Congratulations to Hurray for the Riff Raff (aka Alynda Segarra), who will receive the International Folk Music Awards 2024 People’s Voice Award, presented to "an individual who unabashedly embraces social and political commentary in their creative work and public careers," and to Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway, who are nominated for the International Folk Music Awards' Album of the Year for City of Gold (which is also up for the Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album). Winners are determined by the voting membership of Folk Alliance International; the awards will be presented in a ceremony at the Folk Alliance International Conference in Kansas City, Missouri, on February 21, 2024.

Hurray for the Riff Raff's new album, The Past Is Still Alive, is due February 23 on Nonesuch. Segarra created the album during a period of personal grief, when they found inspiration in radical poetry, railroad culture, outsider art, the work of writer Eileen Myles, and activist groups like ACT UP and Gran Fury. Segarra uses their lyrics as a way to immortalize and say goodbye to those they have loved and lost, and to honor both the heartbroken and the hopeful parts of themselves. Though made in North Carolina by the Bronx-born, New Orleans-based Segarra and produced by Brad Cook, the record brings listeners to places far beyond, evoking vivid experiences of small shops and buffalo stampedes in Santa Fe, childhood road trips and Florida storms, struggles of addiction in the Lower East Side, and days-long journeys to outrun the cops in Nebraska. You can hear the first track, "Alibi," and pre-order the album here.

Singer, songwriter, and musician Molly Tuttle and her band Golden Highway’s second album, City of Gold, follows their acclaimed 2022 record, Crooked Tree, which won the Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album. Produced by Tuttle and Jerry Douglas and recorded in Nashville, City of Gold was inspired by Tuttle’s near constant touring with Golden Highway and their growth together as musicians and performers, cohering as a band. These 13 tracks—mostly written by Tuttle and Ketch Secor (Old Crow Medicine Show)—capture the electric energy of the band’s live shows by highlighting each member’s musical strengths. City of Gold also features special guest Dave Matthews on the song “Yosemite.” You can hear it and get the album here.