LP Review: "Amen Breaks" by Quiet Hollers

Amen Breaks

As far as I'm concerned, my love the Quiet Hollers has never been remotely a secret.

Their eponymous album is still one of the biggest bright spots of 2015 and it's subsequent vinyl pressing (complete with black splatter on clear coloring) was also a bright spot of 2016.

Our friends from Kentucky stopped in at the Heavy Anchor in December of 2015, and we were able to celebrate our sixth wedding anniversary while they played some amazing songs.

The only dark cloud was that their vinyl had been pushed back so I wasn't able to go home with it that evening. The full house they had though warmed the cockles of my heart. It's awesome to see a band succeeding in this day and age.

In this modern age, there are far too many instances of a band, though of quality, being chewed up and spat out because they weren't able to make a financial go of it.

Quiet Hollers

Since then, Quiet Hollers has lived in my vinyl library, along side bands like Led Zeppelin, Mike Adams At His Honest Weight, Heart, and Morbid Slaughter.

See if you can guess which record was recorded by a peer.

Their previous record, was a debut album, but not really. It seems to me that this has been made intentionally hard to pin down.

The first single from Amen Breaks was Medicine. Upon first look and listen, it seemed awfully different. After the second and third listens, the song was still different, but it was one of the odds and bodkins from the album rather than the rank and file.

This album feels like a more fully realized version of its predecessor.

Quiet Hollers are equal parts Americana, Indie Rock, and Bluegrass, but at the same time they're absolutely none of that. Amen Breaks brings out more of the Southern influences in their music.

The violins are stronger. The keyboard is often a piano. There are loads of acoustic guitars to go along with the crunchy Les Pauls.

This disc certainly covers a larger swath of ground than their earlier works. Watching a band grow up into the truest version of themselves is the most satisfying thing.

Quiet Hollers has once again delivered the goods and they did so neither repeating nor reinventing themselves.

Release: 7/7/17
Genre: Kentuckian Bluegrass Indie Pop Rock
Label: sonaBLAST!
Formats: LP/CD/Digital
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