Lucinda Williams is a daughter of the American South, born in Louisiana, who is proud of her heritage while also understanding the contradictions and the baggage that come with that. Tom Petty was a native Floridian who also loved the South without harboring illusions about it, and so it makes sense that Williams would be a Petty fan, and not simply as one gifted songwriter respecting another. As part of her Lu’s Jukebox series, designed to help independent music venues shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, Williams has cut a set of her favorite Tom Petty tunes, and Runnin’ Down a Dream: A Tribute to Tom Petty is long on songs about Southern life, including “Gainesville,” “Down South,” “Rebels,” “Southern Accents,” and “Louisiana Rain.”

The second in a series of albums drawn from livestream concerts Lucinda Williams presented to benefit independent music venues hit hard during the COVID-19 pandemic, Lu's Jukebox, Vol. 2: Southern Soul – From Memphis to Muscle Shoals is the sort of album so well-suited to her gifts that one wonders why she didn't do this sooner. As a performer, Williams has never shied away from showing off the influence of vintage blues and R&B, and for this LP, she covers nine classic soul tunes from the 1960s and early '70s, with two ringers added for seasoning: a lean and swampy take on Bobbie Gentry's "Ode to Billy Joe" and a slow, sensuous reimagining of her own "Still I Long for Your Kiss." This material was cut live in the studio with Williams' road band, and they approach this music as true fans who happen to have some ideas of their own.

The Jayhawks’ seventh album backs away from their “super-pop” releases like Smile and the underrated Sound of Lies and looks back to their earlier, rootsier sound…

‘Tis the season for country-themed side projects. Just a few weeks before Mt. Desolation’s release, Tired Pony – another indie rock supergroup with rootsy inclinations – issued their own debut. What was billed as a country album turned out to be little more than standard pop/rock, though, which makes Mt. Desolation’s debut – recorded by a loose group of British musicians, with Keane's Tim Rice-Oxley and Jesse Quin serving as co-captains – all the more charming. The best songs here sound like genuine Americana, not pop songs dressed up in acoustic guitars and cowboy shirts, and even the filler material has a cohesion that’s rare for most first-time supergroups. “The Midnight Ghost,” with its barroom ambience and harmony vocals, is a woozy Western ballad that takes its cues from Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn, while “Platform 7” – featuring the Killers’ Ronnie Vannucci on percussion – is bar band country-rock, filled with all the twangy trimmings that the Killers attempted (with mixed results) on Sam’s Town.