Album Review – Josie Toney’s “Extra”
Maybe you recognize Josie Toney as the fiddle player and harmonizer that helped underpin the rabid success of Sierra Ferrell and her band for the last few years, or maybe you don’t. Or maybe if you’re from the Northwest or the Boston area and kick around the roots scene, perhaps you recognize her from projects before then. But either way, Josie Toney has officially struck out on her own with an album she’s calling Extra that’s full of her original songs, and it’s proving she shouldn’t be typecast as a side player. She’s got music and a sound that’s all her own, and deserves her own dedicated spotlight.
Originally from Olympia, Washington with a family history in music including old-time and other traditional styles, Josie Toney is so much more than just a fiddle player. A graduate of the Berklee College of Music in Boston, she received the Sam Eisenson Award for Country Music from the prestigious music school, and also won the FreshGrass fiddle championship in 2019. She’s now taking all of her time learning, practicing, studying, playing for others, and teaching as a private instructor, and putting it all on red in service of her own career.
Extra is everything you were hoping Josie Toney’s debut album would be. When she sings, Toney evokes the ghosts of the classic country era by mixing old-school country with old-school blues indicative at times of Hank One. You may think of her as an instrumentalist first, but the album showcases a confident and seemingly effortless vocal delivery with plenty of pain and emotion behind the lyrics, and even the appearance of a yodel.
This album captures Josie Toney in a time of young adulthood where you work all day, and trek out at night searching for love, only to often strike out or to be led down primrose paths to heartbreak. Listening through Extra, it’s not hard to envision Josie sitting on the edge of her bed in a lonely apartment, plucking on a guitar and chewing on the end of a pen, composing out her sincere feelings of loneliness and frustration in real time, and in a way that’s palpable to us all no matter our personal stage in life.
“Cryin’ Lonesome” is some Hank Sr. level country blues sadness, and “Nobody’s Gonna Cry For Me” turns it up even another notch with the extra touch of a console steel guitar mimicking the cry of the yearning heart. Imbuing each song with autobiographical authenticity like “City Girl Blues” just allows each verse to sink its teeth into you that much more. Homesick and lonesome, “Extra” about being filled up with love but nobody to give it to is hard to not fall for. You hope for Josie’s sake that she finally finds the love she’s seeking, but you’re selfishly thankful for the time she spent alone since it have rise to such beautifully devastating songs.
Make no mistake about it, Extra announces Josie Toney as the latest artist to enter the realm of 50s-inspired classic country artists who can evoke the Golden Era of country with modern appeal in a way that quenches old souls. Producer Rachel Baiman (an accomplished performer and songwriter herself) did a great job helping to pick the right accompaniments to Toney’s songs, and evoking the proper era by instrument and tone selection.
It’s been so frustrating over the last few years as independent country artists have been on such a significant rise, but women haven’t always found equal success to their male counterparts. As Sierra Ferrell has shown promise in breaking through that ceiling, others like Josey Toney can hopefully join in on that success by proxy. Extra certainly has the gusto to find Josie Toney an audience. And it’s one she’s earned all on her own.
8/10
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April 10, 2023 @ 8:56 am
Really enjoying this so far. Thank for the find, Trig! The value of this site is remarkable and appreciated.
April 10, 2023 @ 1:55 pm
Yup! You got me, Trigger!
April 12, 2023 @ 6:26 am
Yeah, I’d say probably 70% of the records I buy these days are things I come across through Saving Country Music. And yeah, this will probably be one of them…
April 10, 2023 @ 3:04 pm
immediately added to applemusic, thanks for the heads up
April 10, 2023 @ 4:29 pm
This author is obviously a Cardi B fan! Where’s the story on Hunter’s laptop!…oh wrong article. This is the type of post that should have a hundred comments and has 3. Loving the embedded songs and that 50’s country throwback style. That’s much more my style than the 90s resurgence we’re seeing more of.
April 10, 2023 @ 6:04 pm
On these articles with no comments, sometimes I wonder if there’s just nothing to say other than “yep, it’s good”, rather than nobody reading it. I hope it’s the former.
Anyway, I first heard Josie at a writer’s round I guess you’d call it, right before Covid, and was pretty blown away. Haven’t got the full album yet, but from these videos it seems like it will exceed my expectations.
