NEW RELEASES FROM THE HOLMES BROTHERS AND KENNY NEAL & BILLY BRANCH SET FOR RELEASE

SIMPLE TRUTHS features 13 striking songs reflecting The Holmes Brothers’ wide-ranging musical palette. The CD brings the group back into the secular world (after their spiritually-driven Alligator debut, the Joan Osborne-produced SPEAKING IN TONGUES) while still holding tight to their rich gospel harmonies and rough-edged vocals. Produced by Grammy winner Craig Street (Norah Jones), SIMPLE TRUTHS features an amazing collection of songs written by some of the greatest songwriters of the last 60 years, including Townes Van Zandt (If I Needed You), Bob Marley (Concrete Jungle), Gillian Welch (Everything Is Free), Willie Nelson (Opportunity To Cry) and Hank Williams (I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry) as well as soulful reinventions of Collective Soul’s Shine and Bruce Channel’s Hey Baby. The Holmes Brothers’ spirited original material (Run Myself Out Of Town; We Meet, We Part, We Remember; You Won’t Be Livin’ Here Anymore; and I’m So Lonely) fits perfectly alongside the rest of the songs on this transcendent, boundary-defying release. Already, the All Music Guide said, “Music like this deserves to be played from every open window. This is the first great record of 2004.”

DOUBLE TAKE is the first recorded collaboration between Kenny Neal and Billy Branch – and the first acoustic album for both. The CD blends deep blues tradition with a contemporary, pulsating edge, with Neal and Branch delivering a foot-stomping and uplifting celebration of blues tradition. From St. Louis Jimmy’s Goin’ Down Slow to the Little Walter gems My Babe (written by Willie Dixon) and I Just Keep Loving Her to Sonny Boy Williamson’s Don’t Start Me Talking to the originals Billy and Kenny’s Stomp and Northern Man Blues, the two trade vocals in a relaxed and warm meeting of styles, riffs, whoops and hollers.