We Speak Folk

The Creekers Release Second Album Follow the Sound

Published

4 hours ago

November 1, 2026

The Creekers live. Photo via @thecreekersband.

Kentucky band The Creekers have released their second album, Follow the Sound, and the new record marks another milestone in a fast rising career rooted in the hills of eastern Kentucky.

Released on October 30 through Warner Records Nashville, the twelve track project blends traditional bluegrass with country, pop and other musical influences. The band describes its distinctive style as creekergrass, a sound built on close harmonies, string band drive and songs that stay close to home.

The new album includes Better Way, Little Man, Kentucky and East Kentucky Sunrise, with several songs reflecting the group Appalachian roots and its experiences on the road. Those themes run through the whole collection, which plays like a postcard from Leslie County written by musicians who have spent the year carrying their home sound to new audiences.

The Creekers are a six piece band. Tanner Horton sings and plays lead guitar, Allen Hacker sings and plays rhythm guitar, Jagger Bowling plays bass and sings, Ashton Bowling plays cajon, Scott Sutton plays banjo and sings, and Anna Blanton plays fiddle. Generational roots run deep in Leslie County, where the group formed over a shared love for traditional American music.

The release arrives with serious recognition already behind it. The Creekers also received the 2026 International Bluegrass Music Association Momentum Award for Band of the Year, an honor that underlines how quickly the group has moved from local stages to national attention.

Follow the Sound shows why that attention keeps growing. The playing is crisp and confident, the singing is warm and direct, and the writing keeps one foot in tradition while the other steps toward a wider country and pop audience. For a band that calls its music genuine above everything else, this second album sounds like a promise kept, and like the start of a much longer run.

We Speak Folk

Shane Pendergast Releases Reflective Fifth Album Jack Pine

Published

4 hours ago

November 1, 2026

We Speak Media

Shane Pendergast. Photo via @shanependy.

Prince Edward Island singer and songwriter Shane Pendergast has released his fifth album, Jack Pine, a thoughtful collection of folk songs exploring history, nature and the ever changing cycles of life.

The album arrived on October 23, 2026 and holds twelve songs running about forty three minutes. Led by the focus track The Maiden Voyage, the record captures the uncertainty of new beginnings while reflecting on the connections between past and present. To preserve the honesty of that song, Pendergast and engineer and co producer Mark Westberg recorded it solo and live off the floor, allowing the lyric and the performance to speak for themselves.

The title track draws on Pendergast long fascination with jack pines, hardy and unconventional trees that can grow in barren and unforgiving ground. The song finds beauty in adapting to difficult surroundings without losing sight of who you are, and its roots reach back to the work of Prince Edward Island poet Milton Acorn, whose writing about the tree resonated with the singer. Acclaimed singer and songwriter Catherine MacLellan contributes backing vocals to the title track, adding another distinctly Island voice to the recording.

Much of the album was tracked over five days with the band camped inside a rural Prince Edward Island church, a setting that kept the performances close and communal. Drawing on Eastern Canadian folk traditions, Pendergast continues to explore the natural world, the sea and the passage of time through his songwriting.

Pendergast also hosts the Jack Pine Folk Club on the Island, a gathering dedicated to folk music and poetry, and he was recently nominated for Songwriter of the Year at the 2026 Canadian Folk Music Awards. With its stripped back arrangements and heartfelt storytelling, Jack Pine is a beautiful reminder of why traditional folk music continues to resonate.