ShinyRibs

We will maybe never know what Shinyribs is. Sometimes, it’s a sprawling multi-piece ensemble slapping the air until it grooves; sometimes he’s a somber subtle songwriter pouring poetry on the ground from a cup half full. Either way it’s always the house-party-meets-library that is, Kevin Russell. Raised in Beaumont, TX, and Shreveport, LA—the cradle of swamp pop, Leadbelly, and bayou R&B—Russell distills those regional sounds into something both timeless and immediate, dripping from his fingers like honey, salt & fat. Think Texas Gulf Coast meets Muscle Shoals, songs carved and weaved by hand with a storyteller’s heart.Shinyribs evolved from a solo residency Russell began under that moniker in the mid-2000s, after an incident in a Houston club, playing a private party for a group of welders where he bought a homeless woman a plate of ribs. “Her name was Roberta,” says Russell. “She was a high priestess of transistor radios…