Palmyra

Palmyra is a Virginia-based Americana/Folk Rock trio composed of Teddy Chipouras, Sasha Landon, and Mānoa Bell. During the last three years, Palmyra—for now, a trio with upright bass, electric and acoustic guitars, mandolin or the mandocello, and lots of banjo—have cut a series of EPs and singles, often on the cheap and on the fly. When they realized the time had come to concentrate on a proper album, they recognized that they had a good problem: There were simply too many songs. Bell, Chipouras, and Landon are, after all, all songwriters, and Palmyra’s tunes take shape when one member brings a draft to the rest of the band to finish.

Palmyra straddles at least two musical worlds. They are, on one hand, a band from the South that plays traditional instruments and indeed once lived in the old-time locus of Floyd, Virginia. Comparisons to and a kinship with The Avett Brothers and even Old Crow Medicine Show are inevitable. On the other hand, Palmyra writes about suicide, gender dysphoria and identity, and an epidemic of financial survival in songs that flirt with soul, post-rock, and even emo; the South, too, is the place of My Morning Jacket, Band of Horses, Cat Power, and, now, Palmyra.

Where they fall on this divide doesn’t really matter. The 10 tracks of Restless are compulsive and immediate, true-to-life testimonials from three very good songwriters figuring out existence in real-time in verse. These are songs to be sung or shouted out loud, to be coveted as anthems as we try to make our own way from whatever shape we’re in toward whatever shape we hope to become.