Margo Cilker
Valley Of Heart’s Delight
September 15, 2023
Fluff & Gravy Records
PHOTO CREDIT: Jen Borst
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NPR Music
“50 Best Albums of 2023”
“Cilker's sound is classic cowboy country, but her sensibility is totally now: destabilized, sometimes mournful, but determined to preserve what's valuable and grow new gardens on threatened land.”
ROLLING STONE
“25 Best Country and Americana Albums of 2023”
“The singer-songwriter is poised to have a breakout year”
“As a songwriter, Valley of Heart’s Delight represents a profound leap forward, exploring darker territory that both sharpens and widens her scope as a storyteller.”
Bandcamp Daily
“Best Country Music of 2023”
“To put it plainly: Margo Cilker is a stunning songwriting talent…capable of tender folk ballads, boisterous blues rock and bucolic country with equal aplomb. Cilker sounds like the future Lucinda Williams of the West—a high compliment, but one well within her reach.”
UNCUT
“75 Best Albums of 2023”
“Country rock’s new star delivers superlative second album”
THE FADER
"Cilker's writing has an impressively clear-eyed view while her voice reflects her emotions with a winning honesty."
STEREOGUM
“10 Best Country Albums of 2023”
“50 Favorite Songs of 2023 - ‘Crazy Or Died’”
“She’s a remarkable lyricist carving out her own space within a grand tradition, always subverting Americana tropes or finding ways to make them feel new. Every time I listen through Valley Of Heart’s Delight, another exceptional line jumps out at me.”
PASTE MAGAZINE
“The 30 Best Country, Folk and Americana Albums of 2023”
“A dashing and brilliant leap of Americana...Cilker’s approach to construction transcends reference.”
“100 Best Songs of 2023”
“‘Keep It On a Burner’ is one of the very best country tracks of 2023.”
American Songwriter
“Cilker proves herself to be one of our finest and most literate songwriters, one whose physical and psychological distance from the pressures of Nashville seems to be at least partially tied to her artistic triumphs.”
NO DEPRESSION
“Readers’ Favorite Roots Music Albums of 2023”
"With astounding deftness, she recounts enough details to make you feel like her memories also belong to you...Whether she’s making you laugh or cry, she feels like a friend, her songs a warm hand to hold."
BROOKLYN VEGAN
“13 Great Country Albums from 2023”
“Time-tested country music traditions and the humble modernity of indie folk, coupled with an envious ability to write songs that you feel like you’ve known your whole life yet still sound new and fresh….If you're into indie/country crossover albums like Angel Olsen's Big Time and Plains' I Walked With You A Ways, you need Valley of Heart’s Delight in your life too.”
HOLLER
"One of the most distinctive and self-assured voices to have stepped out of the world of American country-folk in the last few years."
"A lovely, sad and beautifully poetic record that you’ll want to take with you everywhere you go.”
GLIDE MAGAZINE
"One of the most compelling albums of the genre so far this year"
FOLK RADIO UK
"With her 2021 debut, Pohorylle, Margo Cilker set herself a high benchmark, but with Valley of Heart’s Delight, she’s cleared that with ease and guaranteed another set of Album of the Year votes."
AMERICANA HIGHWAYS
"This whole album is wonderful, beautiful, honest and timelessly folksy and is going to be one of this year’s best."
WMOT
“Outstanding and Essential Albums of 2023”
“Comfortable country songs that brim with affection and humor”
The Seattle Times
“A rising star in the Americana world”
Willamette Week
“One of the Best Old-Soul Singers in the Pacific Northwest”
“Cilker continues to dial in her Americana-laced alt-country with poignant songs and vocals that can bring tears to your eyes…Her music reflects the vast, beautiful, and sometimes unforgiving Pacific Northwest landscape where she resides”
ALBUM COVER
Margo Cilker’s sophomore album, Valley of Heart’s Delight, refers to a place she can't return: California’s Santa Clara Valley, as it was known before the orchards were paved over and became more famous for Silicon than apricots. Margo is the fifth generation of Cilkers born there, and in this 11-song collection, family and nature intertwine as guiding motifs, at once precious and endangered, beautiful and exhausting. The trees here are family trees, or they’re apricot trees, but suburban sprawl isn’t looking good for either. Cilker moved from California to the Pacific Northwest in her mid-twenties and wrote much of Valley of Heart's Delight while living in Enterprise, Oregon, a small town near the Snake River and powered by the river’s massive, publicly-funded hydroelectric dams. The dams (part of the same system Woody Guthrie was hired to write about) provide clean electricity to much of the western US but make it extraordinarily difficult for anadromous fish (such as Steelhead Trout) to return from the ocean and spawn in their native streams. Valley Of Heart’s Delight feeds off of this tension - how we live in and off of nature, how we live within and without family, and why we return to the places we were born.
Cilker and producer Sera Cahoone’s work on her critically acclaimed Pohorylle debut earned its accolades for lyric-focused production and understated musicianship. The pair maintain this approach on Valley of Heart’s Delight, bringing back the same crew to the same studio in Vancouver, Washington: Cahoone (Sub Pop, Carissa’s Weird, Band Of Horses) drums and produces, John Morgan Askew (Neko Case, Laura Gibson) engineers, Jenny Conlee-Drizos (The Decemberists) provides piano, organ, and accordion, Rebecca Young (Lindsey Fuller) plays bass, Kelly Pratt (Beirut) on horns, and of course, sister Sarah Cilker contributes harmonies. Those in need of more twang will appreciate the addition of Paul Brainard’s (M. Ward, Richmond Fontaine) pedal steel and telecaster work, Annie Staninec's (Mary Gauthier) fiddle, and the mandolin and high lonesome harmony of Portland country standard-bearer Caleb Klauder. Cilker also branched out in her song-collecting, reeling in a cover (“Steelhead Trout”) by Idaho native Ben Walden, ostensibly because of artistic and thematic reasons, but also because, in Cilker’s words, “it’s a damn good song and I wanted to record it.” Walden also sings and plays harmonica on the track.
Cilker's debut record was released in late 2021, a year swinging wildly between cloistered days of lockdown, social engagement roaring back to life like the former ‘20s, and the Greek alphabet entering the vernacular to turn us inwards again. This tumult was echoed in the artistic life of Margo Cilker, trying in vain to predict what kind of a world her first record would be released into while writing what would become her second. As it turned out, the world was welcoming of Pohorylle. The unpronouncably-titled, darkly-jacketed, quietly-released record ended up a darling of critics and fellow songwriters and notably ended up on albums-of-the-year lists in two different years (strange times indeed). The debut was also nominated for UK Americana Album of The Year alongside Brandi Carlile and Robert Plant, and earned Cilker a slew of festival performances and tours supporting American Aquarium, Hayes Carll, and Drive-By Truckers.
Margo Cilker currently lives near the Columbia River in Goldendale, Washington with her husband, songwriter and working cowboy Forrest VanTuyl, as well their dog and some horses.
Margo Cilker On Tour
For more information, please contact:
Jake Lanier
jake@luckybirdmedia.com