These days, it can often times be a daunting task for those of us who are fans under the ever expanding umbrella of the genre known as country music to sift through the seemingly endless mire of tired, overplayed & shallow subjects like red solo cups, truck tailgates and bikini clad girls on a river bank (usually while also holding red solo cups and sitting on truck tailgates). My open-minded friend, Daniel Donato has entered the conversation to take us all away from all that exhausted, one-dimensional hogwash on a magic carpet ride through the cosmos. So saddle up partner, come take a ride with me…

Horizons is Donato’s third album, the follow-up to the critically acclaimed Reflector. Recorded at Nashville's Sputnik Sound Studio and released on the Retrace Music label, Donato tapped veteran producer Vance Powell (Trey Anastasio, Chris Stapleton, Jack White) for this effort.

With largely returning personnel from the sophomore album, (aside from new drummer William “Bronco” Clark and the guest additions of fiddler Lillie Mae Rische and pedal steel guitarist Brett Resnick) Donato, keyboardist Nathan “Sugar Legg” Aronowitz & bassist Will “Mustang” McGee weave a vibrant tapestry of sonic bliss over fifteen tracks that have all been heavily road tested and expanded upon. Reigning in those expansive jams to album length was a feat in and of itself, but Donato & Co. pull off the task in brilliant fashion. It is also immediately evident that Donato’s songwriting continues to grow and evolve from previous works, as this is undoubtedly his most polished album to date. And the end result? This is so much more than just happy campfire jams. That sound you hear is pure, unfiltered Americana pumping out of your speakers and into your ear canals.

The album begins innocuously enough with Blame The Train, and unlike trucks and tailgates, train themes never go out of style. Somebody seems to have run out again, only this time, right or wrong, the locomotive is the scapegoat. We then take a hard turn for the cosmos with Sunshine in the rain, complete with a super spacey bridge sequence, in which the question is posed “Who’s afraid of destiny?” Next up is some love and life advice in the form of Better deal blues, a little ditty that is utterly soaked in honest to goodness roadhouse style, complete with pedal steel guitar courtesy of the aforementioned Brett Resnick. We pick back up with Along the Trail, where the rallying cry of countless cowboys makes up the chorus: “The ties that bind, I pay no mind. Stretching out, undefined. All I've got to lose is time, along the trail back home.” This track has a distinctively boundless vibe to it, not unlike the quintessential American cowboy and his trusty horse. About the Angels adds a new dimension to the sonic tapestry of cosmic vibrations, the fiddle! Lillie Mae Rische’s beautiful work here introduces a gorgeous element to the band's sound, and has me pining at the thought of them adding a full time fiddle player. Themes of life on the trail are echoed here again, and with that we head over Yonder. Armed with an infectious chorus, if writing singles were the goal, this track has potential. The old cowboy ethos of self sufficiency and minimalism are reverberated here in a resounding and incredibly catchy fashion: "I'll surely find a way….just me and my guitar.” We then come to Translation; a tale of how mere words can sometimes fall flat when trying to express our love: “In my estimation, we're just lost, in translation.” The fiddle seems to drive the vibe on this track, and it has a certain beautiful sadness to it. Our next tune feels right at home in the honky tonks and country bars on Nashville’s Broadway, not far off from where a younger Donato used to busk, foot propped up on a milk crate, just hoping someone would listen to him; Broadside Ballad. Touching on subjects such as whiskey drinking, shooting tails off squealing pigs & the Ohio river, it's the tale of American frontiersman and legendary keel boater and brawler Mike Fink. We shift gears as we head into Hangman's Reel, and it's immediately apparent with the tasty little piano lick and Doobie Brothers-esque guitar chord pattern that make up the intro. The rug gets pulled once the main riff hits your ear drums, driven by the fiddle and a jaw harp, and this instrumental goes exceptionally hard. The band continues to raise the collective temperature in Prairie Spin with a searing funk rhythm and lyrics that evoke a particular passage of The Dead’s Dark Star : “Shall we go, you and I, while we can?” / “Now or never, let's go together, into forever, me and you.” For as catchy as the verses are, the song's chorus is the ultimate hook, all the way through the whispered spoken word capstone of the bridge. From there we dive into See Through. Anchored by a rollicking piano lick courtesy of Sugar Legg and including a ripping note from Donato’s guitar heading into a scorching solo that is positively breathtaking, the chorus of this number is a total earworm: "Won't you see through my eyes?” Although it seems like we may be taming down on the next track, Chore, do not be fooled; This is an absolute monster in concert, routinely eclipsing the twenty minute mark. The boys manage to pare it down to a mere eleven minutes and nineteen seconds for the studio cut, but despite that, all the tasty meat was left on the bone, due in large part to the expansive solo in the songs midsection. The sizzling energy of this track eventually falls away and we enter Another Dimension, which is a gorgeous little cosmic love song, and Resnick's long lonesome pedal steel absolutely shines on this track. Next up: Valhalla. Well partners, are we feeling it yet? Although the album is coming to a close, we aren't nearing our return to earth yet. Actually, quite the opposite. The track's raw energy is captured masterfully on this studio cut, with Mustang and Bronco building that brick house foundation in the intro, cascading into riffs utterly spilling forth from Daniel's guitar. From the verses to the chorus to the bridge, this song has more hooks than a fishing tackle box. Our last stop on the cosmic highway is Down Bedford, a hauntingly beautiful tune with simple, yet highly effective, lyrics. The imagery these words can conjure up is absolutely boundless, and limited only by the listener's own imagination. “It’s a long time gone, they cleaned out my room. The cherry on top of lost days and gloom”’; “Screen door captures a familiar scene, for richer or poorer done lost its sheen.” Common human experience threads such as time and coming home bring about a comforting familiarity to this track. The bridge eventually climaxes under a frenzy of heavy distortion before the telecaster kicks back in and reminds us all that planet earth is indeed still our home, until the outro careens into the heavens once again with the refrain: “Been sometimes tragic, been always true. Time works a magic, it shines right through.” before gently landing us back into the waiting arms of mother earth as the album comes to a close.

