If Kacey Musgraves, Brandi Carlile, and Lori McKenna had a songwriting circle, Laura Sawosko would match proper in. Her newest album, Not What I Do (dropping April 18), is a superbly crafted mixture of heartache, humor, and hard-won knowledge, proving as soon as once more that she’s one in all Nashville’s most underrated singer-songwriters. With 12 authentic tracks, the album takes you on a journey by means of love, loss, identification, and private progress, all wrapped in a heat Americana sound that feels timeless but completely recent.
WEBSITE: https://www.laurasawosko.com/
Sawosko isn’t new to the sport. She’s performed Nashville’s most iconic venues, opened for main artists, and even braved the fact TV present Worry Issue again within the day (sure, actually!) However what units her aside is her capability to show the on a regular basis into one thing poetic. On “Biscuits and Gravy,” she transforms a Southern breakfast staple right into a love letter to nostalgia. “Extra Than Only a Burger” does the identical, proving {that a} music about quick meals can someway make you cry.
After which there’s “Take My Hand,” an emotional intestine punch that seems like one thing off the most effective of any up to date singer-songwriter’s album. With a quiet power, Sawosko sings about survival and solidarity, weaving in themes of vulnerability and resiliency with out ever feeling preachy. It’s uncooked, actual, and one of the vital highly effective moments on the album.
The title observe, “Not What I Do,” is the emotional core of the report. It’s an intimate, stripped-down meditation on identification and the wrestle to interrupt free from expectations. Consider it as a cross between Maggie Rogers’ soul-searching ballads and the brutal honesty of Noah Kahan’s “Stick Season.”
Sawosko’s voice has a uncooked, unpolished high quality that makes all the pieces really feel deeply private—like she’s singing these songs in your lounge, only for you. And whereas the album leans closely into people and nation influences, there are moments that really feel virtually indie-pop. “School Days,” for instance, has the identical nostalgic power as Olivia Rodrigo’s “Teenage Dream,” however with the maturity of somebody trying again fairly than nonetheless dwelling it.
APPLE MUSIC: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/laura-sawosko/4420275
Lyrically, Not What I Do is filled with these one-liners that hit you out of nowhere. The sort you need to scribble in a journal or textual content to your greatest good friend at 2 a.m. The ultimate observe, “Not Your Motive,” leaves us on a be aware of quiet empowerment—a reminder that typically probably the most highly effective factor you are able to do is stroll away.
Total, Not What I Do is an album that calls for to be felt. It’s good for lengthy highway journeys, wet afternoons, or these late-night existential crises once you simply want a music that understands. Laura Sawosko may not have mainstream radio play (but), however this album proves she’s making a number of the most compelling music within the singer-songwriter area proper now. In case you love artists like Brandi Carlile, The Chicks, and even the storytelling of early Ed Sheeran, Not What I Do must be in your playlist.
Mindy McCall
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