Hurry Home (New West, 2017)

On their eponymous 2015 debut album, The Deslondes cooked up an original musical gumbo befitting their New Orleans base, a steaming stewpot filled to the rim with flecks of country, folk, roots rock, Tex-Mex, Stax/Sun soul and, of course, all the sounds and passions elicited by the Crescent City. For their sophomore album, "Hurry Home," the Nawlins quartet - vocalist/guitarists Sam Doores and Riley Downing, vocalist/stand-up bassist Dan Cutler, vocalist/percussionist Cameron Snyder and pedal steeler/fiddler John James Tourville - crank out a second helping of all of the above in a slightly more electrified setting, effortlessly shifting genre gears and continuing to make the most of their flawless one-lead/three-harmony-vocals platoon system. And much like the first album, don't be surprised that a good many of The Deslondes' original songs sound amazingly like covers that you'd swear were done long ago by genre classicists.

"Hurry Home" opens with the laconic lope of "Muddy Water," which starts out like a Delta folk blues ballad and, like a gulf hurricane, gains strength as the temperature rises, colored by Riley Downing's gruff and gritty lead vocal. The album takes an immediate upturn with the Bakersfield-tinged "One of These Lonesome Mornings," then veers into gypsy country territory on "(This Ain't a) Sad Song" before easing into the languid Lee Hazlewood soul/pop of "She Better Be Lonely." On "Every Well," The Deslondes channel Freddy Fender and Roger Miller to great effect, while "Hurricane Shakedown" finds the quintet working a rockabilly groove that tips a cap to Buck Owens and Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats.

"Just in Love with You" is a twang pop waltz that shimmers like later period Michael Nesmith and "Many Poor Boy" exhibits the snake charming roots rock slink of Dave Alvin. But just like The Deslondes' first album, don't mistake all these sonic markers for anything other than handy reference points for the band's masterful ability to fold them all into their own unique and completely authentic sound.