I had to query Americana a little time back, not having heard of it.
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Most music blends and melds and takes influence from other genres. I think of Americana as mostly acoustic, country based folk music. Quite different to English folk which has its roots in medieval music.
Chris Stapleton
Brett Young
Zak Brown Band
I think, at the very minimum, claims of “fastest growing genre” are laughable really.
A 29% increase of, erm, “very little to begin with” versus an increase of barely 300,000. Taylor Swift alone sold something like 11m.
Then there’s the grouping of country, cross over and Americana. That’s a BBC headline from an article on the subject but not a reflection of the sales “increase” itself, which is almost entirely down to so-called crossover and nothing at all to do with country or Americana.
All that said, I’ve zero interest in the crossover stuff and things like Chris Stapleton I find to represent the cliched worst of what’s available.
I love me some country going back 40 years to the likes of Nanci Griffith, Townes Van Zandt, Emmylou Harris, Guy Clark et al. Then I guess you have the start of Americana with the likes of Steve Earle.
Americana turned out to be a favoured thing for me. Arguably all started in earnest with “No Depression” by Uncle Tupelo.
So yeah, Whiskeytown before Ryan left and made three decent albums in thirty years and revealed his appalling controlling behaviour.
Sturgill Simpsons “A Sailors Guide To Earth” is a great record.
“Southeastern” by Jason Isbell.
The last two albums by Hurray For The Riff Raff. The last two albums by Waxahatchee. The wonderful but wholly under the radar album by Plains and many more.
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What a lovely way to endear yourself to you fellow forum members…
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There is an interesting question: what is Americana exactly and how is it different to country? I think of Americana as country music for college students; often played by rock musicians who are consciously exploring the history of American folk and country music. I agree that the first examples were The Band (their own albums as well as the Basement Tapes with Dylan) and The Byrds on Sweetheart of the Rodeo. Also, and notwithstanding that they weren’t American, the Stones; Beggars Banquet and much of Let it Bleed both have country as their origin rather than the blues.
It is strange that Americana and mainstream country music seem to have such different audiences (both here and in the US). There are a few artists who appeal to both audiences but only where their fame and reach transcend genre (Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash).
Anyway the current artist I would particularly recommend who sits somewhere in these categories Gillian Welch. Everything of hers is worth a listen but Time (the Revelator) particularly stands out - one of the best albums of this century (any genre!)
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What? It’s a discussion forum.
Which bit of the forum rules prohibits the discussion of specific aspects of a post? If you didn’t want that aspect to be addressed then it would probably have been better to not have included it as part of the post.
As far as I’m concerned you did post it. It’s a repeat of a palpably false claim made elsewhere and in a world in which people genuinely believe we’re “post truth” and there’s no such thing as “fact” I think we all have a responsibility to stick to fact wherever we can and correct falsehoods when we can.
I have huge amounts of country music and Americana but let’s not make false claims for it. If you choose not to be “endeared” by someone stating a fact then that is absolutely your choice but it won’t actually stop your initial assertion lying somewhere between meaningless and wholly untrue.
Far prefer the very straightforward definition of “Americana” used by Wikipedia. Country music sings overwhelmingly about people. Americana sings overwhelmingly about place and artefact.
Have to agree re: Gillian Welch and that specific album/track.
A friend and I remain unconvinced by the last album though on the basis that it is over produced and over orchestrated. It inserts “stuff” for the sake of it (strings spring to mind) and it all detracts from their greatest strengths of his guitar, her voice and the lyrics. When you hear the stripped down versions you realise there’s a great album in there that we’ve yet to really hear.
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That’d involve political commentary so can’t explain… 
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We can’t ignore Ry Cooder 
Watchhouse (formerly Mandolin Orange) are very good.
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Yeah but most rock is rooted in the blues and that reads across to country as well. Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell etc. And on more recent crossover Nora Jones.
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Good call re: Ry. He’s certainly not country but Americana is a very nice fit for the breadth of his musical interests.
Surprised there’s been no mention of Wilco and the Tweedy’s so far.
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I can heartily recommend two albums from Damien O’Kane and Ron Block: Banjophony and Banjophonics. There is a lot of banjo!
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The original Alt-country: Uncle Tupelo and their breakaway bands Son Volt (Jay Farrar) and Wilco (Jeff Tweedy)
Wilco being the far superior and prolific band. Check it out.
Except The Band was 80% Canadian. 
Actually The Band is my favorite rock group.
I like a lot of the artists mentioned. And I am typing this after having read a long piece about Patty Griffin in today’s New York Times.
Edit - surprised nobody’s mentioned Alison Krauss. Or Lucinda Williams.
Newgrass, anyone? How about this supergroup album?
And all the other albums these folks appeared on?
Béla Fleck
Mark O’Connor
Sam Bush
Jerry Douglas
Edgar Meyer
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Son Volt are very good.
These artists have been getting some play from me over the last few months.
Ken Pomeroy
M J Lenderman
Julien Baker, TORRES
Big Thief (for number of years)
And I think this may qualify - Big Swimmer by King Hannah, please be gentle with me if I’ve wrongly categorised this one
Old : JJ Cale, Tony Joe White.
Modern: Chris Stapleton, Frazey Ford.
Have loved Patty since her first demos. I have a lovely bootleg of the original Silver Bell. Nowadays? Not so much. Her singing increasingly lacks nuance. She’s re-writing the same songs in the same tempos, genres and tone repeatedly and there’s simply no need to go any further. She, as one of my friends put it so beautifully “sounds too much like herself”.
Same with Krauss and Williams really. If you have one Union Station album then you have them all. Lucinda hasn’t made a great record since “World Without Tears” although we’re not allowed to say that cos, y’know, ledge and all that. Her voice both pre and post stroke has taken a significant downturn and, at best, we’re in self pastiche as per Tom Waits.
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We have a coffee shop in the woods near Checkendon, Oxon, that is always playing country and as a consequence I have more exposure to it that might be usual in the UK. I like it. It reminds me of holidays in northern Illinois.
Yesterday’s standout track was Lainey Wilson’s 4x4xU.
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