Ponderosa Grove is a community band. A strange term perhaps, but one that particularly defines their style. Without a fixation on the closed walls of genre, their debut album brings together songs that are folky, dancey, and even anthemic. They play with a sense of joy, a passion that you can feel in each note and lyric that makes you feel part of the experience.
The Arizona based group came together at the onset of the Pandemic in an attempt to infuse some joy in their own musical journeys and to create an album that could showcase the collective talent of their hometown Prescott. While Candace Devine, Drew Hall, and Johan Glidden form the permanent cast, an ensemble of local talent have featured on the eleven track debut. Listening to the project gives an almost nostalgic feeling. There is something old-school with Ponderosa Grove, and I mean that in the best possible way.
Influenced by Fleetwood Mac, The Eagles, Queen, Lake Street Dive, John Mayer, Adele, Lady A, and Crosby Stills Nash and Young, you can tell the group has an affection towards classic rock and folk. Even their modern influences are themselves quite traditional.
The themes on the album are fairly universal, addressing modernity, love, mental health, and regret. The opener is particularly pertinent — a song about looking up from your device and embracing the moment you find yourself in. ‘Freedom Ride’ delves into similar topics, addressing our need to escape the monotonous mundanity of everyday life and choosing liberation through the unknown. Their most streamed tune, ‘Waterline’, touches on the longing of a long distance relationship in an incredibly nuanced way. A song like ‘Till Tomorrow’ is more understated and folksy, but immediately it’s followed by ‘Save My Soul’ — an anthemic choir blasting sing-along song about redemption. Even on ‘Till Tomorrow’, there’s a masterful build-up that creates an enthralling crescendo. ‘Holding Me Back’ is the most Americana and country-esque tune in the album, while the closer ‘Into The Blue’ is a beautifully melancholic song about regrets while emphasizing self-growth.
In essence then, ‘The Debut’ from Ponderosa Grove has a little bit of everything. At its core, it’s an album driven by the collectivism that music can inspire. Anthemic, choir based sing-along choruses, a host of diverse instrumentation and soundscapes, and thematically based on universal emotions, it places feeling at the centre of its craft. As with any project like this, I can only imagine how much more impactful and emotive the experience would be in a live setting. Make no mistake, any collective based musical undertaking is best heard with the collective in the room or stage!
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