{"id":10483,"date":"2026-04-24T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/the-milk-carton-kids-are-alright\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T13:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T13:00:00","slug":"the-milk-carton-kids-are-alright","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/the-milk-carton-kids-are-alright\/","title":{"rendered":"The Milk Carton Kids Are Alright"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<figure><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/03\/the_milk_carton_kids.jpg\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" alt=\"The Milk Carton Kids. (Credit: Max Wagner)\"><figcaption>The Milk Carton Kids. (Credit: Max Wagner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Joey Ryan waited 15 years for this moment. <\/strong>The day when someone wouldn\u2019t automatically associate his folk group the Milk Carton Kids with all those sad images of missing youth splatted across grocery stores in the 1980s.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat is so fucking cool to hear,\u201d he says after learning that I thought the band name was just meant to be reflective of the pastoral, simple life conjured up on the duo\u2019s seven albums, including their latest, <em>Lost Cause Lover Fool<\/em>, out April 24.<\/p>\n<p>More from Spin:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.spinmagazine.com\/2026\/04\/michael-stipe-solo-debut\/\">Michael Stipe\u2019s Solo Debut Will Be Out This Year<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<li>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.spinmagazine.com\/2026\/04\/king-gizzard-synth-album\/\">King Gizzard &amp; The Lizard Wizard Wraps Synth LP<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<li>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.spinmagazine.com\/2026\/04\/deep-cut-friday-you-cant-talk-to-the-dude-by-jonathan-richman\/\">Deep Cut Friday: \u2018You Can\u2019t Talk to the Dude\u2019 by Jonathan Richman<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The name was in fact swiped from one of the first songs he and partner Kenneth Pattengale wrote, also called \u201cMilk Carton Kid,\u201d in which they symbolically describe the loss of youth as some kind of vanishing act. Still, the connotation has been hard to lift ever since.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe almost changed our name when we signed the deal with our first label, Anti- Records, because that cultural reference was so strong,\u201d Ryan admits. But the label\u2019s president, Andy Kaulkin, pushed back. \u201cHe said, \u2018Don\u2019t worry, after a while people will just think of it as your band.\u2019 And this is the first time I have confirmation that it has actually happened.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1290\" height=\"861\" src=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873-1290x861.jpeg\" alt=\"(Credit: Max Wagner)\" class=\"wp-image-659095\" srcset=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873-1290x861.jpeg 1290w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873-340x227.jpeg 340w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873-240x160.jpeg 240w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873-768x513.jpeg 768w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873-498x332.jpeg 498w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/IMG_7873.jpeg 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1290px) 100vw, 1290px\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">(Credit: Max Wagner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a strong start to our wide-ranging conversation, which Ryan comfortably engages in from the driver\u2019s seat of his car. The shaggy-haired singer and guitarist is parked, of course, sitting idle outside the band\u2019s rehearsal space in North Hollywood where he and Pattengale have been preparing for a private album release show at L.A.\u2019s famed Hotel Caf\u00e9.<\/p>\n<p>The coffee shop turned music venue off Hollywood\u2019s main strip has long been a springboard for singer-songwriters, and it has a special place in the Milk Carton Kids\u2019 story, too. It\u2019s where the local talents first met in 2011 while both were working as solo artists. So, when they heard the news that the venue will soon close its doors to prepare for a move to a new location, they were hellbent on playing one last gig inside.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were there every single night for like five years,\u201d says Ryan forlornly, remembering the time he got the call from owner Marko Shafer, suggesting he swing by to see the new guy Shafer just booked. \u201cIt was Kenneth. We met that night and, a week or two later, we ran into each other again. He invited me over to his house to play songs together, and we never played another solo show again,\u201d Ryan recalls. \u201cWe were a duo from that day on.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Within a few short months, the newly inked unit that thrived on simplicity (just two guys, two voices, and two guitars) had written enough material to release their first album, <em>Prologue<\/em>. They did so without a lot of fanfare, simply putting the tracks online for free, figuring people would find it easier. And did they ever.<\/p>\n<p>The sparse folk harmonies on songs like \u201cMichigan\u201d soon caught on with tastemakers like NPR and <em>American Songwriter<\/em>, and tours with Old Crow Medicine Show and the Lumineers followed. So did interest from Anti- Records, which signed the act and released their next three albums, <em>The Ash &amp; Clay <\/em>in 2013, <em>Monterey <\/em>in 2015, and <em>All The Things That I Did And All The Things That I Didn\u2019t Do <\/em>in 2018. A new partnership with Nashville\u2019s Thirty Tigers came in 2019 with the release of that year\u2019s <em>The Only Ones, <\/em>followed by 2023\u2019s <em>I Only See the Moon<\/em> and their newest record, <em>Lost Cause Lover Fool<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1200\" height=\"1200\" src=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/03\/the_milk_carton_kids_cover.jpg\" alt=\"(Album cover credit: Kenneth Pattengale)\" class=\"wp-image-656221\" srcset=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/03\/the_milk_carton_kids_cover.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/03\/the_milk_carton_kids_cover-340x340.jpg 340w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/03\/the_milk_carton_kids_cover-768x768.jpg 768w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/03\/the_milk_carton_kids_cover-498x498.jpg 498w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">(Album cover credit: Kenneth Pattengale)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n<p>In the middle of it all were plenty of highs and lows. There were appearances on Garrison Keillor\u2019s \u201cA Prairie Home Companion\u201d<em> <\/em>as well as the late-night TV circuit, features in film projects like Gus Van Zandt\u2019s <em>Promised Land<\/em> and Tina Fey\u2019s \u201cGirls5Eva,\u201d several Grammy noms, and collaborations with everyone from Rosanne Cash to Sara Bareilles. But there was also Pattengale\u2019s bout with cancer in 2018 and newfound responsibilities of starting families while working as musicians.