The 25 Best Country and Americana Albums of 2022

Ashley McBryde's small-town concept album, Adeem the Artist's revelatory songwriting, and Willie Nelson's celebration of the restless spirit were among the high points in a year that saw country music pushing even further past its boundaries

Jon Dolan, Jon Freeman, Jonathan Bernstein, Charisma Madarang, Joseph Hudak, Tomás Mier, Christian Hoard

December 18, 2022

best country and americana albums of the year rolling stone miranda lambert willie nelson charley crockett hailey whitters — Miranda Lambert, Charley Crockett, Hailey Whitters, and Willie Nelson Jon Morgan/CBS/Getty Images; Gary Miller/Getty Images; Griffin Lotz; Harper Smith

Flashing back to this year’s CMA Awards in November, the consensus was that it was one of the “more country” shows in recent memory. The same can be said of the music that came out of Nashville, Texas, and points in between in 2022. Kelsea Ballerini, Joshua Hedley, Lainey Wilson, Ashley McBryde, Charley Crockett, and Hailey Whitters all incorporated elements of bygone eras into their albums: be they from the rugged Seventies, the golden Eighties, or the glossy Nineties. (Lainey Wilson even wrote this era’s “Strawberry Wine” in “Watermelon Moonshine,” a standout of her superb Bell Bottom Country album.) Yet no matter how far or recent each album looked back, they managed to sound fresh and contemporary.

Of course, country music can also be at its most effective when it dares to take risks. Kane Brown dropped an LP with both fiddle and trap sounds, Paul Cauthen put together a country-funk collection made for the club, and Miranda Lambert made a record that sounded a little bit country and a lot like Seventies rock (plus, The B-52’s!).

Still, it’s the lyricism of country music, and its cousin Americana, that continues to define the genre. In 2022, names like Zach Bryan, Adeem the Artist, Jimmie Allen, and the ever consistent Willie Nelson added some new classics to the canon. Find them here, on our list of the best country albums of the year.

Kane Brown, ‘Different Man’

Arguably country music’s most versatile talent, Kane Brown is the kind of star who can believably duet with Khalid one minute and pull off a sincere Alan Jackson homage the next. Different Man shows him firing on all cylinders and relishing his new role as a father, pumping out raucous numbers like “Bury Me in Georgia” alongside tender tunes like “Thank God.” The genre experiments even work, from the murky trap of “Grand” to caffeinated funk-pop in “See You Like I Do,” but he’s just as comfortable singing a fiddle-laced lament like “Whiskey Sour.” Brown’s best of all when he leans into his own biography — “Pop’s Last Name” is a moving ode to the man who raised him after his biological father ended up in prison, the high point of an album that offers the best of what modern country-pop can aspire to be. –J.F.
Ingrid Andress, ‘Good Person’

The honest lyricism that made Ingrid Andress a Best New Artist Grammy nominee with her 2020 debut, Lady Like, is on full display on her follow-up. Good Person opens in a darker mood, showing the surprising influence of the 1975 as she sings about ridding herself of a toxic relationship and reflects on lost love. On the lyrical standout “Yearbook,” she sings sardonically of an imaginary couple: “I guess they stayed together just because they wrote forever/On the inside of the cover by their names.” But the album’s second half moves into deep love ballads, as she sings proudly about wearing “rose-colored glasses/So I never have to see/The colors of the ocean” on “Blue.” Love can be grand. —T.M.
Melissa Carper, ‘Ramblin’ Soul’

After a forced break from the road in early Covid, Melissa Carper found herself being inspired and rejuvenated by the ability to travel and perform again. That sense of liberation is all over Ramblin’ Soul, which comes steeped in throwback styles that range from honky-tonk and countrypolitan to blues and Western swing. Carper’s songwriting and sense of humor keep things feeling fresh — she celebrates a treasured family ride in the rockabilly-tinged “1980 Dodge Van,” mourns a beloved pet in “Ain’t a Day Goes By,” and smirks about not getting any action in the cheeky “Boxers on Backwards.” Even when she’s putting her own spin on an old tune like Odetta’s “Hit or Miss,” Carper’s enigmatic voice sounds familiar and alien all at once, making Ramblin’ Soul a truly original set of songs. –J.F.
S.G. Goodman, ‘Teeth Marks’

