Zoe Muth & The Lost High Rollers (S/T)

I've been sitting on this album for almost a month, and for that I apologize. I just found out, thanks to good ole Facebook, that today is Zoe Muth's birthday, so what better time to mention this awesome album? Happy Birthday Zoe.

A buddy of ours is all about the Seattle music scene and he sent me an email back in October of KEXP's song of the day blog that featured ZM&TLHR's song, You Only Believe Me When I'm Lying. Instantly, I was into her old-school songwriting and laid back bluegrass style. Thanks to Myspace, I was able to hear a few more tunes, and decided to shoot Zoe an email to buy the CD. She was kind enough to provide me with a free copy, but I insisted we make a trade, so she kindly accepted an FPM t-shirt. Zoe spends her weekdays teaching preschool in the Seattle area, and her weekends playing great barroom music in smoke filled venues, so I'm sure the shirt will either be covered in finger paint or whiskey in the next few weeks. I'd prefer the former!

Anyhow, this is the band's first album release, and they've been getting some major play around the Seattle area for the past couple of years. I'm extremely impressed by the versatility of the group, especially in the terms of the different styles and how well Zoe's voice takes them on. On one hand, they can put together a great mellow tune about lost love due to in-cooperative partners like the aforementioned You Only Believe Me When I'm Lying, that reminds me of a younger Loretta Lynn backed by a much more elaborate and gifted band. On the other hand, they can get moving in a track like Hard Luck Love, that has the polka feel of tex-mex or Buck Owens, with metaphors galore that all sound so well together you'll wish you would've written them. Other notable tracks on the record include I Used to Call My Heart A Home (video below,) Wasting My Time, and Zoe's personal favorite The Running Kind.

You Only Believe Me When I'm Lying


Hard Luck Love


Wasting My Time


The Running Kind


I Used To Call My Heart A Home


I'm pretty darn excited about this whole album. I really feel that Zoe's voice and songwriting can carry this band in any direciton they'd like to go. Whether it be with their sweet mandolin and banjo plucking in their traditional bluegrass/folk tendencies, or further exploring their ability to use that slide guitar and fiddle to get things moving, I'm sure it'll sound great and work pretty well. In my interactions with Zoe she mentioned that she and her band are hoping to put together a Spring tour down in California. Hopefully we can help make that happen. Please share this with any local radio station contacts you may have, and let's see if we can get some interest drummed up for what would be a great live show. Let us know if you've got any ideas or venues that you think would be a good fit!

I'm going to be jamming this album all the way down the I-5 tomorrow on my way to Bakersfield for Thanksgiving. Lord knows I'm excited to hang with the family, friends, and eat a ton of food. This is probably the last thing I'll write before the big day, so Happy Thanksgiving to all of you and your kin!

See ya later,

Brain

BUY ALBUM

SONG OF THE DAY LINK

ZM&TLHR's on MYSPACE