Sample Belles

BELLES blends vintage country soul with modern, dreamy vocals, delivering raw emotion and electric storytelling.

Country To Country 2026

Get ready for another unforgettable celebration of country music at Country to Country (C2C) Festival

Belles

BELLES blends vintage country soul with modern, dreamy vocals, delivering raw emotion and electric storytelling.

Tim Brink & The Rising Release ‘Dark City’

Tim Brink & The Rising have unveiled their debut album Dark City, a cinematic blend

Event Review – Country Thunder Wisconsin

Country Thunder Wisconsin returned with a record-breaking edition in July, drawing over 100,000 fans for

Latest News

Paper Kites Announce New Album for January Release

Alternative folk favourites The Paper Kites have confirmed details of their seventh studio album If You Go There, I Hope You Find It, due for release on 23 January through Nettwerk Music Group.

To mark the announcement, the band have shared a new single titled “Every Town”, a tender, wistful piece built on soft melodies and gentle lyricism. The track arrives with an official video, offering a first glimpse of the record’s tone — warm, melancholic, and quietly affecting.

If You Go There, I Hope You Find It follows the same reflective spirit, featuring recent single “When The Lavender Blooms”, recorded at Melbourne’s Sing Sing Studios and mixed by multi-Grammy winner Jon Low. Early notes on the album describe it as intimate and healing-minded, shaped by themes of nature, hope and simplicity, with each song unfolding like a conversation rather than a performance. There is a sense of return threaded through it — of leaving, searching, and coming home changed.

The band are currently back on the road in the United States, including their own headline dates alongside support slots for The Teskey Brothers. They are also scheduled to appear at Bourbon & Beyond in Louisville before heading to Richmond for Iron Blossom Music Festival later this month.

Fans in the UK and Europe will have a longer wait — but not by much. The Paper Kites have announced an extensive 2026 headline tour across the region, with tickets on sale now. London is set for a show at the Roundhouse, following previous sold-out runs at Koko, Kentish Town Forum and a major summer performance at Somerset House. Additional stops include the O2 Ritz in Manchester and 3Olympia Theatre in Dublin.

The Paper Kites now count more than two billion streams worldwide, their soft-spoken sound resonating far beyond folk circles. Their breakout track Bloom has gone multi-Platinum internationally and remains one of the most recognisable modern indie-folk singles of the past decade. It has since been covered on The Kelly Clarkson Show, while the band’s music continues to soundtrack television staples such as Grey’s Anatomy, This Is Us and Virgin River.

Though their influence has grown, the group remain rooted in restraint and nuance — collaborators rather than chasers, working quietly alongside artists such as Lucy Rose, Nadia Reid and Rosie Carney. Their rise has been gradual, steady and built less on spectacle than on craft. It is that patience, along with harmony-rich songwriting, that has carried them to this seventh chapter.

And if the new single is any indication, If You Go There, I Hope You Find It doesn’t mark a reinvention so much as a deepening — another page in a story written gently, thoroughly, and always in service of feeling.

Big Valley Jamboree Reveals 2026 Headliners

Big Valley Jamboree is gearing up for its 34th edition, returning to Camrose from 30 July to 2 August, and organisers have confirmed a powerhouse 2026 Chevrolet Main Stage line-up to match.

This year’s festival places three major names at the top of the bill: eight-time ACM Group of the Year Old Dominion, multi-platinum hitmaker Riley Green, and four-time GRAMMY winner Keith Urban. ACM New Artist of the Year Nate Smith will open the weekend during Thursday’s Kickoff Party inside the Coors Original Saloon.

“As we celebrate the incredible history of Big Valley Jamboree, this line-up feels like the perfect way to honour where we’ve been and where we’re headed,” said Troy Vollhoffer, CEO of Country Thunder.

“Keith Urban, Old Dominion and Riley Green each bring something unique to the stage, and together they capture the spirit of what BVJ is all about: great music, great community and memories that last long after the weekend ends.”

Urban, returning to BVJ after years away, brings more than two decades of chart success to the Alberta stage. The three-time Entertainer of the Year holds 20 number-one singles – including “Somebody Like You,” “Blue Ain’t Your Colour,” and “Long Hot Summer” – and remains one of the most recognisable live performers in modern country music.

Old Dominion step into their headlining slot as one of the most decorated groups in the genre, with eight ACM Awards and seven CMA wins to their name. Their catalogue of fan favourites – “Break Up with Him,” “Written in the Sand,” “Make It Sweet” – has helped position them amongst country music’s most in-demand live acts.

Riley Green will headline Big Valley Jamboree for the first time following his well-received Kickoff Party appearance in 2024. Known for hits like “There Was This Girl,” “I Wish Grandpa’s Never Died,” and “Worst Way,” Green arrives off the back of multiple ACM and CMA wins and continues to build momentum.

More names join the 2026 roster, including Cameron Whitcomb, Noeline Hoffman, viral breakout Gavin Adcock and Chase Rice. The programme also features Robyn Ottolini, Sacha, Josh Stumpf, Morgan Klaiber, Travis Dolter, Sully Burrows, The Dead South, Mark Chesnutt, Billy Dean & Collin Raye and Logan Layman.

Festival-goers can also expect two signature events: Thursday’s Kickoff Party led by Nate Smith, and the official BVJ After Party, complete with late-night surprise guests throughout the weekend.

Further updates are expected in the months ahead. Tickets and camping packages are already on sale, with a new payment plan allowing visitors to secure their place for £20 down, followed by equal monthly instalments.

A landmark summer for country fans is already on the horizon – and Big Valley Jamboree looks set to make 2026 one to remember.

