Put a Record On: We may have cried through this entire newsletter

Songs about parenting, songs about being parented, songs about dying and other existential crises, how's your Friday going?

Welcome back to Don’t Rock the Inbox! Here’s this week’s music recommendation post and playlist, which are for paying subscribers only. Subscribe to get access to all our new (and old) music picks and pans, and so much more — including new playlists weekly, which are always at the bottom of this email (paying subscribers — make sure you don’t miss them!). If you’re interested in paid content but not able to afford it, shoot us an email.

And follow our very new Instagram!! We’ll be posting up a storm from our various country adventures. Now, on to the music…

Credit: Kirsten Balani

The Good

“Over Everything,” Ashley Monroe: Ashley is up there with the genre’s all-time vocalists, if you ask me, and I love that how when she experiments sonically, everything still ends up sounding country as hell thanks to that absolutely pristine warble in her voice. There’s a deep sadness in this ethereal meditation that stopped me cold the first time I listened to it - uncomfortable and freeing at the same time. Gorgeous. - MM

“Hurricane,” The Castellows: A country song about a city and not an anonymous backroad?!?!? The trio is delivering here, with traditional sounds and a narrative that feels classic but still stretches outside country’s current paint-by-numbers. There are so many things in this world to sing about, and it’s evidence of how resolutely Nashville ignores most of them that a song about hurricanes in New Orleans sounds innovative — but it does! — NW

“When the Pills Wear Off,” Will Carlisle: The theme of today’s newsletter is clearly “crying about things” (keep reading), and this one is no exception. You can write fetish songs about small towns for Fox News points, or you can write ones that actually care about what’s happening to the people within them, like this one from Will Carlisle. Anything with a strong Conor Oberst influence is also right by me. - MM

“Old Jim Crow,” Alice Gerrard: An upsettingly timely missive from an icon of American music — the whole album is just a treat if you want to listen to something wholesome, deep and rich. — NW