Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats

Nathaniel Rateliff is a multi-faceted artist with roots in country music who has two major strands of work: He performs his introspective folk songs under his own name and turns to his backing band The Night Sweats for his more soul-oriented music that requires a bigger sound. And this set up makes a difference. The Rateliff that appears with The Night Sweats is an outgoing, bold singer who sings with a swagger as he dives right into old school rock'n roll, gospel, and all kinds of retro goodness while managing to not sound particularly retro, and writing some top-notch songs in the process. There are shades in his voice that comes out mostly in this context ... perhaps because he is having a ball (his take on Bob Dylan's vocal mannerisms in "The Future", is indeed, priceless). The music benefits a great deal from the band's tightness and enthusiasm as well as the volume that the brass section brings to the table.