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All Music Guide:
Walking that fine line between punk and country, Sarah Borges emerged from Boston with her alt-country debut, Silver City, in 2005. Influenced by a wide range of artists including Mahalia Jackson, Sid Vicious, Hank Williams, and Merle Haggard, Borges has a sound that encompasses rootsy barroom country and hard-edged American rock with a fair amount of ease. Signed to Blue Corn after a well-received gig at South By Southwest in 2004, Borges went into the studio to work on her debut. Some tracks from the demo sessions were good enough to make the final cut, and the album was released to critical praise. She spent a good portion of the summer of 2005 touring and promoting Silver City alongside such respected players as Dave Alvin. Borges returned to the studio soon after, working once again with producer Paul Q. Kolderie. Her second full-length, Diamonds in the Dark, arrived in 2007.
Wikipedia:
Sarah Borges is a rock and roll musician from Taunton, Massachusetts, signed to Sugar Hill Records. Her music is described as "walking that fine line between punk and country".
Borges grew up in Taunton, a city south of Boston in the third generation of a Portuguese (hence the hard "g" in her name) family. She was interested in musical theatre as a youth, and majored in the subject while a student at Emerson College.
On the strength of a performance at the South by Southwest Festival, Borges earned a record deal with Houston's Blue Corn Records. Her first record, 2005's Silver City earned praise for showcasing "an unusual knack for mixing alternative rock with country". Allmusic compared Borges to Maria McKee of Lone Justice, and admired how her songs "balance some fierce guitar licks with heartfelt twang".
After much national touring and opening for noted acts such as Dave Alvin, Borges, and her band, The Broken Singles, were signed by Sugar Hill Records. The title of her 2007 release Diamonds in the Dark is a line from the song Come Back to Me, by one of her favorite bands, . The album features a cover of this song, many original works, and Tom Waits and Greg Cartwright covers. Allmusic commended the album as "grittily brilliant" with songs that are "brilliantly rollicking".
Borges' wide variety of influences are often noted. They range from Dolly Parton, Mahalia Jackson, X, Sid Vicious, Merle Haggard, to bubblegum pop.
A third album, The Stars Are Out was released in March 2009. Borges commented that the album features more of a straightforward rock n roll sound than her earlier work. The album features five covers of artists ranging from Smokey Robinson to The Lemonheads. Allmusic describes the album as "material grounded in Americana even as it morphs from folk to rock and even soul" and calls it a "short but sweet collection".