S.G. Goodman’s voice calls to mind the high-lonesome sounds of bluegrass from her native Kentucky, but with an added dash of unbridled rock & roll spirit that refuses to be pinned down. On her second album, Teeth Marks, the singer-songwriter situates tales of unrequited love, working-class struggles, and the opioid crisis in settings that vary between plaintive folk-rock, scuzzy garage-punk, and even dreamy, feedback-filled post-rock. There are moments of hope and resilience along the way, such as the upbeat “All My Love Is Coming Back to Me” and the cathartic closing track “Keeper of the Time,” which looks with clarity at all the scars etched into one’s life and how we come up with ways to keep going. With Teeth Marks, Goodman envisioned a South that defied any kind of simple categorization, as it should be. –J.F.
49 Winchester, ‘Fortune Favors the Bold’

Rolling Stone dubbed 49 Winchester country’s “buzziest of buzz bands” earlier this year not just because of their leave-it-all-on-the-stage live shows, but because of this sterling collection of shuffling country-rockers and Appalachian ballads. The Virginia group pay tribute to their homeland in the yearning “Russell County Line,” give thanks for the little things in life (a dog that don’t shit in the house, for instance) in “All I Need,” and in the gutting “Damn Darlin’” lament the city that broke their hearts (spoiler alert: it’s Nashville). Singer Isaac Gibson has a Stapleton-level voice and the band members all excel at country-soul, making Fortune Favors the Bold one of the most satisfying records of ’22. –J.H.
Willie Nelson, ‘A Beautiful Time’

Willie Nelson sets every word on fire in his 97th (give or take, depending on who you ask) studio album. There’s something woozy, sly, and comforting when his hazy voice rumbles through the love-lost “I’ll Love You Till the Day I Die” to the celestial “Energy Follows Thought.” That voice still soothes like a lullaby, even when painting his mystical jam session in the sky with tongue-in-cheek lines: “I don’t go to funerals/I won’t be at mine.” When he signs off with the bittersweet ballad “Leave You With a Smile,” it’s impossible not to want a little more. The solution? Play the whole damn album one more time. – C.M.
Joshua Hedley, ‘Neon Blue’

Nineties country vibes are all the rage right now, but no one pulls it off as convincingly (and genuinely) as Joshua Hedley. Nashville’s proudly working-class musician — every Monday night at Robert’s on Broadway! — reaches back in time to create an album that’d fit in seamlessly between Don’t Rock the Jukebox and Third Rock From the Sun. The title track gallops along with Telecaster and fiddle, “Down to My Last Lie” is made for beers diluted with tears, and “Country & Western” celebrates the purity of the genre. The highlight though is LP opener “Broke Again,” which features a stuttering chorus that would do Mel Tillis proud. –J.H.
Gabe Lee, ‘The Hometown Kid’

Heartbreak, homesickness, and growth are gloriously on display in Gabe Lee’s third album, The Hometown Kid. Pedal steel grounds his sound in Music City while the songs offer vivid memories of past lovers and sobering realizations that you can never quite go home again. The Nashville-raised singer-songwriter dives deeper into his examination of the soul in “Longer I Run – Hammer Down,” then lifts things back up with the piano and gospel flourishes of “Angel Band.” And “Over You,” in which his brassy, impassioned voice fills every forlorn lyric with feeling, is a perfect showcase for why Lee is one of Nashville’s biggest contenders. –C.M.
Caitlin Rose, ‘Cazimi’

