Arty Hill - A Thousand Smoky Nights

Voted 2021 Album of the Year by Eddie White, Ameripolitan Award-Winning DJ, Cosmic Cowboy Cafe, 2RRR 88.5 FM, Sydney, Australia

I am a long-time fan and friend of Arty Hill. He never fails to deliver quality music with whatever project he is creating, and A THOUSAND SMOKY NIGHTS nails it yet again. His vocals on this album are superb — one minute going way deep into the heart of country music and the next blowing out the truck doors full volume.

Arty Hill delivers the goods: top drawer songwriting, singing, musicians, and production. From the brash R’n’R of "I Feel A Twang Coming On" to the open-heart surgery of "Are You Sleeping," there’s a wealth of real deal Honky-Tonk in here.

Life just got a lot better. Live music and Arty Hill are back! A Thousand Smoky Nights is a honky-tonker's dream. It delivers heartache and misery with "The Last Foolish Thing I'll Do" and "The Lonely Game In Town." Then, there's the boot-scootin' gold of "Honky Tonk OCD" and the best song story of all, "Big Wheel!"

A Thousand Smoky Nights brings me back to the alleyways winding around Baltimore’s waterfront dives, where the scent of cheap cologne and cigarettes collides with the aroma of Royal Farms fried chicken, Old Bay, and exhaust fumes...

Arty Hill - Live: Church on Saturday Night

Words like beer-stained and whiskey-drenched don't really do justice to the work of Arty Hill... He is one of country music's most underrated songwriters.

With his new live album, Arty has done it again and gotten me once more.

Live: Church on Saturday Night — #18 on Americana Music Show's Best 40 CDs of 2016.

Arty Hill has created his own honky tonk utopia in Baltimore. But to get there he had to go back in time and observe that sacred moment in country music — a Saturday night in Nashville, 1951...

Arty Hill - Heart on My Dirty Sleeve

No-bullshit honky-tonk hero carries the torch for the hard-livin', harder drinkin', troubled sweethearts of unaffected real-talk country.

Arty Hill has the perfect voice for singing real country, and does full justice to all his high quality writing. All 27 songs here have a unique, special feel, and moments of greatness.

I knew ahead of time what Arty Hill was planning — to release a double CD with 27 original songs. Was he crazy? Turns out, no. He definitely had the material... The vocals and songwriting are top flight and the title is perfect.

Arty Hill - Another Lost Highway

Some call this music modern honky tonk. Heck, this is the way country music should sound, period.

One of the best country singers going right now is not from Texas or from Tennessee — he’s from Baltimore and his name is Arty Hill. He’s also a first-class songwriter...

This powerful collection of country songs shows us the expected thrills and cold-morning chills of the honky tonk life — from some unexpected angles.

Another Lost Highway is the best record I've heard in a long time. We get review copies for free, but I would buy it with my own cash money.

If you don't like western swingin', top-notch twangin', sweet singin' barn burners, then you need to get your American parts checked.

Arty Hill - Montgomery on My Mind

Perhaps because [Hank Williams's] music is so good and even somewhat difficult, many stay away out of respect, but that is not a problem for Arty Hill & His Long Gone Daddys... Hill sings faithfully, and adds his own "Church on Saturday Night" in homage to the icons of Nashville back in 1951.

This laid-back and loving celebration from cow'n'tree maestro Hill and his hound-dog gang stands and will continue to do so like a whole desert of cacti for many a year, blue moon, midnight howl, and cold-kissed dawn.

With Arty Hill, anyone into Real Country should be happy with anything they can get — there are times when he reminds me of Don Walser, and you can't say any fairer than that... Hill is currently setting the bar for male country singers.

This fine EP from Arty Hill is rooted in the 50s but very much about today... hardcore and heartfelt.

Making a tribute album to Hank Williams could be career suicide, but Arty Hill and His Long Gone Daddys pull off their eight-song homage with solid vocals, great picking, and most of all, a ton of respect.

Arty Hill - Back on the Rail (2009 reissue)

The Long Gone Daddys are one fabulous band, and Hill is a 'billy singer who delivers the narrative — sad, bitter, wry, humorous or odd — with absolute authority. He is, moreover, a country songwriter of the first order.

Hill and his two-man assembly line plough out the sparsely-attended, softly-hewn but hard-bitten songs of heavy heft and sharp reckoning of the stripe usually associated with Texan poets like Guy Clark or Rodney Crowell.

Drenched in sawdust-on-the-floor feeling and smartly sequenced, Back on the Rail is what country music used to be all about.

Vocally, Hill is perfect for these songs. The 'everyman' quality of his voice is reminiscent of Johnny Cash, and he has the integrity and skill to convey lyrics ranging from funny and silly to serious.

This is what country music should be: real music by real people for real folks.

Previously

[Back on the Rail is a] self-released jewel... much too good to be overlooked. It's the real deal, Honky Tonk Country with intelligent, totally heartfelt lyrics, great production, singing and picking.

Voted Austin's Best New Band of 2005, the Texas Sapphires have a secret weapon named Arty Hill in the unlikely city of Baltimore. Hill's stone-cold 'Driftin' In' and the lowdown 'Bring out the Bible (We Ain't Got a Prayer)' mark the high point of the Sapphires' debut.

The Houston Press gave a great review to "Valley So Steep," which includes their versions of Arty's songs "Driftin In" and "Bring out the Bible (We Ain't Got a Prayer)." William Michael Smith said: "If honky-tonk has a future, hopefully it will sound a lot like 'Driftin' In' or 'Bring Out the Bible (We Ain't Got a Prayer)."

Arty Hill's songs are salted with tears and steeped in the rich brew of classic country and western. Shaded from Nashville's bright lights, Hill draws inspiration from the streets of Baltimore, and his tunes should be in heavy rotation on every jukebox in every corner tavern.

[Arty Hill and the Long Gone Daddys are] firmly rooted in the country traditions of Hank Williams and George Jones, yet find equal footing in the earth-quakin' rattle of Sun-era rockabilly.

"The Streets of Baltimore" has reigned as the official Baltimore Country Song for decades, but in Arty Hill's "I Left Highlandtown," there's a respectable rival. It slaps impressive lyrics on top of basic Tele-twang-and-shuffle backing custom-built for red-lit barrooms.

"Jackson Shake," "Drifting In," and "Back on the Rail" perfectly deliver that jumping old country vibe so many try to nail and so many fail at. Great songs, great production, and great singing/picking — it's all here. Pay close attention to "Tammerlane." It is a masterpiece.

[Arty Hill and the Long Gone Daddys] make music in the spirit of classic country — Hank Williams, Johnny Cash — but add a strong dose of '50s rockabilly to the mix. It's the kind of music that makes you want to get up and throw your sweetheart around the dance floor and drown your sorrows in another pint of beer.

[Arty Hill's] music is grounded, genuine. When he sings alone... a vulnerable sweetness emerges and it is hard to resist.