Max McNown continues his streak as one of folk and country music’s more prolific up-and-comers with this new project, released within a year of his celebrated sophomore album, Night Diving. Produced by Grammy-winning multi-hyphenate Paul Mabury (Lauren Daigle, The War And Treaty), Both Sides of the Blade is even more intimate than its predecessor, with an emphasis on ballads and quiet narrative songwriting. Like contemporaries Zach Bryan and Cameron Whitcomb, McNown leans into the ache central to much of his work, finding even the smallest opportunities to wring emotion out of each note he sings. Highlights on Both Sides of the Blade include the title track, a Lumineers-esque tune about the duality of love, and “Macbeth,” a gentle folk-rocker that likens its protagonist to the titular Scottish king, doomed to “a journey headed for a tragedy.”