Nine long years elapsed between the release of Caitlin Rose’s second album The Stand In and 2022’s Cazimi, a time that saw Americana become the de facto home for jangly, indie rock-influenced singer-songwriters like herself. Cazimi affirms that Rose is still one of the best to do it, a collection that works in sly, sidelong ways rather than trying to overwhelm. “Modern Dancing” and “How Far Away” have shades of angular indie rock, but with a sophisticated sense of pop melodicism, while “Getting It Right” brings in Courtney Marie Andrews to pair staticky guitar noise with a little country sunshine. Rose’s clear, limber voice keeps things tethered to roots music, even when she’s delivering an ornate, Baroque-pop number like “Black Obsidian.” A much-belated and very welcome return. –J.F.
Billy Strings, ‘Me/And/Dad’

Billy Strings has performed and/or recorded with stars from Post Malone and Dierks Bentley to Les Claypool and Del McCoury, but his best collab yet comes with a relative unknown: his own father. On Me/And/Dad, the guitar-picking genre-hopper enlisted his stepdad Terry Barber to revisit the bluegrass songs that informed Strings’ childhood. There are covers of the Stanley Brothers’ “Long Journey Home” and Flatt & Scruggs’ “Dig a Little Deeper (in the Well),” along with renderings of traditionals like “Little Blossom” and the hymn “Wandering Boy.” Strings, as usual, is a dynamo in both his playing and singing, but the LP is at its most heart-tugging when he hangs back to let dear ol’ dad take the leads. A true father-and-son connection. –J.H.
Jake Blount, ‘The New Faith’

Banjoist-singer-scholar Jake Blount turned in this year’s most innovative and forward-thinking roots collection with The New Faith. To do that, he reimagined a series of half-century old spirituals and traditionals as part of an Afrofuturist concept album about starting anew in the age of climate catastrophe. Listen to how Blount transforms the 100-year-old “Didn’t It Rain” into a contemporary calling, or how the sparse, hand-clapped closer “Once There Was No Sun” becomes a final prayer for the fragility and temporariness of the planet we inhabit. The New Faith does something profound: deliver an urgent, thoroughly modern story by digging deep into the past. –J.B.
Paul Cauthen, ‘Country Coming Down’

No country album released this year has as much attitude as Paul Cauthen’s outrageous exercise in self-belief. Over 10 tracks, the Tyler, Texas, wildman sings about being “Country as Fuck,” having “Fuck You Money,” and going “Country Clubbin.’” Paired with producer Beau Bedford’s funk-and-twang beats, the album is custom-made for dancefloors — and long nights that tip into delirium. When “Big Velvet,” as Cauthen’s known, boasts in “Champagne & a Limo” about cruising up to the party in tinted windows, Veuve in hand, you wish you were right there in the stretch with him. –J.H.
Kelsey Waldon, ‘No Regular Dog’

The Kentucky songwriter mixes bits of Bobbie Gentry, Loretta Lynn, and her hero John Prine in No Regular Dog, her first album recorded outside of her home state. Waldon decamped for L.A. to cut the LP with producer Shooter Jennings, and the change of scenery serves her well. The album is an immersive listening experience, with woozy strings and forlorn pedal steel intertwining in songs like the ominous title track. Regardless of where it was recorded, or by whom, it’s Waldon’s songwriting and warbling voice that ties it together. In “History Repeats Itself,” she takes stock of a world in crisis and wonders if it’s all too much to bear. “Politicians pushin’ pills wanna keep me sedatеd,” Waldon sings, before delivering advice in her own unique vernacular: “Find your faith in somewheres else.”–J.H.
Miko Marks and the Resurrectors, ‘Feel Like Going Home’

