Anyone who talks to me will find that I generally have a bone to pick with most things country. To clarify, I don’t mean COUNTRY country, I mean the pseudo-country (pop infested) that has seemed to ravage the local airwaves around my University. Is my college the last bastion of wholesome music? Perhaps.
Nonetheless, when I saw Darlin appear on my ITunes preview, my finger instinctively flexed back a bit, beginning to brace myself for another faux-country outfit.
Oh, how wrong I was.
Goodbye June is a band that reminds us that country, well, folk rock, really, still has its roots in all the right places. It’s pure, it’s raw, gone are the sappy, cliché lyrics that plague the genre, it’s a group that threatens the placid nature of a style that’s lost its way. Infused equally with rifts that remind us of Van Halen, Hendrix and Jimmy Page, Goodbye June takes us down a very different road, and I’m certainly thankful for it.
Made up of cousins Landon Milbourn, Brandon Qualkenbush and Tyler Baker, the trio formed after the passing of Baker’s late brother, lending them their name, and a focal, visceral event to build from.
The EP opens with Oh No, a biting track that lends us the best of folk, rock and country, all tied together beautifully with Milbourn’s gritty voice, followed by Darlin.
It was Danger in the Morning that really caught my ear. One would be remiss not to compare it to Zepplin, the banjo all the while lending us a view to the band’s midwestern and southern roots. It’s a track that I would expect to hear in Sons of Anarchy, there’s something that tells us that the EP is but a taste of what the band has to offer.
Goodbye June to me, is a statement. It’s so far removed from anything in the scene currently, it’s an EP that sits miles ahead of the competition, a unique sound that dares you not to listen more. It’s honestly a challenge not to do so, I found myself replaying it over and over again while trying to do it justice. I don’t think I can do an honest and fair job by telling you to listen, you’ll need to do that on your own. I generally say that bands are “worth a listen”, but truly, you’d be foolish not to do so here. Watch the airwaves closely, folks. They’re coming, and they’re going to hit hard, and you first heard it here.