April 11, 2023 @ 5:22 am
Without getting too meta about it, “yep, its good” doesn’t generate a lot of comments or reaction as some comments about an artist’s twitter feed that doesn’t have anything to do with the actual music. Easy to get mental clickbait from outrage, less so from sharing how much you are enjoying some new music. I try to remember to thank Trig when he reviews something like this but it often takes a couple of days of listening to really appreciate it.
I hope others are enjoying this as much as I am and that Ms. Toney puts Washington DC on the list of places to play soon. Y’all in Nashville are lucky to be able to see her.
April 11, 2023 @ 9:04 am
Sometimes the albums reviewed aren’t exceptional enough to praise, or bad enough to criticize. Those are the things that usually draw comments to an album review. People rarely comment that it’s alright. This album is a good example. I personally enjoy the Album reviews more than the political stuff, so I usually try to leave some form of comment so Trigger will continue to do them, as I did for this album. Sometimes it’s just thanks for the review.
April 11, 2023 @ 9:14 am
Comments don’t always denote traffic or engagement with an article. They just deonte comments. Generally speaking, album reviews get less traffic than other articles (though not always), but they also get a really important type of traffic, which is folks who are so engaged with music that they would actually take the time to read an album review. These are the kinds of folks who will take active participation in an artist’s career, buy their merch, go see them live. And so they are really important.
There are a lot of folks that love to talk a big talk about supporting artists in music, or supporting women especially, but won’t take the time to do this type of ground-level coverage of artists just starting out because they won’t draw big traffic numbers. Someone has to write about Josie Toney first and break that ground, and I’m more than happy to. Sometimes artists like this blow up, and then you can boast about being “first” on them. I was the first to write about Sierra Ferrell, the first to write about Sturgill Simpson, and so on, and so forth. This is how we save country music from the grassroots up.
It’s always great to see a lot of discussion around an artist or album. But either way, I’ll be writing about these folks, and keep searching for the next needle in the haystack. Because there’s nothing more fulfilling than getting on the ground level with an artist and watching their career take off.
April 10, 2023 @ 11:22 pm
Heyo! Got to love some local music! Definitely going to check this out! It sounds fantastic!
April 11, 2023 @ 5:17 am
This fuckin rips. I’m usually not the biggest fan of the 50s throwback style, but god damn it suits her so well in these songs. The writing is so honest and just unpolished enough to where it feels like she’s talking right to you. good stuff
Jeremy pinnell rips also
April 11, 2023 @ 6:25 am
Unrelated, unless you want to do a three degrees of separation thing, I just got an email for a music event in Denver called Dusty Boots. Apparently it’s the first year going, and of course it’ll start a month after I’ll have moved to NC so I’ll miss it, but I’ve never seen a lineup here like this: Colter Wall, Orville Peck, Margo Price, Houndmouth, Futurebirds, Murder By Death, Nick Shoulders, Willi Carlisle, Casey James Prestwood, Kyle Moon & The Misled, Extra Gold, Honey Blazer.
I don’t know half those names, but having Colter Wall and Nick Shoulders would be enough for me to buy a ticket if I were to still live here.
April 13, 2023 @ 10:32 am
That line up is so good that I really considered spending my summer vacation budget on visiting my cousin in Denver from NC and seeing that show.
April 11, 2023 @ 6:30 am
There’s an upside and a downside for Josie with the connection to Sierra Ferrel. The upside is that this album will get attention it probably never would have without her association. The downside is that this album will inevitably be compared to Sierra’s music and creativity.
Deservedly or not, the comparison shows a difference in Toney and artist like Ferrel who has taken old time traditional sounds and formed them into her own unique style. While this album is enjoyable, it fails to really bring anything new or original to the table in a way that Sierra has. Overall a good album, but unable to separate itself from similar sounding albums from her male counterparts in the retro country lane. Hopefully the future takes Toney, who is obviously talented, in a direction of growth and expanding her sound.
One exception for me is the song Extra which is a standout on this album simply because it sounds different than the rest of the album. Love the guitar in this song. I see why she named the album after this one.
April 13, 2023 @ 10:29 am
I’m enthralled from the first yodel I heard in Cryin Lonesome. It reminds me so much of Patsy Cline how much control she has of her vocals. Thanks for this review, Trigger!