Americana
The honest middle of country, folk, soul and rock.
Americana is the word the industry came up with when 'country' got too narrow to hold everything country had always been. It's where roots, folk, soul-leaning songwriting, and unpolished rock all sit together. The Americana Music Association made it official in 1999.
Names worth knowing
USA · 1944 — 1997
Townes Van Zandt
The patron saint of the kitchen-table songwriters.
USA · 1953 — present
Lucinda Williams
Louisiana made audible.
USA · 1978 — present
Sturgill Simpson
Walked into Nashville with a haircut and an attitude.
USA · 1991 — present
Tyler Childers
Appalachia, unfiltered and unembarrassed.
USA · 1988 — present
Sierra Ferrell
Sings like she found the songs in a creek bed.
USA · 1984 — present
Charley Crockett
Keeps the bones, throws out the gristle.
USA · 1979 — present
Jason Isbell
Wrote 'Southeastern' and meant it.
USA · 1983 — present
Margo Price
Outlaw country with a working-class spine.
USA · 1996 — present
Drive-By Truckers
The South as it actually is.
USA · 1955 — present
Steve Earle
Wrote 'Guitar Town' and never apologized.
USA · 1967 — present
Gillian Welch
American primitive, on purpose.
USA · 1976 — present
Hayes Carll
The funniest songwriter to also break your heart.
USA · 1983 — present
Pokey LaFarge
Western swing, ragtime, and string-band soul.
USA · 1961 — present
Iris DeMent
Arkansas gospel-grade phrasing.
USA · 1973 — present
Ray LaMontagne
A voice you can hear from across a room you haven't entered yet.
USA · 2010 — present
The Cactus Blossoms
Brother harmonies in the Louvin tradition.
USA · 2006 — present
The Felice Brothers
Catskills barn-band Americana with a literary streak.
USA · 1933 — present
Willie Nelson
The road never asks if he's tired.
USA · 1937 — 2002
Waylon Jennings
Built the outlaw template and refused to let Nashville own it.
USA · 1936 — 2024
Kris Kristofferson
Rhodes Scholar, helicopter pilot, wrote 'Me and Bobby McGee'.
USA · 1992 — present
Billy Strings
Bluegrass at the speed of a freight train.
USA · 1993 — present
Molly Tuttle
First woman to win IBMA Guitar Player of the Year — twice.
USA · 1991 — present
Vincent Neil Emerson
East Texas songwriter in the Van Zandt lineage — literally.
USA · 1989 — present
Margo Cilker
High-desert Oregon Americana with literature in the lyrics.
USA · 1981 — present
Brandi Carlile
The biggest voice Americana has produced in twenty years.
USA · 1991 — present
Sarah Jarosz
Octave mandolin, NYC fog, Texas hill-country bones.
USA · 1969 — 2014
The Allman Brothers Band
Two drummers, twin lead guitars, the South amplified.
USA · 1964 — present
Lynyrd Skynyrd
The South's loudest argument with itself.
USA · 1990 — present
Ian Noe
Eastern Kentucky Dylan, hill-country fatalism.
USA · 1986 — present
Jaime Wyatt
Outlaw country with country-soul horns.
USA · 1976 — present
Ana Egge
A songwriter's songwriter, prairie to Brooklyn.
USA · 2005 — present
Turnpike Troubadours
Red-dirt country with a fiddle out front.
USA · 1996 — present
Zach Bryan
Navy songwriter who outran the entire format.
USA · 1946 — 2020
John Prine
Wrote 'Sam Stone' at 24. Everything after was a gift.
USA · 1988 — present
Kacey Musgraves
Cosmic country with a pop heart.
USA · 1979 — present
Allison Russell
Banjo, French, English, and a backbone of soul.
USA · 1977 — present
Rhiannon Giddens
The historian-musician of American roots.
USA · 1947 — present
Emmylou Harris
The harmony singer who built modern Americana.
Canada · 1988 — present
Orville Peck
Glam outlaw country with a fringed mask.
Canada · 1933 — 2022
Ian Tyson
Wrote 'Four Strong Winds'. Then went back to the ranch.
Canada · 1967 — 1999
The Band
Made the foundational North American Americana record.
Canada · 1969 — present
Corb Lund
Alberta cowboy country, sharp and funny.
United Kingdom · 1983 — present
Yola
Bristol-born country soul that floors every room.
United Kingdom · 2015 — present
William the Conqueror
Cornwall trio writing literary Americana with three guitars.
United Kingdom · 2015 — present
The Wandering Hearts
Four-part harmonies in the Fleetwood Mac lineage.
United Kingdom · 1979 — present
Robert Vincent
Liverpool songwriter in the Springsteen-Petty lineage.
USA · 1971 — present
Eagles
California country-rock perfected on a desert highway.
USA · 1964 — 1973
The Byrds
Jingle-jangle to Sweetheart of the Rodeo in five short years.
USA · 1946 — 1973
Gram Parsons
Cosmic American Music — invented, then gone at 26.
USA · 1968 — 1972
The Flying Burrito Brothers
Rhinestone suits and broken hearts in the canyon.
USA · 1967 — 1972
Creedence Clearwater Revival
Bayou rock from the East Bay — and somehow it worked.
USA · 1976 — 2017
Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers
Florida kid who turned American rock into a craft.
Canada · 1945 — present
Neil Young
Half a century of refusing to repeat himself.
Sweden · 2007 — present
First Aid Kit
Two Swedish sisters who out-Emmylou'd half of Nashville.
USA · 1968 — present
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
Three (then four) voices that defined a generation's harmony.
Sweden · 1983 — present
Daniel Norgren
A one-man Swedish Big Pink, recorded to tape.
USA · 1946 — present
Linda Ronstadt
The voice that connected country, rock, and the canyon.
Sweden · 1983 — present
The Tallest Man on Earth
Kristian Matsson, one guitar, a voice like cracked porcelain.
USA · 1948 — present
Jackson Browne
Canyon songwriter with a moral compass.
Sweden · 1978 — present
Anna Ternheim
Stockholm noir-folk with a Nashville detour.
USA · 1969 — present
Little Feat
New Orleans funk, slide guitar, and Lowell George's pen.
Sweden · 1990 — present
Sarah Klang
Dream-country from Gothenburg.
USA · 1969 — present
ZZ Top
That little ol' band from Texas.
Sweden · 1952 — present
Doug Seegers
An American discovered by Sweden, then by Nashville.
USA · 1972 — present
The Marshall Tucker Band
Country, jazz and Southern rock with a flute solo.
Sweden · 1975 — present
Lars Winnerbäck
Sweden's Springsteen, in Swedish.
USA · 1931 — 2013
George Jones
The greatest country singer who ever lived.
Sweden · 1995 — present
Weeping Willows
Stockholm rockabilly noir with a baritone center.
USA · 1929 — 2006
Buck Owens
Founded the Bakersfield Sound — and held the line.
USA · 1956 — present
Dwight Yoakam
Bakersfield, by way of Los Angeles, in tight Wranglers.
Norway · 2013 — present
Darling West
Oslo Americana duo with three Spellemann awards.
USA · 1941 — present
Bob Dylan
The river all of this drinks from.
Norway · 1989 — present
Malin Pettersen
Norway's most quietly authoritative country voice.
Norway · 1989 — present
Signe Marie Rustad
Plainspoken Norwegian Americana.
Norway · 1985 — present
Ida Jenshus
Trondheim country with a Trønder backbone.
Norway · 1963 — present
Stein Torleif Bjella
Hallingdal's quiet master of the village song.
Norway · 1981 — present
Amund Maarud
Norway's hardest-working roots-blues guitarist.
Norway · 1968 — present
Bjørn Berge
Acoustic blues guitarist who tours the world from Haugesund.
Norway · 1979 — present
Thomas Dybdahl
Stavanger's hushed alt-folk auteur.
Norway · 1969 — present
Tønes
Sirdal dialect country-folk, miniature masterpieces.
Norway · 1956 — present
Kari Bremnes
Northern Norwegian songcraft, cinematic and exact.
Denmark · 1985 — present
The Sandmen
Copenhagen roots-rock since the mid '80s.
Denmark · 1979 — present
Marie Fisker
Aarhus noir-Americana, Howe Gelb's longtime collaborator.
Denmark · 1976 — present
Kira Skov
Cinematic Danish songwriter with a country-soul streak.
Finland · 2011 — present
Steve'n'Seagulls
Finnish bluegrass band that covered metal classics into a global cult.
Finland · 1957 — present
J. Karjalainen
Finland's Springsteen-figure, four decades in.
Iceland · 1992 — present
Ásgeir
Icelandic folk that crossed the Atlantic both ways.
Iceland · 1980 — present
Junius Meyvant
Icelandic folk-soul with horns.
Iceland · 2010 — present
Of Monsters and Men
Reykjavík folk-rock that filled rooms three sizes too large.
Australia · 1976 — present
Kasey Chambers
Grew up hunting foxes on the Nullarbor. Sings like it.
Australia · 1955 — present
Paul Kelly
Australia's most important songwriter, full stop.
USA · 1990 — present
Courtney Marie Andrews
Desert-honed Americana with a Joni-grade pen.
Ireland · 1982 — present
Lisa O'Neill
Cavan voice carrying the old Irish-American thread.
Ireland · 2000 — present
Lankum
Dublin's drone-folk band reshaping the tradition.