Paul Howard wanted to keep things fun and relatable when he wrote Rodeo Mouth’s latest single. Those adjectives rightly sum up a band that began when the Nashville music-industry fixture began crafting the skewed, folky originals he’d occasionally unveil at solo gigs in his adopted Music City hometown. Before long, Howard began acquiring band members from a pool of friends who’d also relocated to Nashville from upstate New York—and Rodeo Mouth wasn’t so much born as aggregated.
The quartet floated a series of singles in 2024 and 2025, seeking an offbeat place for its “acid Americana” to land in a city with way more going for it these days than Kid Rock and commercial country. Rodeo Mouth found enough of an audience at Nashville clubs—and some airplay on local radio—to warrant the self-issued Terrestrial Thrills. Slated for release May 22, Rodeo Mouth’s debut LP was mostly recorded live to tape at the Bomb Shelter in East Nashville. The driving rock ’n’ roll energy of “Pretty Sweet Deal” harkens all the way back to Chuck Berry, updated with a dash of present-day salt-of-the-earth humor.
“The relatable aspect is getting stoked when you find good deals and bargains out there in the world, which we all know is harder and harder to come by these days,” says Howard, who’s also the founder and editor of the blog Music Mecca. “Not even so much just the consumerist ideation, but also just acknowledging when good things happen to you. Beyond that, it’s simply about savoring the small victories in life, because sometimes that’s all we have.”
We’re proud to premiere Rodeo Mouth’s “Pretty Sweet Deal.”
—Hobart Rowland
See Rodeo Mouth live.
