After previewing his latest album These Days over the past few weeks with several singles including the title track and “Let You Down, Vancouver-based singer/songwriter Tyson Ray Borsboom officially releases his new nine-song collection today, marking his arrival as one of Canada’s rising alt-country stars.
Tyson’s work on These Days embraces the kind of country music that doesn’t shy away from hardship and loss, and everything else that makes us human. It’s been a steady evolution for the artist originally from Calgary, from releasing his debut EP in 2018 to building an audience across western Canada through shows with Field Guide, Kacy & Clayton and others, and more recently to packing venues both in Canada and the EU.
For These Days, Tyson teamed up with producer Phenix Warren (Wyatt C. Louis, The Dust Collectors) to make the album at Pocono House in Calgary with a band of seasoned vets who have also worked with Noeline Hofmann and Shred Kelly. Now able to reflect on the sessions, Tyson describes the final product as the seamless result of working with a dream team.
“I think Phenix really understands where I’m at as a songwriter. He heard how I was performing the songs live, and we talked a lot about how my favourite records sound. We pretty much recorded my vocals and guitar and then I let him run with it. He’d send me mixes, and apart from a few minor tweaks, they would be perfect.”
On the current single from These Days, “Exit Sign,” Tyson echoes the classic alt-country sounds of Son Volt and Steve Earle, up to more current practitioners such as Jason Isbell and MJ Lenderman. With his voice blending naturally with the track’s easy-flowing pedal steel and organ parts, “Exit Sign” is a highlight on an album that from top to bottom is sure to appeal to all Americana fans.
With a 30-date tour of western Canada currently underway, these fans are among the first are to experience Tyson’s songwriting gifts and magnetic stage presence in person, with many more expected to get that opportunity in the near future.
And like the long drives across the Prairies that he’s intimately familiar with, Tyson’s songs carry a sense of place, along with serving as a traveling companion, there to remind us that we’re doing the best we can.
