Case Oats - Last Missouri Exit

In 2018, Case Oats was something of a nebulous idea. Its bandleader, Casey Gomez Walker, had played in bands before, and Case Oats had a self-released single to its name, but it wasn’t a band until an out-of-town friend asked her if Case Oats could headline a show in Chicago. She bluffed—yes, she had a band, yes, they were ready to play a show—and buckled down to make good. “It was a bit delusional of me,” she says, “but there’s something to be said about being a bit delusional.” Last Missouri Exit, the debut album by Case Oats, is a remarkably assured record, the band—Spencer Tweedy (drums), Max Subar (guitar, pedal steel), Jason Ashworth (bass), Scott Daniel (fiddle), and Nolan Chin (piano, organ)—gelling around Gomez Walker’s voice and guitar.

Last Missouri Exit is a collection of sharply drawn character studies, Gomez Walker’s background in creative writing expressing itself in wry observation and a disarmingly easy sense of the lyric, the profound and profane tumbling out of songs like “Bitter Root Lake” with the weight of a confessional poem and the ease of a conversation between friends. The throughline from Case Oats’ first show to their debut album is trust, in the songs and in their players.