New Music from Laura Gibson, Elvis Perkins

Word of Mouth music reviewer Bill Slammon is back to fill us in on two impressive new releases:

Laura Gibson's new record is called Beasts of Seasons. She's 26 and lives in Portland, Oregon. Her songs, played on a nylon-stringed guitar, are hushed and meditative, and the album is split into two halves: communion songs and funeral songs. You can hear more music at Laura Gibson's MySpace page.

Elvis Perkins is frontman for the band Elvis Perkins in Dearland. The folksinger has an intriguing backstory: His father, actor Anthony Perkins (who played Norman Bates in Hitchcock’s Psycho) died of complications from AIDS when Elvis Perkins was a teenager, and his mother, photographer Berry Berenson, was a victim of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. His songs are both catchy and thoughtful, and he's earned comparisons to both Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan. Their self-titled debut is out now, and there's more music available at Elvis Perkins in Dearland's MySpace page.