Ohio’s punk scene is well-known for many things: hyperactive egg punk, indignant hardcore, and every style of jangle pop you can think of, just to name a few. Trippy, motorik-heavy meditations, not so much. But as the saying goes, there are always exceptions that prove the rule.
Enter Cincinnati-based Dylan McCartney, who’s spent more than half a decade exploring the outer fringes of guitar music with his band The Drin, embracing everything from krautrock and dub to field recordings and found sounds. The man’s unstoppable creative drive, reinforced by economical songwriting and easy, effortless intra-band chemistry, garnered them a cult reputation that’s snowballed further in the wake of their breakout 2024 album, Elude the Torch.
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After making their Dualtone label debut with 2024’s Easy Company, 
Forty years on, The Jayhawks remain true to their trusted sound. Their lush and patented three-part harmonies and thoughtful, imagery-filled lyrics never go out of style. Their 12th studio album, Sanctuary Park, is a balm for these times. They capture the innocence of teenage years, reflecting from the perspective of adulthood. The opening track, “Keeping Our Heads Above Water,” begins with the line, “under the football lights,” immediately putting the listener in a nostalgic frame of mind. Yet, the upbeat music obscures the theme of resignation heard at the end, “taking all that you have to believe again.” The album’s most riveting track, “Hands on the Wheel,” begins this way in a cappella harmonies, ‘We’ll steal your daddy’s car/Roll down the window…
…Almost a decade ago, when the Minnesota-born 
…’12 Golden Country Greats’, which includes Ween classics “Piss Up a Rope,” “I’m Holding You,” and “Pretty Girl,” has been remastered from the original tapes and comes with more than 20 unreleased demos and outtakes from the Nashville sessions. Among them are two songs cut from the original album, “I’ve Got No Darkside” and Jerry Garcia tribute “So Long, Jerry.”
You have to hand it to Chris “CR” Gennone when it comes to naming his bands; consistency is at the fore. He loves the moniker CR so much so that he’s recorded five albums as CR and the Degenerates, then with a few lineup changes, it was CR and the Nones in 2019, and now we have the third album from 
When 
…featuring newly unearthed bonus tracks and unheard demos.
Lynn Blakey was not a name that gained a great deal of traction commercially but she was an influential figure in the indie rock and alt-country scene in her home state of North Carolina where she DJ’d on college radio in the early ’80s; this was before forming Oh Ok in Athens Georgia with Michel Stipe’s sister Lynda (driven by the inspiration of seeing REM at a small local gig). She collaborated with others such as guitarist Mitch Easter in The Royal Opposition and guitarist Michael Chumbris in Glory Fountain, but her most well-known group experience was with Tres Chicas, a band formed in the late ’90s in Raleigh, NC, with Blakey, Caitlin Cary (from Whiskeytown) and Tonya Lamm (from Hazeldine). The group sang together for a few years before releasing Sweetwater in…
Celebrating 25 years, 
For more than a decade, 
…Like Hoboken’s finest, 
…Originally shelved by his label in 2001, this 21-track record has finally seen an official release.
Musicians who become parents sometimes feel compelled to write songs about it. But really, what is there to say? Every parenthood experience is unique, and also very much the same, and probably has been for something like three hundred thousand years since humans evolved. All the wonder or magic inherent in the process is deeply personal, and therefore dreary as hell when someone else sings about it. That’s a grinchy perspective, no question, but 
Cowboy Junkies release 