Parker Bradley - Certain Days (2024)

Parker Bradley has a new album Certain Days, which was recorded between August and November last year at The Zone Recording Studio in Dripping Springs, Texas. It was produced by Pat Manske and Parker Bradley; and engineered and mixed by Pat Manske.

Everything about this album, every riff, every tone, and every song, is a tug at your heartstrings in the intensive highs and lows of Americana style.

“Painkiller” opens the album with a loping rhythm and “the pain in my chest runs straight to the tip of my tongue… you left me again threw all my guitars out the door….” and the song tackles the raw pain of rejection head on. “Lay Down” opens with the comforting sustained B3 organ sounds, and an easy pace “it ain’t easy to pick yourself up off the ground, so you lay down.”

On the title track “Certain Days” you get treated to electric guitar solos and “I lost another one to the whiskey, and you had to move on. I focus on my work, and how it pays, to figure out how to get through all these certain days.”

“Get in the Van” features subtle pedal steel by Lloyd Maines in a gentle ode to the road trip, a J-45, and the “chance to find a few songs inside… making all the music that we can.” “The Flatness of Kansas” again features pedal steel by Lloyd Maines and piano sounds and a lament for “Emmylou – if he could only make her smile. one hundred years is how long that we have been here.”

In covering the range of Americana styles, there’s even a little bit of Mark Knopfler tone in the mix for the sorrowful “Out of Range,” and the touching descriptions of being out of touch and out of range: “If there’s a way you can hear me darling, if there’s a way you can understand.” This is a highly laudable and satisfying album.