I’m dedicating my first entry in this new video column to the Mike & Ruthy Band, since I’ll be premiering a new video from them each week for the next few weeks. This week, we lead with a special video for the title track from their new album Bright as You Can.
If ever there was a band that that turned the Americana scene on its head, it was the Mammals, a group that the L.A. Weekly dubbed “The finest young bluegrass/old-timey band in the country.” When the group announced a hibernation in 2007, fans felt a tinge of remorse.
Now, there is reason to celebrate as founding members Mike Merenda and Ruthy Ungar have re-emerged in big-bang style (with many of the original Mammals as their backing band) to remind us why their music was celebrated as such in the first place.
On their most recent recording project, we find something of a synthesis of all their musical experiences to date: a folk-rock hybrid record that pays tribute to their mentors while defiantly forging a path that is electrified, youthful, and now.
Bright As You Can celebrates the grit and glory of kinship with 14 road-tested tunes of radio-ready acoustic pop, broody rock, country soul, and boot-stomping front porch folk.