Brooks & Dunn – The Long Game

They didn’t arrive as revolutionaries. But Brooks & Dunn redrew the borderlines of country music just the same — blending honky tonk, arena rock, and emotional clarity into a sound that still echoes through the genre’s bloodstream.

When Brooks & Dunn reunited in 2015 after a five-year hiatus, it wasn’t out of necessity. They had nothing left to prove. Already Country Music Hall of Famers, with more CMA Awards than any other duo in history, they could’ve stayed gone — proud, platinum, and preserved.

But Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn were never interested in legacy as museum piece. Their return wasn’t nostalgic. It was purposeful. A reminder that the sharpest tools in country’s box were far from relics, they still had an edge.

Three decades after their 1991 debut, Brooks & Dunn remain a blueprint: for duos, for crossover acts, for anyone trying to make traditional country sound contemporary without losing its roots. And for all the numbers — the chart-toppers, the tour grosses, the awards — their real achievement might be that no one’s ever done it quite like them since.

Their origin story is tidy on paper, but jagged in reality. Both men had solo ambitions. Dunn was a powerhouse vocalist from Texas with a gospel background. Brooks was a sharper-edged songwriter from Louisiana with industry connections and an ear for momentum. Arista Records head Tim DuBois suggested they try working together, and they did, somewhat reluctantly.

The pairing didn’t immediately make sense. Their writing styles clashed. Their personalities diverged. But the tension became fuel. In interviews, Brooks has often said the act only worked because they were so different. Dunn, more reserved and vocally dominant, brought the ache. Brooks, gregarious and guitar-forward, brought the grit.

That tension gave them range. It let them pivot between floor-fillers like “Boot Scootin’ Boogie” and ballads like “Believe.” They weren’t trying to split the difference, they were doubling the spectrum.

By the time their debut album Brand New Man dropped in 1991, the balance had clicked. Four No.1 hits later, Brooks & Dunn weren’t a gamble. They were the new standard.

Throughout the 1990s, Brooks & Dunn became country’s most bankable act, not by chasing trends, but by setting them. Albums like Hard Workin’ Man and Waitin’ on Sundown fused dancehall energy with emotional storytelling. Their music lived on jukeboxes and in stadiums. It worked as well in boots as it did in headphones.

They built an aesthetic as much as a catalogue. Cowboy hats and designer jeans, Telecasters and pyrotechnics. They didn’t play small, they scaled country up. And they did it without sacrificing the fundamentals: story, heart, and voice.

Radio embraced them, but so did fans outside the usual orbit. Their sound, stitched with blues, rock, honky tonk, and even gospel, made them accessible without sanding off their roots. Dunn’s vocals soared; Brooks kept the rhythm grounded.

And they just kept winning. By the end of the decade, they’d earned Entertainer of the Year, dozens of chart-toppers, and a place on the Mount Rushmore of modern country.

To read the full article, see our last issue here.

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HuneyFire Release Festive Christmas Single

Afro/Latina country duo HuneyFire are embracing the holiday season with the release of their new single, “My Christmas Wish”, a warm and romantic track celebrating love in December.

The song is described as a light-hearted tribute to spending the festive period with someone special, wrapped in harmonies and seasonal glow.

“My Christmas Wish is a sweet and playful holiday single about the joy of being in love at Christmas and wanting nothing more than to spend the season with the one you love,” the duo said.

HuneyFire added that the track captures “the simple and tender desire to make memories together under the glow of Christmas lights.”

Written and produced by Cheaza Figueroa, the song features Figueroa and daughter Marri Nevarez-Barlow sharing lead vocals and harmonies, bringing a soft, familial touch to the arrangement.

The recording also features Caitlin Evanson on fiddle, Eddie Dunlap on dobro, and Hugo Castillo contributing drums, bass guitar, organ, piano and synth. The single was recorded at Mir Records USA.

“My Christmas Wish” adds a festive chapter to the duo’s catalogue, blending country instrumentation with soulful, honey-toned delivery, and positions HuneyFire as emerging seasonal voices within the genre.

HuneyFire continue to build momentum as a mother-daughter pairing distinctly placed within country music – blending cultural heritage, harmony-led songwriting and a modern Americana sensibility.

Their work has drawn attention for its warmth, sincerity and genre-spanning influences, marking them as artists to watch as they move into the new year.

Tim Brink & The Rising Release ‘Dark City’

Tim Brink & The Rising have unveiled their debut album Dark City, a cinematic blend of Southern gothic storytelling, Americana grit and brooding blues.

The release marks a defining moment for frontman Tim Brink, the Quebec-born vocalist and multi-instrumentalist whose career to date has included international touring with Pete Möss, a finalist position on La Voix IV, and even consideration as lead singer for Stone Temple Pilots.

Dark City leans into the mythology of desolate highways, ghost-town silence and hard-earned redemption. While fans of Colter Wall, Chris Stapleton and Orville Peck may find familiar textures, Brink carves his own territory – darker, more atmospheric and rooted in the tone of series such as Yellowstone, True Detective and Justified.

The album, co-written by Brink and guitarist Samuel Busque, unfolds like a film. Songs move with tension and release, borrowing the grit of Johnny Cash, the intensity of Rage Against the Machine and the dramatic flair of Tarantino.

Produced by Busque alongside Michel Francoeur and mixed and mastered at Red Tubes Studio, the record explores themes of vengeance, forgiveness and the moral grey spaces that sit between.

Brink’s vocal performance anchors the work – raw, soulful and weathered like a road map creased at the edges. The music shifts between thunderous instrumentation and quiet reflection, offering a listening experience that feels both widescreen and intimate.

Dark City is now officially released, signalling a bold entry onto the North American roots-rock stage and marking the beginning of a chapter that is wholly Brink’s own – storm-charged, cinematic, and unafraid to stare directly into the dark.