King of Having Fun CASSETTE

Picture a guy who writes sad songs in Nashville and then flies home to Anchorage to shovel snow, that's Nick Carpenter's whole deal as Medium Build. Rolling Stone put him on its Future 25 list after last year's Country, and the Americana crowd nodded along with an Emerging Act nomination. Fourteen tracks in, King of Having Fun swaps the heavy stuff for '90s pop-country hooks and rock muscle, Carpenter basically giving himself permission to have fun again.