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First new album in 14 years – listen to the first track from it below.
Well this is exciting news. Alison Krauss & Union Station have announced the release of their first new album in 14 years “Arcadia” which is due out March 28th on Down The Road Records, and self-produced by the band. Largely written by modern masters such as Robert Lee Castleman, Viktor Krauss, Bob Lucas, JD McPherson and Sarah Siskind, the album’s songs are described as “contemporary reflections of history”. But it’s the album’s opening track in particular that reunited the band and reignited their focus. “Usually, I find something that’s a first song, and then things fall into place,” says Alison Krauss. “That song was ‘Looks Like The End Of The Road.’ Jeremy Lister wrote it, and it just felt so alive – and as always, I could hear the guys already playing it.”
Recorded in studios across Nashville, “Arcadia” also welcomes brand new member Russell Moore on co-lead vocals, guitar and mandolin. Best known as the frontman for chart-topping group IIIrd Tyme Out, Moore is the International Bluegrass Music Association’s most awarded male vocalist of all time. He’s joined by Alison Krauss (fiddle, lead vocal), Jerry Douglas (Dobro, lap steel, vocals), Ron Block (banjo, guitar, vocals) and Barry Bales (bass, vocals).
On the songs of “Arcadia” , Alison Krauss expands: “The stories of the past are told in this music. It’s that whole idea of ‘in the good old days when times were bad.’ There’s so much bravery and valor and loyalty and dreaming, of family and themes of human existence that were told in a certain way when our grandparents were alive.
Someone asked me, ‘How do you sing these tragic tunes?’ I have to. It’s a calling. I feel privileged to be a messenger of somebody else’s story. And I want to hear what happened.”
Furthermore, “Arcadia” rejoins Alison Krauss & Union Station with Rounder Records founders Ken Irwin, Marian Leighton Levy, Bill Nowlin and John Virant, who first signed Krauss when she was 14 years old – and who first worked with Jerry Douglas in 1975, when JD Crowe & The New South released their eponymous album, commonly referred to as Rounder 0044. Now heading up their own Down The Road Records, the group’s relationship with the band serves as a testament to their enduring friendship and longstanding creative partnership.