Folk & Bluegrass

Can the highly publicized band turn its hype into hits? Ken Tucker wants to join the fan club.

June can sing a duel with the Devil, even as her voice tells you she knows she's already triumphed.

The singer-songwriter has said, as he was writing his new album Still Fighting the War, that "a theme of perseverance through hard times revealed itself." Rock critic Ken Tucker says the record is no downer and that Cleaves finds complex sentiments and wittily phrased ideas in many of his new songs.

Cash spent half a century in the limelight as a country singer turned American icon. Between 1958, when he first recorded for Columbia, until 1986, when it didn't renew his contract, he recorded more than 50 singles and 60 albums for the label.

The singer-songwriter often writes songs about his complex relationships with women. On his new Electric, Thompson is still coming to terms with the sources of his frustrations which out to give him material for many years to come.

In the early 1960s, Joe Barry combined Cajun and country music into a whole new sound. In honor of a new anthology of Barry's music titled A Fool to Care, critic Ed Ward tells the forgotten musician's story.

From the inescapable "Call Me Maybe" to Fiona Apple's intricate word puzzles to the strikingly gorgeous return of Iris DeMent, the Fresh Air critic counts down hiss favorite albums and musical moments of the year.

In Who Could That Be at This Hour?, a prequel to A Series of Unfortunate Events, Daniel Handler satirizes pulp mysteries and uncovers the parallels between detective fiction and childhood. In both, he says, an outsider is trying to make his way in a mysteriously corrupt world.

Critic Ken Tucker says that some songs on Tempest should less like concentrated efforts than outpourings of rambling thoughts; others are as precisely crafted as any Bob Dylan has written.

The legendary folksinger wrote hundreds of political songs, children's tunes an ballads, including "This Land Is Your Land," "Pastures of Plenty" and "Pretty Boy Floyd." Many of his tracks appear on a new CD box set released by Smithsonian Folkways.

Young's latest album with Crazy Horse, Americana, features songs many of us learned as children, like "Oh Susannah" and "Clementine."

Doc Watson, who was called "a living national treasure" for his virtuoso flat-picking and his repertoire of traditional folk and bluegrass tunes, has died. He was 89. Fresh Air remembers the blind guitar and banjo player with excerpts from a 1988 interview.

Snider is a singer-songwriter with a sharp sense of humor, as evidenced by the title of his new album, Agnostic Hymns and Stoner Fables. Rock critic Ken Tucker says that even Snider's most pessimistic songs have a sense of humor and energy that gives them an exhilarating spin.

Helm, the longtime drummer of The Band who backed Bob Dylan and sang with Van Morrison, died Thursday. He was 71. Fresh Air remembers Helm with excerpts from his two appearances on the show in 1993 and 2007.

Over the past four decades, the singer has chronicled his relationships with his ex-wife, the late Kate McGarrigle, and his children, the singers Rufus and Martha Wainwright. His new album, Older Than My Old Man Now, addresses his relationship with yet another family member: his father.

Bahamas is the stage name used by Canadian singer-songwriter Afie Jurvanen, who put out his first album in 2009. His second album, Barchords, is a measured look at the end of a lengthy relationship.

Now in his late 70s, the singer-songwriter has just released a new album, his first collection of new material in eight years, titled Old Ideas. Rock critic Ken Tucker says these Cohen songs work as both pop music and as prayers.

Rowan got his start performing with the father of bluegrass, Bill Monroe. In the '70s, he formed the band Old and in the Way with Jerry Garcia. Now, he joins his group for an in-studio session and interview on Fresh Air.

Deer Tick has just released its fourth album, Divine Providence. Rock critic Ken Tucker says the album takes the Rhode Island band in a more raw-sounding direction.

Bridges won an Oscar in 2009 for his performance as a broken-down country singer in the film Crazy Heart, for which her performed his own vocals. He also sings as himself on a new self-titled album.