Bluesfest 2006, courtesy Subject to Reluctance

Jim Bryson is a treasured singer-songwriter from Ottawa, voted Ottawa's "Best Folk Band/Artist" in 2006. We know we've got something good here...

Jim's debut The Occasionals turned heads from in Canada and the UK, and Bryson became a regular at festival events around the country. He then released The North Side Benches in 2003 on Orange Records/Universal Music, which made several Top 10 lists (Billboard, No Depression, NOW Magazine) and received much critical acclaim.

Bryson is back in 2007 with his third and best album, Where the Bungalows Roam (Kp 050), a perfect cure to the cooling winter blahs. Confessional and direct, Jim knows how to pen an honest song, and deliver it convincingly. The album will hit the streets on March 27th, the first collaboration between Kelp and Calgary's Saved by Vinyl. MP3s will follow here in the coming weeks!

Jim is a member of The Kathleen Edwards band and while in her company last year performed on Late Night with David Letterman, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and played at Farm Aid 2005. He also toured with Howe Gelb in his Sno’ Angel band.

“The North Side Benches... is a cogent showcase for Bryson’s music, which could inadequately be summarized as the Replacements recording at Big Pink. A bruised emotional core of songwriting blends with gruff humour, set in uncluttered, inventive musical settings.” No Depression

"Jim Bryson is the quintessential songwriter's songwriter. He writes some of the most painfully beautiful, deceptively simple songs you'll ever hear, and plays them with a highly skilled bunch of moonlighting musicians." Mary Dickie (TORONTO SUN)

"#6 Album of the Year! If Kathleen Edwards has a "Mr. Miyagi," it's this excellent singer/songwriter." Jason MacNeil (BILLBOARD)

“Acres of old-fashioned heart and soul. This album will be no more unfashionable 20 years hence than it would have been in 1972, and that’s an achievement in itself.” Q Magazine