Texas troubadours are a nickel a dozen. Even great ones aren’t exactly hard to come by. So you have to go the extra mile to put some distance between yourself and the rest of the pack. On his third full-length Ready the Horses, singer-songwriter Jarrod Dickenson pulls off that neat trick by decorating his soulful melodies, dusty vocals and earnest delivery with noisy guitars, thumping drums, boisterous horns and rich organs. Half the resulting songs feel like you’re living it up at the roadhouse on Saturday night with Nathaniel Rateliff and Tom Waits — while the other half feel like you’re trying to live it down on Sunday morning. Happy trails.
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Storytelling is something of a Texas tradition. Tall hats and even taller tales are woven into the fabric of The Lone Star State, and singer-songwriter Jarrod Dickenson can spin a yarn with the best of them. Hailing from Waco, now based in Nashville via Brooklyn, Dickenson spends most of his time on the road bringing his own particular brand of soulful Americana to a wide variety of music loving audiences around the globe. Jarrod’s new album, Ready The Horses, which received a major label release in the UK, is another step forward for the artist. Where predecessor The Lonesome Traveler was rich with folksy storytelling and largely acoustic instrumentation, Ready The Horses dives head-first into the whiskey-soaked worlds of soul and junkyard blues, while retaining Dickenson’s knack for telling a captivating story. It’s louder and electrified with an intensity that can’t be denied. Recorded live straight to 2” tape in a studio on the southeast coast of England, Ready The Horses is filled with punchy horns and big Hammond organ swells, infectious melodies and most importantly, incredibly well-crafted songs. The album has a sense of urgency and potency that grips the listener from the get-go, straps them in and takes them on a journey.”
