One of the strange things that’s happened over recent years with the increasing dominance of streaming as a platform is that albums which don’t for whatever reason end up on Spotify or YouTube end up as kind of ghosts, to the extent you begin to worry that they’re going to be lost forever in the sands of time if somehow they’re not documented digitally.
It would be a travesty if that was the case for Nashville’s The Young Republic who were one of the first signings to the short-lived End of the Road label (as in the festival, which they played on more than one occasion). ’12 Tales from Winter City’ remains one of the great lost americana records of the 20th century so far – the highlight of the which is the achingly gorgeous ‘Excuses to See You’ but in the absence of that being available online anywhere, ‘Blue Skies’ is another song which in three minutes is everything that’s warm and engaging about this wonderful record. There’s a terrific fuzzy clip of them playing this in Rough Trade in London back in 2007 – in the meantime before it disappears off the face of the earth forever, you can get a CD of the album for £2 online. Beautiful artwork too. I will honestly send you the two quid if you don’t like it.
