The Nineteenth, touches on certain subjects privy to the alt. country crowd and yielding nods toward Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Nick Drake. The smooth, tender vocals and poetic verse fly delicately over 12 string acoustic guitars, accordion and the occasional harmonica.

Born in Nashville and raised in the South, J. Stricklin's music gets inside you. It provides that rainy day explanation to sip coffee and be melancholy and reminisce about past relationships and lonely photographs. It’s healing music for needy souls.

Maybe it’s that isolation in rural upstate Alabama, which brings forth such demanding listenership and loneliness, only rather this compilation of songs recorded on the farm spans a variety of experiences from growing up in the South to backpacking in the UK. J’s song “Reason to Live”, written while traveling in England, catches a somewhat humorous observation about a girl’s obsession with finding love in all the wrong places.

However, when asked about whether or not his songs are fictional depictions or simply an artist’s observations of his own personal relationships, J. Stricklin smiles and says, “It really bugs me when songwriters start talking about muses; I think it sounds pretentious. I just try to be original and creative and write from what’s inside and outside of me. That could be you or me. Wait, does that sound…?”

Regardless of such un-seriousness, J’s music is excruciatingly honest with answers about soul and questions about optimism. His song, “Hey, Sam” addresses his late grandfather about lessons true to living and how one can roller coaster through the ups and downs of life.

“I have this old, rough cassette recording of my Grandpa singing “T For Texas” on his front porch. His guitar is a bit out of tune, he only knows part of the verses, and the tape hiss is crazy obnoxious, but to me, it’s perfect. It captured the moment of that lost, random summer day. Like, it put a label on that particular day. Things like that make life endurable.”

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