“You took to the bottle
And I took to Jesus
Funny how we both ended up in pieces”
On Doin’ Fine, his second full-length album, Josiah Flores tells it like it is. If he says he’s going high, he’ll go high, playing the prettiest little ditties for the tipsy, two-stepping revelers. But if he strums a somber minor chord and smilingly warns it’ll feel this sad for four minutes, then buckle in. He did just that at his record release show before playing “Eddie,” a poignant, poetic reflection of a song about his father that had many of us in tears.
Inspired by Waylon Jennings, Stoney Edwards, Freddy Fender, and Willie Dunn, the Chicano singer-songwriter fearlessly traverses the spectrum, telling songs about being “Young, Dumb, & Full of Beer,” about our time being overripe for decolonization, and about the reality of familial heartbreak—all within the span of a half hour. Produced, recorded, and released by Alicia Vanden Heuvel of Speakeasy Studios SF and featuring a handful of Bay Area musicians—including Jacob Aranda on pedal steel and Ainsley Wagoner of Silverware on keys and backup vocals—Doin’ Fine is an essential work of local outlaw country.
Not to worry if you missed the record release show: Josiah Flores plays the Ivy Room on July 5 alongside Jacob Aranda, Trans-Pecos Department of Dust & Wire, and Mac Cornish.
