video review: 'golden eagle' by holly macve

Man, I wish I liked this more. I mean, it's not bad and I think if I had a little more distance from some personal issues right now it might resonate more... shame that it doesn't. Eh, oh well.

Next up, a moving-on record: Freddie Gibbs! Stay tuned!

album review: 'golden eagle' by holly macve

So I've been told by a lot of my international audience that they tend to be a little perplexed at the larger amount of country I cover in comparison with other critics. And that is worth calling out, because almost by design country is a highly regional genre, born out of American traditions and archetypes that haven't really crossed over around the world in the same way. Sure, Canada has a country scene - and to some extent so does Australia, driven out of the rougher, wilder frontiers - but go to Europe? 

Well, country music does exist in pockets across the Atlantic, but remember what I said about how country music to this day has a terrible web presence problem? Unfortunately, this is still very true internationally as well, and thus without good grassroots promoting, it's hard to hear about acts coming up in the UK or the rest of Europe. And thus I'm pretty happy that my audience decided to recommend the debut album of Holly Macve. Born in Ireland and growing up in the UK, she came up in a musical family and seems to have gravitated towards the vintage-leaning, smoky flavors of country that's popular in the indie scene right now. Now I've covered a lot of variations of this style, from Angel Olsen to Lindi Ortega, from Cheryl Desere'e to Whitney Rose, and I was curious where Holly Macve's English influence would shift the music, perhaps inject a heavier folk touch or a slightly different instrumental palette. Either way, I was in uncharted territory when I picked up her debut album Golden Eagle - what did I find?