Carolina Chocolate Drops’ new album, Leaving Eden, is out today. Rolling Stone, in a four-star review, says that the album “grows handsome fruit from a nation's tangled roots,” calling the record “a lesson in 21st-century American folk.” The Los Angeles Times notes that “band spends much of this very fresh-sounding album aligning itself with traditional values.” USA Today notes that the group “may take their cues from 1920s string- and jug-band music, but they're simply a great band.”
Carolina Chocolate Drops’ new album, Leaving Eden, is out today. Following their Grammy Award–winning label debut, Genuine Negro Jig, Leaving Eden is produced by Buddy Miller, and features originals as well as covers and traditional tunes. The group formed in 2005 after founding members Dom Flemons and Rhiannon Giddens met at a roots festival; in 2011 multi-instrumentalist Hubby Jenkins joined Flemons and Giddens. Cellist Leyla McCalla and beatboxer Adam Matta also join the band on this record.
Many of the reviews cite the Drops’ style of blending the traditional with the modern; in a Los Angeles Times review, writer Mikael Wood notes that “band spends much of this very fresh-sounding album aligning itself with traditional values,” highlighting the track “Country Girl” as “most immediately arresting cut” on the album, in which singer Rhiannon Giddens “ponders her background” over Adam Matta’s beatboxing (“a pretty old-timey approach to percussion.”) Read the full review at latimes.com.
Similarly, in her feature about the group in the Washington Post, writer Sarah Godfrey notes that ”the Drops seem to be saying that keeping this music alive means not just playing it but playing with it … the interpretation feels a bit looser; boundaries are pushed a bit further.” Godfrey says that the original tracks on the album, “new songs written with a nod to old-time, are standout” which prove the band to be “artists capable of significantly updating and shifting the music they love.” Read more at washingtonpost.com.
In Rolling Stone’s four-star review of Leaving Eden, Will Hermes says that the album “grows handsome fruit from a nation's tangled roots,” calling the record “a lesson in 21st-century American folk.” Read the full review at rollingstone.com. USA Today’s Elysa Gardner notes that the group “may take their cues from 1920s string- and jug-band music, but they're simply a great band,” and points out that “Leaving Eden captures the variety of their exhilarating live shows.” Read more at usatoday.com.
To find out where Carolina Chocolate Drops are playing near you, head to nonesuch.com/on-tour.
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