This is my third time reviewing a CD for the Stillhouse Junkies. The first was in 2018 for their CD Over the Pass, on my own blog (Stillhouse Junkies - Over the Pass), then their CD Calamity in a 2020 issue of this magazine (Bluegrass Standard - Stillhouse Junkies – Calamity) before they won the IBMA award for 2021 Momentum Band of the Year. The Stillhouse Junkies have not rested on their laurels, continuing to give us new, fresh music, superbly performed.

This three-piece band, consisting of Fred Kosak, Alissa Wolf, and Cody Tinnin, is not traditional Bluegrass but something between it and a loose, banjo-less jam band. Three-piece bands, when they get in the pocket, manage to sound like a much bigger band. The Stillhouse Junkies sure manage to sound bigger than they are. Their synergy yields something much larger than their three-piece status would lead us to believe.

Every song on Small Towns is original, except for one surprising but not unwelcome, Lindsey Buckingham (Fleetwood Mac) tune. We are again presented with the wonderful, intriguing writing of Kosak, and this time also being offered selections from the pen of Tinnin and Wolf, whom both shine with their song contributions.

The songs are:

1. Moonlight Over Ridgway (Tinnin)
2. Over the Pass (Kosak)
3. River of Lost Souls (Kosak)
4. Evergreen (Kosak)
5. Never Going Back Again (Buckingham)
6. Half a Pound of Silver (Kosak)
7. Colorado Bound (Kosak)
8. El Camino (Wolf)
9. 1963 (Kosak)
10. Five doors down in Leadville (Tinnin)
11. On the House (Kosak)
12. Haskell Town (Tinnin)

I haven't yet written a review of a CD I don't like. Having limited myself to CDs I do like, picking a favorite song is typically difficult for me. I like every song presented on Small Towns, but my particular favorites are “Moonlight Over Ridgway,” “Evergreen,” “River of Lost Souls,” “Colorado Bound,” “El Camino,” “1963,” “Five Doors Down in Leadville,” and “Haskell Town.” That's eight favorites out of twelve songs. There's no point in picking a favorite when you like them all. What makes one song speak to someone more than another is so subjective. One line in a song may fasten itself to our memory, a fond or painful memory, and stick like jam, honey, and sorghum molasses to a recently busy breakfast table.

The Stillhouse Junkies have guest fiddler Becky Buller working some twin fiddle with Wolf on El Camino. Other than that, Kosak, Tinnin, and Wolf bring home the bacon all the way through. I particularly enjoyed Kosak's work on the octave mandolin. Many times throughout the CD, a remarkable tension is added by Tinnin's bass work and Wolf's backup fiddle as the band works its way through Colorado’s small towns. If this CD has a theme suggested by the lyrics and music, it is travel to a destination...urgent travel to a destination. Maybe the destination is Small Towns. They graciously take us along on their journey to and through those small towns.

It's a fine ride, too.