“So how do you know when someone is genuinely steeped in a genre, when they find focus in both learning tradition and crafting their own space within it? Well, you’ll know when you hear a singer like Caitlin Rose. When I say she is a country singer, I don’t say that to exclude all the other things she is at the same time—a clever wordsmith, a pop siren, a charming frontwoman. No, I say it because she embodies the soul of a country singer in all the best ways. The young Nashvillian’s debut album, Any Side Now (available last year in Europe, and now finally released in the states) is country without being quaint, poppy as all hell but never overly light, twangy in a way we recognize but not by the numbers.”
