Editor's Picks 10/23: Country Risqué, Zachary James, Ratskin Family Band
Every week, Rainbow Rodeo editor Rachel Cholst picks the three best queer country albums of the week. This week features risky country music, heartfelt serenades, and country at its best: irreverent while grounded in tradition.
Each week, editor Rachel Cholst picks the best queer country to send you off into your weekend.
Country Risqué – As the Crow Flies
Country Risqué drawls their way through flings and heartbreak and everything in between on As the Crow Flies. The album is a hit of classic country – there's truly no way to tell what decade Country Risqué belongs to: after all, tooling around on the margins while doing your best to live authentically is kind of the whole point. Miles Gordon and Daniel Bromfield trade off vocals, sharing stories with vulnerability and a dry humor. The album gives us a sense that our ramblings – metaphorical and otherwise – are never for naught, because the journey is most of the fun.
Zachary James – Dreaming Of You
On this lovely EP, renowned Broadway and opera singer Zachary James goes acoustic. Dreaming Of You centers James' heartfelt love song for his husband. The steel guitar and soaring fiddle on the title track give us a sense of grounded intimacy: the steel guitar keeps us rooted while the fiddle soars to new heights. The other three tracks are instrumental but no less powerful: "Fantasia" sets the tone while the fanciful horns on "Revelry" keep the party classy.
The Ratskin Family Band – Back to the Cuntry
The Ratskin Family Band hit the road in style and aplomb, performing completely in drag. But it's not just the onstage package – the quintet are skilled at crafting punk-tinged country in the grand tradition of alt-country – the real kind. Back to the Cuntry kicks off with a nod to the Carter Family's "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" and ends with a rowdy rendition of "All You Fascists Bound to Lose." In between are tales of lonely truckers and near misses on the highway. Overall, the EP gives us the best of country music: classic tales of yearning with a reverence to the past and an irreverence to authority that conflates "tradition" with "morality."
