Artist: Sideline
Album: Front and Center
Label: Mountain Home Records
Release Date: 4.17.2018
Sideline’s latest, Front and Center comes fully formed, a twelve-track release full to bursting with Americana-cum-bluegrass edge that at times slips effortlessly back in time to the good ol’ days of classic country music, when Nashville writers and players set the tone, the standard and the bar for “proper “music.
This is a Carolina band with pretty clear influences, loves and purposeful ambition. Rippling with top-dollar musicianship, stinging banjo, mando, fiddle and frets, Front and Center should keep lovers of Americana lyricism, song-writing and rhythmic flourish safely content while also keeping lovers of traditional banjo-bashing bluegrass firmly on-side. This is simply music guaranteed to bring a smile to a morose face, put a spring in a step and push out to those fleet-footed dancers among us all.
In many ways it’s hard not to think of Tim O’Brien or Union Station when listening here, such is the evident quality of the band and this delightful recording. We all know how hard it can be to sound original or inventive in the Americana/bluegrass tradition these days; the world seems already overflowing with talent, quality and bands that work this ever-popular musical seam. But, despite this potential minefield, Sideline succeeds with a sure-footed delivery that sparkles at every turn. An excellent album full of true class.
—Iain Patience
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