Miko Marks’ 2021 album Our Country reintroduced fans to a monster talent who’d been mostly overlooked during her early 2000s time in Nashville. Feel Like Going Home doubles down on those strengths and stands as the most stirring country-soul release of the year. There’s a spiritual heaviness that permeates these songs, whether it’s the gospel-funk of “Feel Like Going Home,” the swampy blues of “River,” or the Sam Cooke-style balladry of “The Good Life” — Marks knows some troubles, but never gives up hope of finding higher ground. The centerpiece of the set is Marks’ voice, a marvelous instrument that’s absorbed and synthesized styles of singing from church, the coffee shops, the honky-tonks, the juke joints, and beyond, and imbues each song with a kind of hard-won authority. When she sings about the grace of a higher power in “Jubilee,” it’s impossible not to believe her. -J.F.
Lainey Wilson, ‘Bell Bottom Country’

On her second album in as many years, Wilson cements her status as one of country music’s best new stars. The title refers to her open-armed, down-home style — “country with a flare,” as she puts it — and Wilson happily describes herself as a “hillbilly hippy” who wears a crystal on her neck, drives a Ford F250, and loves Keith Whitley. But it’s heart, as much as flare, that makes the songs stick: Wilson writes convincingly about her daddy (spelled “deddy”), working-class roots, and lust, among other worthy topics. Start with “Heart Like a Truck,” which shows off Wilson’s speciality of flipping country convention into something meaningful. —C.H.
Jimmie Allen, ‘Tulip Drive’

Jimmie Allen’s dedication to his family and roots runs the full breadth of his third album Tulip Drive, named in honor of the street where his grandmother grew up. Autobiographical songs are when he’s at his best, from “Down Home,” a tribute to his late father, to “You Won’t Be Alone,” which opens with a heartfelt moment featuring Allen’s son. Packed to the gills with hits, Tulip Drive also features collaborations with Jennifer Lopez, CeeLo Green, and T-Pain, effectively pushing Allen’s signature sounds into uncharted territory. –C.M.
Kelsea Ballerini, ‘Subject to Change’

Following 2020’s transitional Kelsea, Ballerini’s fourth album fully marks her shift from singles-oriented hitmaker to one of the most thoughtful album-oriented artists working in country music. Never scared to point the finger at herself, Subject to Change is Ballerini’s wonderfully messy statement on being an adult in progress, learning life lessons the hard way while leaning into everything “heartfirst,” as the album’s lead single puts it. All the while, songs like “I Can’t Help Myself” and “If You Go Down (I’m Goin’ Down Too”) show that, despite the tasteful pop production she’s employed heavily in the past, Ballerini is also a reverent Nineties traditionalist. It’s a potent mix that makes Subject to Change her finest work to date. –J.B.
Ian Noe, ‘River Fools & Mountain Saints’

The second album from Ian Noe broadens his sonic palette with a louder set of full band roots-rock like surging “Burning Down the Prairie”. And yet, Noe has gotten even better at the John Prine-level storytelling he introduced on his 2019 debut Between the Country, as evidenced by character sketches like “Tom Barrett” and “Ballad of a Retired Man.” The latter, a chorus-less five-minute epic inspired by Noe’s grandfather that traces the last years of a man’s hard-fought life, shows why the Kentucky singer-songwriter just might be the most talented young roots storyteller working today. –J.B.
Adeem the Artist, ‘White Trash Revelry’

The Thirty Tigers debut from Adeem Bingham is a mix of whip-smart wordplay, empathetic character sketches, and whimsical philosophizing reminiscent of Todd Snider. “Books & Records” chronicles hard times with gut-punch narrative details that conjure Merle Haggard, while “Going to Hell” casts a witty interventionist glance at Delta blues mythology (“White folk would rather give the devil praise/than acknowledge a Black man’s worth”). But Adeem the Artist delivers the biggest knockout with “Middle of a Heart,” a masterclass in economic folk storytelling that shows why their latest LP is the most thrilling introduction in roots music this year. –J.B.
Maren Morris, ‘Humble Quest’

