after radio started to turn on him. From there, I worked backward and was still not fully on board. And his more recent albums have all been solid, if unspectacular. So I was definitely surprised by how strong this collection is: It’s a career record for him.