Mobile, Alabama country duo Muscadine Bloodline released their new album, The Coastal Plain, on Friday (August 16). It’s a quick follow-up to 2023’s Teenage Dixie that reflects the evolving sound of the rising country stars. Muscadine Bloodline is made up of Charlie Muncaster and Gary Stanton, who ignored major labels to stay independent on their new album. “If there was a phrase for this record, it would be ‘proving ground,’” Stanton says. “To kind of tip a hat to Charlie and I, being that we’re an independent band and not in cahoots with a lot of people. So, as songwriters, he and I were just like, we want to write the bulk of this record.”

Muscadine’s current single, “Tickets to Turnpike,” is a nod to Turnpike Troubadours, who tipped them as their opening act the last two years. “Going on the road with Turnpike, after growing up being inspired by those cats and their records, we just wanted to have an ode to those guys,” Muncaster says. Turnpike’s Kyle Nix even plays fiddle on the song. “We could have just gotten anybody in town to do it, but it wouldn’t have been Kyle playing,” Muncaster says. (Rolling Stone)