Born out of the axis of Arizona bands that revolved around seminal desert-rock group Giant Sand, Calexico debuted in the mid-1990s with a unique sound that mixed mariachi horns, alt-country, spaghetti-western themes, and the wide-open-spaces vibe of …

Tom Waits started out in the early 1970s as a piano-based barroom balladeer with a penchant for beat poetry and West Coast jazz. By the late '80s he had mutated into a brilliantly adventurous artist whose style suggested an amalgam of Howlin' Wolf, K…

Formed in Belleville, Illinois, USA in 1987, Uncle Tupelo revolved around childhood friends and songwriters Jeff Tweedy (b. USA) and Jay Farrar (b. Belleville, Illinois, USA). Primarily influenced by punk, then the blue-collar folk and country of Gra…

The Mountain Goats is essentially lo-fi singer-songwriter John Darnielle. Originally recording crude homemade tapes for obscure independent labels in the early 1990s, Mountain Goats records have seen increased fidelity and a maturing of songcraft and…

Chapel Hill NC-based insurgent country band Trailer Bride was led by singersongwriter Melissa Swingle a onetime member of the all-female trio Pussy Teeth Following that bands demise Swingle switched from bass to guitar began writing songs and formed …

Johnny Cash was part rockabilly rebel, part campfire storyteller, part outlaw in black. Cash made country and rockabilly history on the Sun label in the 1950s. During the '60s, the ruggedly charismatic Cash rose to superstardom, ending the decade wit…

b. 1967, San Francisco, California, USA. An earnest country/folk singer-songwriter in the tradition of Guy Clark or Townes Van Zandt, Buckner first began playing music during his college years in Chico, California. He was a member of several punk and…

After leaving the post-punk mayhem of the Birthday Party behind, Australian rocker Nick Cave turned toward a somewhat quieter--but equally dark--sound. Recruiting Birthday Party member Mick Harvey, Einsturzende Neubauten frontman Blixa Bargeld, and o…

Bob Dylan began as a Woody Guthrie acolyte, imitating the dust-bowl balladeer as faithfully as a baby boomer from Hibbing, Minnesota, could. It wasn't long before he found his own voice, spearheading the early-1960s folk revival as well as the singer…

A songwriter of unprecedented depth, Townes Van Zandt brought to his country/folk offerings a lyrical grace that rivals the great poets. He's best known for dark, haunted imagery, but had his greatest success with others' versions of his gentler song…

Silver Jews is the musical alias of Kentucky-born poet Dave Berman. Berman uses a slightly off-kilter brand of Americana rock as a platform from which to sing-speak his fractured pop-culture-infused verse. Although Silver Jews achieved a certain noto…

When pioneering alt-country band Uncle Tupelo split in the mid-1990s, they broke off into two camps. Jay Farrar started the rootsy, twangy (if lyrically elliptical) Son Volt. Singer/songwriter/guitarist Jeff Tweedy, who co-led the band with Farrar, e…

Singer-songwriter Ryan Adams started out as the leader of Whiskeytown, one of the most highly regarded alt-country bands of the late 1990s. By 2000, he was a solo artist, delivering a mostly acoustic set of Dylanesque tunes on HEARTBREAKER. By the ti…

Singer/songwriter M. Ward, a protege of Giant Sand leader Howe Gelb, made a splash on the indie-rock scene in the early-to-mid-2000s, despite being closer in spirit to John Fahey (guitar-wise) and Bob Dylan (in songwriting style) than to any alt-rock…

Based in Nashville, Lambchop combines country and R&B influences with moody, orchestral arrangements (strings and horns are a permanent part of the ensemble) and quirky lyricism. Leader Kurt Wagner delivers the songs in an endearingly cracked drawl, …

The majority of bands to emerge from New York City, USA during the late 90s seemed to all be cut from the same musical cloth (namely 70s era CBGB's bands such as Talking Heads, the Ramones and Television), but there were exceptions to the rule, such …

This Denver, Colarado, USA-based trio's brooding, god-fearingly religious songs are reminiscent of the gothic tones of Nick Cave and Gun Club. Vocalist and lyricist David Eugene Edwards sings his tales of sin and redemption against a stripped down bu…

Often credited as pioneers of "slowcore" music, the Minnesotan trio Low formed in 1993. Taking inspiration from melancholy bands such as Joy Division and Galaxie 500, the group developed a powerful yet minimal sound based on spare instrumention and t…

Formed by Virginia singer/songwriter Mark Linkous in 1995, Sparklehorse set out to make melodic yet experimental pop music in the vein of maverick performers such as Tom Waits and Neil Young. Following the critical acclaim of their debut album, the g…

Formed in 2000 in Detroit, Michigan, USA, Blanche revolves around married couple Dan Miller (guitar/vocals) and Tracee Mae Miller (bass/vocals). Dan Miller enjoyed cult notoriety in the 90s owing to his involvement with both explosive cow-punk outfit…