The first track from Maren Morris’s Humble Quest is a triumphant autobiographical hit that lays out the singer’s early days driving “a Montero with the AC busted,” and a few “bad demos on a burned CD.” It’s a straightforward tune that renews the theme of big city struggles with sharp lyrics, a big guitar riff, and an even bigger chorus. This candid approach plays throughout the album, as Morris pivots from “Good Friends” to “Better Than We Found It,” a track that acknowledges the country’s current rancorous climate (“America, America/God save us all/From ourselves and the Hell/That we’ve built for our kids”). As Morris blurs the line between country and pop, Humble Quest roots itself in themes of family and love, all while keeping it undoubtedly joyous. –C.M.
Ashley McBryde, ‘Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville’

Ashley McBryde’s third album is more of a group effort than solo project, as Lindeville brings in the considerable talents of Brandy Clark, TJ Osborne, Aaron Raitiere, and others together to spin stories of small-town life both heartbreaking and hilarious. The John Osborne-produced album includes trailer-park drama in “Brenda Put Your Bra On,” a haunting story of a young woman who disappeared in “The Girl in the Picture,” and the oddly sweet “Gospel Night at the Strip Club” — all stitched together by clever radio jingles for businesses in the town. McBryde closes the album with a beautiful lullaby, singing from the perspective of the town’s stoic, watchful clock tower. —J.F.
Zach Bryan, ‘American Heartbreak’

Oklahoma native and Navy vet Zach Bryan vaulted from cult figure to full-blown star with this supersized major-label debut, a 34-track treatise on heartbreak and restlessness that felt like country music at odds with Nashville. He’s a skilled storyteller, bringing poetic flair to tales of the touring life (“Highway Boys”), struggling friends (“Mine Again”), and youthful misadventures (“Heavy Eyes”), all sung with raw intensity and arranged like a friendly backyard jam. He’s at his best when he’s showing his vulnerable side, as on “Something in the Orange,” searching the light and shadows for signs of the woman he’s missing. —J.F.
Miranda Lambert, ‘Palomino’

This rule-hating Nashville superstar pretty much only makes great albums, from her freewheeling double-LP masterpiece, The Weight of These Wings, to her rocked-out Wild Card. Add her eighth studio set to the list of successes. The sense of musical and personal wanderlust that governs everything she does comes through in free-booted travelogues like “Tourist” and “Scenes,” as well as musically freewheeling songs like “Actin’ Up” and “Geraldene,” which give down-home sounds Seventies rock twists. The big, rousing anthem “Strange” is a fine contribution to the “modernity sucks, let’s do shots” country canon, and she closes things with “Carousel,” an acoustic ballad about a trapeze artist that might make you chuckle at its low-hanging metaphor corniness until it has you choking back tears. —J.D.
Charley Crockett, ‘The Man From Waco’

Who could have guessed that the 11th album (and fifth in the past two years) from this Texas road-warrior would be the one to finally break through? But that’s a credit to the music on The Man From Waco, Crockett’s most cohesive, razor-focused, and endlessly rich LP to date. He runs through R&B, honky-tonk, country-soul, jazzy pop, and ages-old folk on this song cycle of Texas tall tales, which highlight all the ways in which Crockett has become a first-rate songwriter. With The Man From Waco, Crockett reached an apex of the songcraft and Southern roots synthesis he’s been practicing on stage after stage for the past decade. –J.B.
Hailey Whitters, ‘Raised’

The third album from the Nashville by-way-of Shueyville, Iowa, singer-songwriter is a tour-de-force reflection on Whitters’ small Midwestern hometown roots that traverses rock (“Middle of America”), folksy country (the title track), and grooving country-pop á la Thomas Rhett (“The Neon”). The sounds, styles, and storytelling come together in a halfway point between John Mellencamp and Kacey Musgraves, matching the heartland romanticism of the former with the witty small-town claustrophobia of the latter’s early work. The result is a thrilling collection that masterfully walks the line between big-time country commerce and renegade rootsiness. –J.B.