Sparkle Carcass – Maraschino Chevy (2025)
Maraschino Chevy, the sophomore album from Sparkle Carcass, serves as a reminder that honesty still sells best when it’s wrapped up in twang and grit, in a time when country-rock far too frequently veers into formula or sarcasm. The husband-and-wife duo of Cody Palmer and Reilly Downes, joined by Justin Frederick on bass and Aaron Vincel on drums, crafts a record that feels lived-in and luminous. An eight-song odyssey through dive-bar nights, restless hearts, and the tender resilience of people who keep showing up for love and the music that saves them.
Sparkle Carcass first formed in 2017 around Palmer’s Texas-by-way-of-the-Midwest songwriting sensibilities, and those roots run deep through Maraschino Chevy. His lyrics retain the unpretentious bite of barroom confessionals, but they’re framed by arrangements that shimmer with a distinctly modern polish. Downes, whose solo work in Chicago has drawn comparisons to Margo Price and Lucinda Williams, lends both harmony and emotional dimension, her voice curling around Palmer’s like cigarette smoke in the glow of a neon sign. Together, they sound like the kind of couple who’ve weathered a few storms but still find reason to dance.
The album opens with ‘Texarkana Moonlight’, a dusty, mid-tempo rocker that announces the band’s confidence right out of the gate. Palmer’s guitar tone crackles like a long highway drive at dusk, while Downes’s harmonies evoke the kind of comfort only found in a shared silence between two people who’ve seen too much and love each other anyway.
‘Sippin’ On a Cool One’ turns the tempo up, delivering a two-step-ready anthem that could easily soundtrack any Friday night in a roadside honky tonk. There’s humour here, Palmer’s sly grin audible in every line, but also a trace of melancholy beneath the clinking bottles, reminding us that celebration often comes with its own quiet ache. Then comes ‘Not Ever’, a slow-burning ballad that might be the emotional centrepiece of the record. Palmer sings with the kind of rawness that makes you believe every word, while Downes’s harmonies float just out of reach, like a memory you can’t quite grab hold of.
The album’s title track, ‘Maraschino Chevy’, gleams with both nostalgia and mischief. Over a jangly rhythm and sugar-sweet steel, the duo delivers a love song that feels equal parts teenage joyride and grown-up redemption. It’s country music at its best, simple, direct, and irresistibly evocative.
But the album’s standout moment might be ‘Rainy Day Head’, a barroom ballad that encapsulates everything that makes Sparkle Carcass compelling. The song begins with a damp acoustic strum before exploding into a Skynyrd-meets-Stones groove. “Been livin’ on water and bread /It’s a rainy day in my head,” Palmer sings, his voice weary but unbroken. The steel guitar sighs in the background, conjuring that uniquely Southern brand of beauty born from regret. It’s a song about survival, of the heart, of the dream, of the stubborn will to keep making music no matter how many storms roll through.
Closing with ‘Galdwell County’, Sparkle Carcass ties the record together with a sense of place and purpose. It’s a homecoming of sorts, geographic, emotional, and spiritual.
With Maraschino Chevy, Sparkle Carcass have not only refined their sound but deepened their storytelling. This isn’t nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake, it’s a portrait of real people, real love, and the messy grace of everyday life. It’s the kind of record that reminds you why country music still matters: because it tells the truth, even when it hurts.
Find out more about Sparkle Carcass on their official website, Facebook, Instagram and Spotify.
This artist was sent to us by Clarion Call Media.
