If you are in the mood for some dark country or Americana noir or have a hankering for murder ballads, check out the new album from The Blood Feud Family Singers. On their debut they come across as down-and-dirty outlaw country, which is the kind of country I actually enjoy. There is no pop sheen here, just locomotive guitar lines, lyrics of love and loss, and yes, murder.
If you are in the mood for some dark country or Americana noir or have a hankering for murder ballads, this album is for you.
The Blood Feud Family Singers are something of a mini-supergroup, featuring Darryl Scherrer (“The Voice Who Lost Its Man”) on vocals, guitar and piano; Marc Oxborrow (Haymarket Squares, Shivereens) on vocals, bass and melodica; and Douglas Berry (sicmonic) on drums, with Megyn Neff (Dry River Yacht Club, Tobie Milford) on violin. This is compelling music to listen to while working through a fifth of whiskey, and ideal if you’ve been recently heartbroken. As dangerous and rough and tumble as it is beautiful and sentimental, it’s not just an album for the down times, but also a well-balanced record for any occasion.
It’s filled with great moments from beginning to end, whether it is the classic sound of “Following the Sun,” the mythological-themed “Lay Me Down, Let Me Down,” the wistful beauty of “The Name of Love,” the spaghetti western-tinged “Sepia Song,” the energetic and murderous “Let’s Go,” the honkytonk of “Let Me Believe in Your Body,” the lonesome yearning of “A Hundred Times,” the near rockabilly and biblically tinged “All the Angry Angels” or the slow, sweet finale of “Hold You in My Shadow.” No Moon is one of the best Americana albums of 2015 and feels as comfortable as a pair of broken-in jeans.