Richard March

At the forefront of Sacramento’s recent explosion of first-rate Americana acts is Richard March, who holds court these days every Monday night at the Blue Lamp’s “Nashville Nights” feature, along with Scott McChane and whatever guest they rope in. This CD, cut with March’s band at David Houston’s studio, frames the local singer-songwriter as a homegrown John Hartford, with a firm grasp on American folk, bluegrass, pre-hat-act country music and the iconography of rolling boxcars. At times, March sounds like a bluegrass Waylon Jennings (“Helicopter”); at others, like Hartford (“San Francisco”). His songs include parallel-universe 1960s country classics (“Better Believe”) and Dylanesque political jeremiads (“Rome”). And the CD’s instrumental prelude and coda are nice touches. A fine disc.