Brad Butcher - East of Everything (2023)

Brad Butcher devotes much of his sixth album to his adopted home of Queensland’s Capricorn Coast, where he has found both love and a new family in recent years. But the country singer also makes sure to pay tribute to his tropical hometown of Mackay in Central Queensland. “My hometown lay east of everything/By the warm Pacific sands/All the people and the places/That made me who I am,” he sings on “Other Plans”, before weighing lingering mistakes and lost connections against brighter moments.

Butcher excels at capturing all aspects of daily life, describing the cheeky ambush of new romance on the opening “Ain’t Love Grand” and wishing aloud for a longneck of beer and a lazy chair on “Look What You’ve Done to Me”. With flowing strings courtesy of Dave Eggar, who played cello on Coldplay’s 2008 hit “Viva La Vida”, East of Everything hits a sweet spot between classic country and Tom-Petty-style rock. And Butcher chooses his other collaborators just as well: guitar legend Diesel brings bluesy grit to “Get a Grip”, with added poignancy from Perth folkie Helen Shanahan on the rousing duet “Out of Our Hands” and from New York singer-songwriter Brielle Brown on the closing piano ballad “Lay Your Head”.