Pop-rock Americana artist Reed Mitchell never gave himself a shot at music. The Akron, Ohio-based singer-songwriter married his first girlfriend while still in college, and he went from living in his parent’s house to living in the college dorms to starting a family. In this blur of accelerated domesticity, his lifelong desire to play music was buried under family responsibilities.
Reed’s situation drastically changed three weeks prior to the pandemic, however. He endured a divorce and he found himself in a uniquely lonely isolation during lockdown. In the silence and suspension of fast-paced adulthood he had time to reflect. The solitude was transformative for Reed, and he now emerges with his solo debut, Hot & Cold. The aptly-titled album chronicles the prolonged painful drama of falling for someone at the wrong time, and the songs span the full spectrum of emotions in this ill-fated narrative arc. The 12-track collection of twangy pop-rock was produced by Neilson Hubbard who previously produced Sam Baker, Kim Richey, Glen Phillips, and Mary Gauthier’s Grammy-nominated album, Rifles & Rosary Beads. Hot & Cold snapshots a man in the middle of rebuilding his life, and it conjures the rough but literate songwriting of classic and contemporary outlaw country figures such as Steve Earle and Johnny Cash.