The 17 Best Southern Albums of 2017

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The 17 Best Southern Albums of 2017

Freedom Highway
Rhiannon Giddens

Any album that shares a title with a Staples Singers civil rights anthem has a lot to live up to, and Freedom Highway, from MacArthur “Genius” Grant winner Rhiannon Giddens, approaches the challenge masterfully. The opener, “At the Purchaser’s Option,” takes its name—and its narrator—from a 19^th century advertisement for a female slave. Giddens’s take on “Birmingham Sunday” is a chilling reminder of more recent atrocities, and up-tempo horns belie a grim warning about police brutality on “Better Get It Right the First Time.” But Freedom Highway is hopeful, too, from the romantic New Orleans sound on “The Love We Almost Had” to the hymn-like “We Could Fly.” It’s essential listening for our time.

Essential Tracks: “At the Purchaser’s Option” and the understated picking of “The Angels Laid Him Away.”