Folk Family Revival

I first listened to Unfolding, Folk Family Revival’s debut album, as background music and promptly forgot about it. I’ll admit some prejudice, though, upon approaching this album: call me old-fashioned, but I want pop in my country like I want a straw in my beer. Which is not at all. I’ll be damned, though, if I didn’t wake the following morning with one of their catchy-as- hell melodies playing in my head. The four “brothers” who make up this Revival — really, they’re three brothers and a childhood friend — might be young, but they’ve crafted an impressive piece of modern Americana in Unfolding. The album owes its punch to frontman Mason Lankford’s impressive songwriting and his confident country-clean twang. “I feel lonely when I’m not sad, well you’re unfolding in my hands,” he howls on the title track, warning, “don’t tell me that a storm’s not coming.” Don’t be mistaken, though: whereas other groups choose pop gleam over country grit, Folk Family Revival is polished enough to shine yet still ragged enough to charm. Whether they’re breaking your heart (“Have a Nice Life”) or rocking your face with a fiddle-screamin’ runaway-banjo get-down (“Mountains”), they do it with undeniable chemistry and a wealth of musical inspiration, including alt-rock, bluegrass and folk. They’re at their best on cerebral Southern-rocker “Chasing a Rabbit,” where Mason spouts off on death and rapture like a crazed preacher as the band churns out some country drone verging on the psychedelic. They may be new on the scene, but these guys could make it big.