The Morning Passengers (Acoustic Sessions) - EP

iTunes Review

With this acoustic six-song EP, Green River Ordinance harks back to their Texas origins. "Dancing Shoes" opens softly with folky strumming and picking that make way for rootsy gear like harmonica, banjo, mandolin and warm tones from an old Hammond organ. Frontman Josh Jenkins should be commended for singing of pastoral subjects like country roads without affecting a Southern drawl. He inflects in a lower register on the start of "Uncertainly Certain" over spare piano notes as percussion and cellos slowly seep into a ballad that sounds heartfelt without being over maudlin. "Undertow" and "Inward Tide" are also semi-sappy serenades that will hit home with anyone who ever got into Goo Goo Dolls' big hit "Iris" from the soundtrack to 1998's City of Angels and though "Out of the Storm" moves at the same slow rainy-day pace, it's more of a confessional trimmed with threadbare piano, organ drones, and tambourine as Jenkins croons about learning from humility in the face of heartbreak. "Where the West Wind Blows" bookends the EP with an uptempo rhythm and more countrified instruments.