Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology

Souled American were often lumped in with the alt-country scene of the late 80s and early 90s, though that was largely a matter of there not being a better description for what they were doing. The bands that rose in the wake of Uncle Tupelo grafted country, folk, and roots influences to the passion and fire of punk rock. On the other hand, Souled American -- Chris Grigoroff on guitar and vocals, Scott Tuma on guitar, Joe Adducci on bass, and Jamey Barnard on drums -- were deliberately shambolic, adding wobbly rhythms (sometimes fractured variations on reggae and Cajun beats) to melodies whose twangy core barely kept them from veering off the rails. Their approach became even harder to pigeonhole after Barnard quit the group and they opted not to replace him; their songs became increasingly spare and atmospheric while taking on an art-damaged veneer, suggesting a rootsy, lo-fi variation on Big Stars Third. Given their offbeat style, Souled American were the sort of band destined to have a cult following rather than breaking through to the mass audience, but their problems finding a record company that would release their material without going out of business made it difficult for them to attract any sort of consistent fan base, and the fact they managed to release six albums between 1988 and 1996 seems more a matter of tenacity than meeting any sort of demand. (When Jeff Tweedy praised the song "Before Tonight" from 1996s Notes Campfire in his book World Within a Song: Music That Changed My Life and Life That Changed My Music, he acknowledged that of all the songs in the book, it was the one hardest for listeners to find.) While a reissue program putting Souled Americans catalog back in print would be more than welcome, Omnivore Recordings has made a powerful sampling of their music available again with the 2025 compilation Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology. The compilation features 20 songs, delivering highlights from each of their studio albums, and it honors their creative trajectory, as the engagingly chaotic attack of Fe (1988) and Flubber (1989) gives way to the more contemplative, late-night feel of Around the Horn (1990), then veering into the detourned folk and C&W covers from Sonny (1992), and finally embracing the spectral chill of Frozen (1994) and Notes Campfire (1996). Souled American were a band that never went out of their way to make things easy for themselves or their audience, yet in spite of that, they created a body of work thats richly fascinating and has lost none of its singular personality in the nearly three decades since they last released an album. They deserve to be heard, and Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology is the excellent introductory set theyve long needed. ~ Mark Deming