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KORT’s Cortney Tidwell Is Gonna Love You Now: Bob Dylan’s “The Bootleg Series Vol. 9: The Witmark Demos: 1962-1964”

KORT is Lambchop frontman Kurt Wagner and solo singer/songwriter Cortney Tidwell, and with covers album Invariable Heartache (City Slang), the duo has recorded a sort of love letter to its hometown of Nashville and the city’s musical past. Eleven of the LP’s dozen tracks were originally recorded in the ’60s and ’70s for the Music City-based Chart Records (a label with huge familial ties for Tidwell), and the 12th song was cut by Tidwell’s mom, Connie Eaton, in 1975 for ABC Dunhill. And while the heartfelt Invariable Heartache is certainly ensconced in Nashville’s storied musical history, it’s a thoroughly modern statement by two of the town’s brightest hopes for Music City’s future being as fertile as its past. Wagner and Tidwell will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our new Q&A with them.

Tidwell: Whole lotta heartache here, folks, and it’s just demos, right? I got this over Christmas, and if there ever was a master expresser of heartache through song, this guy is it. I looked forward to such a release because next to just pen and paper, it don’t get more direct than this. Just the nuts and bolts of songwriting captured and distilled for the purpose of publishing interests. Terrific. A great document as much as anything, and though this may not be for everyone, it should be. An artist recording of an artist at work so other artists can record the artist’s work. Happens every day now, sure (we can use our phones), but back then?