Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology Souled American

• 1 Notes Campfire 04:54
• 2 Full Picture 02:38
• 3 Lottery Brazil 03:16
• 4 True Swamp Too 03:48
• 5 Feel Better 03:33
• 6 Mar'boro Man 02:58
• 7 Wind To Dry 04:09
• 8 Over The Hill 04:58
• 9 Why, Are You 03:39
• 10 Around The Horn 03:43
• 11 Rise Above It 06:08
• 12 You 04:14
• 13 In The Mud 02:21
• 14 Little Bessie 05:03
• 15 Rock That Cradle Lucy 02:28
• 16 Blue Eyes Cryin' In The Rain 03:26
• 17 Downblossom 04:13
• 18 Heyday 03:09
• 19 Before Tonight 03:30
• 20 Suitor's Bridge 03:55
• Total Runtime 01:16:03

Info for Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology

Asked in 2019 to select a song he wished he’d written, Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy named “Before Tonight” by Souled American, a lost song, a forgotten band.

We always think we know the history of music that matters until we hear some unearthed treasure like the unearthly Souled American and must account for how greatness this great gets forgot.

Souled American formed in 1987 with four musicians from Illinois—vocalist/rhythm guitarist Chris Grigoroff, vocalist/bassist Joe Adducci, electric guitarist Scott Tuma, and drummer Jamey Barnard. They were scouted and signed by popular independent label Rough Trade Records. Their 1988 debut Fe and Lucinda Williams’s Lucinda Williams became the label’s initial US releases. The band made a total of four records for Rough Trade before the label went bankrupt and the music vanished. They then made two records for Germany’s small Moll Töntrager which, scarcely distributed and poorly promoted, were (as Abraham Lincoln would say) little noted nor long remembered. The Internet arrived but none of Souled American’s six records ever found it.

Engineer Jim Rondinelli (Wilco, The Jayhawks, Matthew Sweet, Urge Overkill) co-produced Fe and calls Souled American, “far and away the most unique and fresh and talented band I ever worked with.” Engineer Brian Deck (Modest Mouse, Iron and Wine, Counting Crows, Califone) co-produced their next three records. “I was flabbergasted that they existed. I couldn’t believe there were people singing together like that in my generation. I was utterly in love.”

Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology collects 20 tracks—a third of the band’s recorded output between 1988-1996—newly remastered from their first six releases to tell the Souled American story (up to this point). The accompanying booklet features song lyrics from the band and liner notes from Camden Joy detailing the band’s history, as well as their influence on and importance to the Americana/Alt-Country/Rock scene.

Tweedy devoted a chapter to “Before Tonight” in his 2023 bestseller World Within A Song. He began his praiseful paean wit an admonition. “This song,” wrote Tweedy, “is likely the hardest track to find of any I’ve included here…” Until now!

Souled American

Souled American
A pioneering band in what would become the alt-country movement of the 1990s, Souled American plays music rooted in American folk and country traditions in a style that's both playful and reverent. On early efforts like 1988's Fe and 1989's Flubber, Souled American's music had a loose, semi-acoustic sound dominated by acoustic and slide guitars, matched to vocals that bore a pronounced twang. With 1994's Frozen, Souled American introduced a different approach, dominated by languid tempos, minimal instrumentation, and an embrace of ambient, atmospheric textures, a style that carried through to 1996's Notes Campfire.

Singer/guitarist Chris Grigoroff and singer/bassist Joe Adducci formed Souled American in Chicago, IL 1986 after first collaborating in the group The Uptown Rulers, who specialized in ska and reggae. Guitarist Scott Tuma and drummer Jamey Barnard completed the lineup, which quickly honed an expansive, compellingly idiosyncratic approach to rock that reduced the idiom to its basic elements -- country, folk, and bluegrass chief among them -- then reassembled the parts to forge an otherworldly music quite unlike anything produced by the band's contemporaries. In 1988 Souled American signed to Rough Trade and issued their classic debut, Fe, a far-ranging effort that won them support in the independent music press. Flubber appeared just six months later and was supported by a tour opening for Camper Van Beethoven. But shortly after the release of 1990's moody and impressionistic Around the Horn, the U.S. division of Rough Trade went bankrupt, stranding Souled American without an American label and putting distribution of their product in limbo. The band soldiered on, issuing 1992's Sonny, a collection of covers, through Rough Trade's European branch, but few copies reached U.S. shores, and Barnard left the lineup to focus on his family. The remaining trio opted not to replace him, and reworked their sound, with 1994's spare, haunting Frozen trading percussion for a more spectral approach; it was issued by the German Moll Tonträger label.

The downbeat Notes Campfire was issued by Moll Tonträger in 1996; that same year, Scott Tuma left the group and later issued a handful of solo albums, while Chris Grigoroff and Joe Adducci continued on. Frozen was given a belated American release by Checkered Past Records in 1998, and their sibling label the Catamount Company issued Notes Campfire in the U.S. in 1999. 1999 also saw Souled American's Rough Trade releases become briefly available again on the independent tUMULT label. In 2002, Souled American contributed a cover of "Please Don't Tell Me How the Story Ends" to Nothing Left to Lose: A Tribute to Kris Kristofferson, a multi-artist project which also featured appearances from Calexico, Grandaddy, the Handsome Family, and Richard Buckner. In 2006, an unreleased Souled American track was included on a compilation CD released in tandem with the fourth issue of Mike McGonigal's music and literature magazine Yeti. Since then, Chris Grigoroff and Joe Adducci have continued to play live shows as Souled American, and have been working on a seventh album. The group's back catalog finally became available on streaming services in 2023. (Jason Ankeny, AMG)

Booklet for Rise Above It: A Souled American Anthology