Here’s another excellent 2016 album that has gone by without a mention even though it has been on my playlist for several months. Justin Wells is a Lexington, Kentucky based roots-rocker and americana songwriter and his new album Dawn in the Distance came out in August, 2016. It was actually another awesome songwriter Austin Lucas that I owe the thanks for this discovery. I was vaguely familiar with Justin’s former band Fifth on the Floor, but had not heard about his solo material until I saw Austin praising this album on his Facebook. I trust that guy, so I bought a download and have been enjoying this a lot. Here’s the video for album outtake Going Down Grinnin’.

And here’s a live version of album cut The Dogs. This song has actually been featured on several best songs of the year lists on country/americana/roots blogs and websites. And deservably so.

Justin Wells Website

It has been a little bit difficult to hear and buy the music of Oklahoma-based songwriter Parker Millsap in the Europe. It almost feels like there’s neither digital or physical distribution. It took me a long time to hear the debut a couple of years ago and same would have happened this year, but I ordered a CD from the states in the summer. His song Heaven Sent is among the most powerful and best songs of the year, but live youtube videos have been the only way to share it, so I haven’t taken that route. Thankfully it’s finally on Spotify, so I can share the studio version of this song. Heaven Sent is an incredible and powerful song about gay son and his religious father who doesn’t approve. The new album The Very Last Day is also very good as a whole. Maybe I prefer the debut, if I have to choose, but that might just be the indie twat in me speaking. The first demo was the best and all that nonsense. Parker is a wonderful artist, the record is very good and this song Heaven Sent is phenomenal.

Parker Millsap Website

Still a lot of great 2016 albums that I haven’t even mentioned yet. I’ll quickly go through some before starting to work on those year end lists. I’ve had a bit of a soul phase going on for the past couple of weeks. I’m not a big soul expert nor own a huge stack of soul LPs and 45s, but every man/woman needs a bit of soul in their life in order to function as a living being. I rarely write about soul records, because I don’t have the expertise and there are better blogs to provide this information. However, it’s still a part of my music taste and therefore I wanted to share a couple of songs from the soul albums that I’ve had on heavy rotation lately. These are the new Lee Fields & The Expressions album Special Night that just recently came out on Big Crown Records and the self-titled Durand Jones & The Indications album that came out earlier in the year on Colemine Records (but which I only discovered a couple of weeks ago). Charles Bradley, Michael Kiwanuka and Nick Waterhouse are the obvious earlier soul-related favourites. The Frightnrs also seem very good based on my limited listening session albeit that’s a wee bit different and more rocksteady type of thing. Oh and I still haven’t heard the new St. Paul & The Broken Bones album. I’ll make a mental note of that and fix this criminal offence of not listening to St. Paul. That actually sums up my limited knowledge of 2016 soul, so feel to drop me hints if I’m missing out on something spectacular. Here’s Smile from Durand Jones & The Indications and Special Night from Lee Fields & The Expressions.

Lee Fields Website

Durand Jones at Facebook