Tyler Childers

Hailing from the Appalachian Mountains in Kentucky, Tyler Childers is part of a wave of 2010s Americana artists who prize authenticity both in their songs and sound. Sonically, he borrows heavily from the weathered, ornery progressive country records of the 1970s, a comparison brought into sharp relief on his second album, 2017′s Purgatory, which was produced by the acclaimed Americana rocker Sturgill Simpson. Childers’ success continued with a Grammy nomination for “All Your’n,” a cut from 2020′s politically charged bluegrass album Long Violent History. Where that record benefitted from his control, its 2022 successor Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven? showcased his ambition, featuring a variety of styles spread over the course of three LPs. Childers tightened back up for Rustin’ in the Rain, an alternately raucous and empathetic album from 2023.
Purgatory may have been Childers’ breakthrough, but he has played since his childhood in Lawrence County, Kentucky, and had been performing professionally for over half a decade. As a young adult, he relocated to Lexington and played with a band called the Food Stamps. He began his solo career with the self-released 2011 album Bottles & Bibles and continued to write and perform for the next five years. Miles Miller, a friend of Childers’ and the drummer for Sturgill Simpson, introduced the two singer/songwriters, and Simpson decided to produce a record for Childers with the assistance of engineer David Ferguson. The resulting Purgatory arrived in August 2017 on Thirty Tigers, and was followed in 2018 by Live on Red Barn, Radio Pts. I & II, a reissue of a pair of EPs taken from two 2013 performances for the Lexington-based Red Barn Radio program.
Childers’ third studio album, Country Squire, appeared in August 2019 and included the singles “House Fire” and “All Your’n,” the latter of which earned him a Grammy nomination for Best Country Solo Performance. He returned in September 2020 with his fourth full-length, the Grammy-nominated Long Violent History, which topped the folk chart and hit number 45 on the Billboard 200. The stirring “Angel Band” appeared in September 2022 ahead of Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven?, a triple album that featured a set of eight original songs performed in three different ways: a live set recorded with the Food Stamps, an overdubbed rendition, and a “Joyful Noise” version. Upon its release in September 2022, Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven? became Childers’ highest-charting album, debuting at eight on the Billboard Top 200.
He released the succinct, seven-song Rustin’ in the Rain in September 2023, heralding the record’s release with “In Your Love,” a ballad accompanied by a music video depicting the romance between two gay miners in the Kentucky of the 1950s. Rustin’ in the Rain featured guest appearances by Margo Price, S.G. Goodman, and the Travelin' McCourys. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine