Hear the Best New Folk Music with Fresh Cuts Friday
Ready for some of the best new music we’ve heard this week? It’s a great list as you’ll see below — and as you’ll hear when you join me for my ‘Fresh Cuts’ radio hour! Listen every Friday at 2 p.m. Eastern, 11 a.m. Pacific via the 24/7 stream on our website, app, or your smart speaker.
Or, just click on the Fresh Cuts stream whenever it’s convenient for you.
In the meantime, check out some of the best new music we’ve been listening to this week.
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Caroline Spence, “Confront It”
Of her new single “Confront It,” Caroline Spence says: “I want this song to act like a reset button on how you see me and how I see myself as an artist and a person. I know that my art seeps out of the cracks in the foundation of who I am and yet I have always felt pressure to appear to the world as if I am cool, confident and have it all together, which is frankly exhausting. So, I am not hiding any more, I am confronting it and I thank you for coming along with me.”
The Devil Makes Three, “Spirits”
Out on February 28, 2025, Spirits is the Devil Makes Three’s first album in 7 years and follows 2018’s acclaimed Chains Are Broken. The album marks a return to the band’s stripped-back roots while delving into deeper, more personal themes of grief, mortality, and personal reflection. “There’s a theme of ghosts and death running through this album,” acknowledges frontman and principal songwriter Pete Bernhard, who lost his mother, brother, and closest childhood friend while making the record. Bernhard adds, “The world’s in a strange place right now. A lot of the songs on this record come from that place—trying to make sense of it all, whether it’s dealing with loss, addiction, or the way people are more divided than ever. But at the end of the day, this band has always been about celebrating resilience. We’ve always found a way to push through, and wanted to reflect that in this album.”
Them Coulee Boys, “I Am Not Sad”
Wisconsin band Them Coulee Boys return with their new album No Fun In The Chrysalis (out February 28). While “I Am Not Sad” touches on a theme that shows up in many places in Them Coulee Boys’ music, mental health, this time it’s connecting from a place of acceptance. The verses follow a trajectory that acknowledges the many reasons you might be sad and the challenges that go along with it, but also recognizes that today is a good day. The band has weathered changes in the last couple years as well, most of them personal: new kids, marriages and engagements, and the realities that accompany 10 years in the music business.
Recorded at The Beatles legendary studio in London, Lucinda Williams Sings The Beatles From Abbey Road (out December 6) serves as the 7th volume of her celebrated Lu’s Jukebox series; it’s also her first new volume in almost four years. Williams is the first major artist to actually record Beatles’ songs at the legendary space — aside from the Fab Four themselves.
