Wrinkle Neck Mules

Wrinkle Neck Mules
Minor Enough
Liza (EP)
Roundhill Records

It's nice to go on holidays, and it's nice to return from holidays and find a mailbox stuffed full of good things. One of the happy packages of musical delight this week was an order of CDs and a shirt from the Wrinkle Neck Mules, a band with roots in Virginia and North Carolina. I was put on to them by a blog reader and I couldn't be happier. Blog readers rock.

You know, I do love the banjo in roots/country rock. It adds such a buoyancy under the melody, you can go a bit thrashy on the guitars and drums without losing a lightness of touch. WNM have a classic alt.country rock sound in the Uncle Tupelo vein but which also diverts into bluegrass (I listened to "17 Miles of Bourbon" about eight times in a row last night) and sometimes the territory of a less scary 16 Horsepower. The songwriting stands out too, covering comfortingly familar tears and beers country with great style and substance.

Minor Enough is the band's debut album from way back in 2003, and Liza a 6 track EP featuring four live songs which indicate they don't lose anything in person. Of course, it's unlikely I'll get to see them live anytime soon so you Americans will have to make up for me. A new album, Pull the Brake, is out March 7 on Atlanta's Shut Eye Records.