Roger Knox - Buluunarbi and the Old North Star LP

The Koori King of Country Roger Knox returns for his first album in twelve years and his first collection of original songs from the same label that brought you Kankawa Nagarra’s Wirlmarni last year, and as with that one, I can’t endorse this one enough!

Most recognisable as an interpreter of classic country songs (not to mention the iconic photo of him holding a Fender bass dressed in a pink nudie suit and a killer Elvis-style quiff), Knox’s songs draw upon country music lineages and tropes. Within them, he sings of travelling on country, confronting racism, stories of his mother’s birth in a tent, through to a commemoration of those murdered at Myall Creek.

Knox’s voice and the band accompaniments are lush, beautiful, and evocative, but it’s his voice as a songwriter that really shines through as the highlight of this record. Don’t wanna call it too early, but one of those albums that feels like it will be a future touchstone of Indigenous country! —Mitch