Fact #127153

If you prefer your folk singers a shade more traditional than the high-profile acoustic popsters currently trading as folk-rockers, Samantha Crain could be the woman for you. This is the Oklahoma-born, Shawnee-descended singer-songwriter’s fourth album, and it’s a comfortingly solid set of underdog tales, left-of-centre vignettes about life as a working person in America today. Elk City, focussing on the sorrows of a young woman who turned to drink to survive hard times, shines with the heartfelt lyrical clarity of Woody Guthrie at his best, and the jaunty Big Rock delivers light relief with a country-rock groove. Crain feels like she’s in it for the long haul and, given time, the odds are good that she’ll make it.
Johnny Black
(Source : Hi Fi News, August 2015)