While the lyrics on Horizons are not overly profound, they really don't need to be. Donato himself has said as much: “I wanted the lyrics to be easy to understand, not abstract, there are many layers to the meanings and you think about it, but it’s not rocket science to understand them.” What this all boils down to is that, at the end of the day, you don't always need to be cryptic to be cosmic, my friends. And while the lyrics may not hit a level achieved by some of the poetic masters of the past, sometimes, it's what isn't said that speaks louder than any words could ever hope to. For it is within these places, when we let go of the safety net of spoken words, and time and space falls away, that is where the magic lives, and in it, we can all ground ourselves. In this expanse, the true genius of Daniel Donato is fully realized. Donato not only manages to transcend space and time with his psychedelic wizardry on the Telecaster, but he does it while also simultaneously sounding more firmly rooted in traditional country than pretty much anyone else in the genre currently can claim. By accomplishing this feat, cosmic country feels so very accessible and inclusive to fans of so many different genres, and it is those traits that gives Horizons its broad appeal. I could play this album for my kids, for my hippie millennial friends, or my boomer parents, and all would enjoy it, albeit for different reasons. It is my sincere belief that a hallmark of truly great art are pieces that can bring together legions of people from very different walks of life, and Horizons sets that up for us beautifully, if we only have the courage to open our minds, as well as our ears.

So, if you ever happen to find yourself lost in the cosmos, like a guiding star, Donato & Co. will always lead you back home with timeless American song craft that, just like mama’s home cooking, intensely satisfies the soul and deeply nourishes the spirit.

To cap it all off, Donato will be making his debut headlining performance at the mother church of country music, Nashville's storied Ryman Auditorium, on August 22, to celebrate the album's release.

Rating 8.5/10