Charles Wesley Godwin

One Liner: Zach Bryan's wingman making coal dust country

Wikipedia Genre: Country

Home: Morgantown, WV

Poster Position: small Type 
Saturday.

Thoughts: Absolutely have never heard of this one.  But it looks like he is in cahoots with Zach Bryan - the top single listed on his Spotify page is a Bryan tune that this dude appears on, called "Jamie."  And that song is cool - they work together with similar sounds and a sparse arrangement that sounds classic.

Godwin is from West Virginia, he has the sound of a roughneck coal worker who happened to get good at guitar and made some tunes about what he knew.  He started doing some music when he was attending West Virginia University, and claims to have been inspired by a perfect list of inspirations - Kristoferson, Willie, Prine, Chris Knight (totally underrated and awesome), and Ryan Bingham.  The others he reminds me of is Slaid Cleaves and Steve Earle.

Two albums - 2019's Seneca and 2021's How The Mighty Fall.  The debut album has three of his top songs including the top streamer, called "Hardwood Floors."  5.3 million streams.

High energy and rockin'.  With that fiddle and those guitars, this tune is going to whip people into a frenzy.  His sound actually seems to work like that - a chill folky tune and then a barn burner with rock and roll guitars.  Many of his tunes sound more like the Zach Bryan thing of a quiet story told over a lovely guitar line, but then right when you think that is the sound, he throws "Blood Feud" with an "Ain't Going Down Til the Sun Comes Up"-style rave-up your way.  "Sorry For The Wait" almost has an Irish lilt to it.

The new disc is really good - I've just been diving back in to it a few times the past two days.  "Strong" has a guitar solo that sounds like something Jason Isbell might have cooked up and an uptempo beat.  "Lyin' low" makes me think of the Tyler Childers song "Whitehouse Road."  "How the Mighty Fall" has a John Mayer guitar sound in there.  I actually really enjoy this album.  The top track is that "Lyin' low" one, see if you heard the "Whitehouse Road" comparison.  Just over 2 million streams.

I mean, come on.  He's singing about living up the holler over the top of banjo and fiddle.  This is like a theme song for one of the minor bad guys in Justified.

I'd absolutely go check this out.  Loving it.