Hannah Aldridge - Gold Rush (2017/2019)

In literature and in songwriting, the American South is where writers go to face their fears. Hannah Aldridge doesn't just dip her pen into the well of the South, the Muscle Shoals native embodies it. With every song, she's facing down demons of a life once lived from substance abuse to failed relationships and scars from the lashes of the bible belt. 'Gold Rush' is Hannah Aldridge's second album, a follow up to her 2014 debut 'Razor Wire.' While that album launched her career, drew the attention of music writers and sent her touring across the world, 'Gold Rush' shows a more mature and introspective artist with more life experience - and music experience - under her belt. The honesty Hannah Aldridge crafts into each track is off-set by her stubborn, maybe defiant, nature, which gives her music a hopeful silver lining. Hannah Aldridge is the daughter of Muscle Shoals legend Walt Aldridge. An Alabama Music Hall of Famer, Walt Aldridge is a prolific and decorated songwriter of countless Number One and Top Ten hits recorded by the likes of Lou Reed, Reba McEntire, Travis Tritt, Earl Thomas Conley, Ricky Van Shelton, Ronnie Milsap, and Conway Twitty. Mixing her personal life and the sounds of her hometown, Hannah's new album also draws in influences from across the rock genre. Working with people with one foot in country music and one foot in rock, she makes a fresh kind of Southern Rock styled by Southern Gothic storytelling. Recorded at Creative Workshop in Nashville, Hannah worked with Muscle Shoals writers such as Mark Naramore, Tosha Hill, Matt Johnson and Brad Crisler and artists such as Andrew Combs, Ashley McBryde, Don Gallardo, Ryan Beaver, and Sadler Vaden on 'Gold Rush.' She teamed up with Jordan Dean and M. Allen Parker, who were instrumental in working on her new album, finally finishing by calling on her Dad, Walt Aldridge, to master the record. In total, Hannah compiled a team of distinct talents to work with her. With their help she has put together a progressive, creative and memorable body of work.

Review
This quite brilliant collection sets its stall out in the first 30 seconds. Some brooding, Blue Collar American rock, which owes something of a debt to Steve Earle, and the first line 'I was born in the crossfire....' From here Aldridge lays bare (literally in the case of the phenomenally sexual 'Lace' who's chorus urges her man to 'kiss me like you own me, and hold me like a heathen') her appetite for self-destruction in a quite superb way... Ending with the title track is another clever move. The most 'country' if you will, with its mournful Lap Steel it's another with a marvellous turn of phrase. 'I don't know if this is living' is its almost whispered line 'or slow-motion suicide. Anyone who feels like that has found their favourite album of the year. But then so good is 'Gold Rush' that anyone who just loves great music and wonderful song-writing has probably found theirs too - 9/10 --Andy Thorley, Maximum Volume Music, June 3rd 2017

Fabulous. That one word says it all - do I have to write any more? Ok, time to use your imagination... wouldn't a more urban Gillian Welch backed by The Stones in their country influenced days sound wonderful? In my mind it would and, in my mind, it has happened and is called Gold Rush by Hannah Aldridge. How on earth do I, logically, back up this claim? I don't think I can - it's just the feel, sound, emotion and passion, that sears through this album like a branding iron, that has me in its grasp and reaching for the repeat play button - **** --Ian Ambrose, Maverick

Unquestionably one of the best Americana albums of the year. She's struck the mother lode -Folk Radio UK; A veritable star in the making - the future Queen of Southern Gothic - Americana UK; Quite simply, this is heartfelt and of the highest quality; music made with love - 9/10 --Max Mazonowicz, The Digital Fix