Charlie Treat - Dawn Is Breaking (2025)

Folk music is certainly at the core of Charlie Treat’s superb new album, Dawn Is Breaking, but it’s also so much more. Along with Americana, there are moments of jazz, indie pop, and rock influences weaved throughout, as well as the telltale echoes of Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash – specifically in the lyrics. Treat’s 2021 LP The Comet and the Bluegrass-heavy Into The Wild Mystic Mountain that followed a year later showed Treat willing to experiment within the genre beyond what he offered on his debut EP, but Dawn Is Breaking is his most ambitious step forward yet.

The opening track, “Anybody But You,” a moody, shuffling song with an ominous tone, is a solid start, but what follows is even better. “Baby Boy” is a fantastic, fully fleshed-out character in just three minutes, while the sulky “Layla (Pass Me The Orange Moon)” is the closest thing to a love ballad on the record (it’s also one of the best songs).

On a record crammed with great songs, “Goddamn I Miss Earth,” seemingly about astronauts hurdling through space, is also one that listeners are bound to keep coming back to again and again. Musically, a song like “Stay Getting High On Your Love” has a brilliant ‘70s guitar/organ vibe that would make the Doobie Brothers jealous, while the title track shows Treat flirting with modern indie rock but punctuated with brilliant backing harmonies that bring to mind some of the earliest Hall & Oates classics. The album closes on “Summer,” a great song whose triumphant music belies the real meaning in the lyrics. It’s probably one of the starkest examples on the record of the brilliance of a Charlie Treat song, where the lyrics show a much different scene than what’s offered on the surface.

Yes, it’s a folk album. But it’s also an Indie pop record, and it’s Country music with a conscience. Music genres aside, it’s a remarkable, experimental album that pays off in every way.