The third album in singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Grant Maloy Smith’s roots music series is called Appalachia: American Stories. It follows his critically-acclaimed releases, Yellow Trailer and Dust Bowl: American Stories. As “The Coal Comes Up” opens, Jelly Roll Johnson’s harmonica wails mournfully beneath Smith’s lyrics and their deliberate exclamation of inner turmoil. Matt Combs’ fiddle, Rob Ickes’ Dobro and Trey Hensley’s guitar converse in the bouncy “Down to Hatchabee Road,” a song of going down to the river to wash one’s sins away.  All twelve original tunes, written by Smith, provide folksy tales to enjoy. “The Red Haired Girl from Hazard” is a tribute to his mother, “Sometimes You're the Holler” is a make-believe story of some little girls and their grandmother. “Gas Station Chicken” shows Smith’s witty side with a musical recipe that’s finger-pickin’ good.

Grant Maloy Smith’s countrified tenor makes the album whole as he relates his stories with poignant effectiveness and comforting warmth. Appalachia: American Stories has what we’ve come to expect from Smith: fine picking, vibrant vocals, and a lyrical emphasis on values of the past. As the album progresses, the singer recounts terse ballads (“By and By the Way”), somber meditations (“In This Twilight”) and gospel offerings (“I Have Faith”) in a rootsy Americana vein, as well as toe-tapping selections like “Must've Been the Moonlight.” This isn’t an album with a rustic, haunting mountain feeling but rather one with evocative, contemporary radio-friendly moments and messages in songs like “We Got Mountains,” rich in the humanity that animates the album’s intriguing Appalachian landscape. The 40-page glossy booklet that accompanies the album is a bonus with its photos, lyrics, sociological and historical perspectives. Co-produced by Jeff Silverman, the album’s creative tunes have well-balanced arrangements that beautifully blend and overlay musical passages. The resulting mountainous journey is like a patchwork quilt of interwoven multicolored hues. (Joe Ross, Roots Music Report)