Proper country, raw and honest and raucous.
Devyn Brinsfield is one of those characters with a backstory that you would dismiss as being unbelievable if you didn’t know better. Still employed as a school bus driver and groundsman, in his spare time he has developed quite a talent for invigorating the Bakersfield sound, while stretching the limits of that label to include honky tonk, sad country tunes, rollicking hoedowns, but also the odd blues lick and even the odd naughty word. Bring on the revolution!
His career has received a significant boost after two songs were picked up and featured in the Paramount+ series Dutton Ranch (no, me neither), and for this his second album, he recorded in the Basement in the historic Woolworth’s building in downtown Bakersfield.
He certainly embraces the myth; the artwork online for his website and album is very much based on 60s peak-Bakersfield artists, and his sound would be familiar to anyone with a few Merle Haggard or Waylon Jennings albums in their collections. He has multiple references to bars, whiskey, bad luck and bad women, and he’s not above calling a song I’m a Truck Drivin Pool Shootin Son-of-a-Gun. So far, could be so bro-country. But…
The songs are bloody great. Reaper is a dark-tinged outlaw classic in the making; Coal is the sort of blue-collar anthem people used to write; Econoline and Hindsight are ballads from the heart, sung properly. Bed I Made is a great sorry-not-sorry tale of one too many nights out on the town. And yes, I’m a Truck Drivin Pool Shootin Son-of-a-Gun is rollicking great fun. The man has stories to tell and a tour to the UK is unlikely, so get the record and support him where you can.
