Luke Bell – The King is Back [Cloudy LP]

As a leader of country-western music, Luke Bell’s time on the throne was short. He released one official album during his lifetime, delivering a mix of honky-tonk shuffles and Bakersfield barnburners in a voice as magnetic as his own personality. He toured briefly, graduating from career-launching gigs in the dive bars of Austin and Nashville to bucket-list shows opening for Willie Nelson and Dwight Yoakam. And then he disappeared from the public eye to privately wage a war with the mental illness that eventually claimed his life. He was just 32 years old.

Three years after his passing, Luke’s music endures. Nowhere is that more apparent than The King Is Back, a posthumous collection of studio recordings most of them previously unreleased that showcase his full range as a storyteller and songwriter. Tracked between November 2013 and August 2016, these 28 songs capture Luke in his artistic prime, spinning stories about blue-collar workers, hear