Inner Journey, released on 18 October 2019, is Darin and Brooke Aldridge’s first album for Rounder Records (1166100681). Darin Aldridge and bassist Mark Fain produced it. Brooke Aldridge sings lead throughout, with Darin on harmony and on mandolin and guitar. Fain plays bass on most tracks, and the other players are Ron Block on banjo and guitar, Matt Menefee on banjo, Aubrey Haynie and Carley Arrowood on fiddle, Zeb Snyder on guitar, Rob Ickes on Dobro and lap steel, and Tommy White on Dobro and pedal steel. Arrowood also sings harmony.
Nearly all of the twelve songs come from other writers: Doc Watson’s “Your Lone Journey,” Graham Nash’s “Teach Your Children,” Richard Thompson’s “Tear-Stained Letter,” Nanci Griffith and Rick West’s “Trouble in the Fields,” Kasey Chambers’s “This Flower,” and “Emmylou,” by the Swedish duo First Aid Kit. “Every Time You Leave” is a Charlie and Ira Louvin song, and Jimmy Fortune, who sang tenor with the Statler Brothers for 21 years, joins the Aldridges on it. “I Found Love” is by Vince Gill, Earl Scruggs and Randy Scruggs. The one original is Brooke Aldridge’s “Someone’s Everything.”
The album reached No. 2 on Billboard’s Bluegrass Albums chart, the duo’s highest chart debut to that point, and also made its first appearances on the Top New Artist Album, Americana/Folk Album and Current Country Album charts. Brooke Aldridge had won the IBMA Female Vocalist of the Year award for the third year running in 2019.
Tracklist
- 1 I Found Love 3:35
- 2 Someone's Everything 3:37
- 3 Tear-Stained Letter 3:12
- 4 When You Love Someone 3:01
- 5 This Flower 3:14
- 6 Sweet Companion 3:33
- 7 Trouble In The Fields 3:29
- 8 Teach Your Children alt version 2:43
- 9 Every Time You Leave 2:52
- 10 End Of A Long Hard Day 2:45
- 11 Emmylou 4:05
- 12 Your Lone Journey alt version 3:23
