Squelch

Jason Boland is a literate, leftist, alt-country songwriter: Texas’ answer to Jason Isbell. His subtle tunes have enough juice to win over a honky-tonk, and he’s funny, too: "Fat and Merry" is a stomping, tongue-in-cheek ode to bourgeois ideas of happiness, and on "I Guess It's Alright to Be an A*****e" he turns up the distortion, wrapping his weathered voice around a punk jam about getting ahead. These songs prove that traditionalism doesn't always equal conservatism—in music or politics.