<\/p>\n<p>In 2023, the Milk Carton Kids had another pinnacle moment when creating their own event, the Los Angeles Folk Festival, wanting to bring together the voices behind the treasured musical storyteller tradition in a city often preoccupied with Sunset Strip rock deities and annual jaunts to Coachella. Over two editions, the event has featured luminous lineups with Emmylou Harris, Waxahatchee, Sierra Ferrell, and Valerie June, among others; and though Ryan and Pattengale put a pause on it this year while they release their anticipated new album, Ryan says, \u201cI hope we can do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So, whether you call that magical meeting 15 years ago fate or destiny, it certainly kicked off an unbelievable journey for the Milk Carton Kids that continues unfolding. If you ask Ryan, though, he believes it was predetermined.<\/p>\n<p>Not too long ago, he read a book called <em>Powers of Two <\/em>by Joshua Wolf Shenk that describes the kinetic nature of creative partnerships like the one he and Pattengale entered into all those years ago. \u201cIt posits this idea that the basic unit of human creativity is a dyad, the space between two people in collaboration,\u201d he explains, citing examples like Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak or Paul McCartney and John Lennon. \u201cI think I was searching for Kenneth, without realizing it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Things really clicked when the two started putting their harmonies and guitar parts together for the first time. \u201cIt was totally effortless to sing harmonies together, in that kind of eye-opening, hair-raising lightbulb kind of a way. And underneath it was this tense musical struggle between these two guitars. I was very riveted and fascinated by it,\u201d says Ryan, remembering that Crosby, Stills &amp; Nash had a similar story about the first time they sang together in Laurel Canyon, mere miles from where the Milk Carton Kids live and work today.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1290\" height=\"860\" src=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196-1290x860.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-659086\" srcset=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196-1290x860.jpg 1290w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196-340x227.jpg 340w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196-240x160.jpg 240w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196-498x332.jpg 498w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2173024196.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1290px) 100vw, 1290px\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Joey Ryan and Kenneth Pattengale onstage for the 23rd Annual Americana Honors &amp; Awards at Ryman Auditorium on September 18, 2024, in Nashville, Tennessee. <br \/>(Credit: Erika Goldring\/Getty Images for Americana Music Association)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>That supergroup is one that gets brought up a lot in describing the Milk Carton Kids. Simon &amp; Garfunkel, too, even if the Smothers Brothers is admittedly more of what they are going for, at least live with their off-kilter banter. \u201cI used to think it was lazy to compare us to Simon &amp; Garfunkel, because they\u2019re probably the most mainstream famous harmony duo. I used to resent it,\u201d Ryan admits. But when he listened back to <em>Prologue <\/em>not too long ago, he finally heard it. \u201cI was like, oh my God, we do sound just like them. There\u2019s something about our voices to where I can see why people latched on to it in that way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What the Milk Carton Kids bring forth is a similar exploration of the art of minimalism and the unexpected power it wields. Opting for nothing more than acoustic guitars and harmonized voices, like their elders, was a \u201cconscious constraint\u201d Ryan and Pattengale put on themselves in the beginning. \u201cWe wanted to see how much we can do just within this framework,\u201d says Ryan, almost as a counterbalance to the sometimes over-produced works of contemporaries. \u201cOne of the great paralyses of modern music production is you can do anything and everything on one track at the push of a button. Deciding what you want your tools to be is quite paradoxical because you find out how liberating it is.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>On <em>Lost Cause Lover Fool<\/em>, that dynamic is more magnified than ever. A song like the opener \u201cBlue Water\u201d gets caught up in pensive moments of taking in nature and its grandeur, while \u201cMy Place Among the Stones\u201d and \u201cA Friend Like You\u201d feel like a bouquet toss of essential life lessons from a close narrator in a private one-on-one conversation. With lyrics in the first person, the songs offer an intimacy and presence that have become commodities in a society that talks behind screens and largely focuses on the future.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs the world is moving incomprehensibly fast, Kenneth and I were feeling this very human instinct to crave transcendence and the eternal,\u201d explains Ryan, before turning even more philosophical. \u201cThe faster and faster that the world goes, the only way to transcend this sort of timebound existence is to really focus on each present moment and realize that eternity is contained within it. In other words, taking the small things and making them bigger. Because I think it\u2019s literally impossible for the human brain to grasp the world that we find ourselves in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Many of the album\u2019s themes are steeped in the kind of 2020s hindsight that\u2019s become a focal point for modern folk, but then again, big topical swings have been on the minds of Ryan and Pattengale since the beginning of the Milk Carton Kids, long before it was \u201cin vogue.\u201d (Just listen to 2013\u2019s \u201cPromised Land\u201d and tell us that\u2019s not wildly prophetic.) In some ways, it took time for the modern folk scene to catch up to them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe first came along during the Mumford &amp; Sons\/Avett Brothers folk revival, which was awesome, except that we were so much quieter than all of that, and we never got bigger in our sound. We just kept doing quiet, sad folk music,\u201d recalls Ryan, sensing a current sea change that they fit into better. \u201cBut this latest revival seems way more in touch with its sadness, which suits us very well. All the sad boys and sad girls on TikTok doing sad songs in their bedroom, that\u2019s how we felt 15 years ago. That\u2019s what we wanted to do, but there was no place to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1290\" height=\"860\" src=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010-1290x860.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-659087\" srcset=\"https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010-1290x860.jpg 1290w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010-340x227.jpg 340w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010-240x160.jpg 240w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010-498x332.jpg 498w, https:\/\/static.spinmagazine.com\/files\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2207717010.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1290px) 100vw, 1290px\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Onstage during Garden State: The 20th Anniversary Concert at Greek Theatre on March 29, 2025 in Los Angeles. (Credit: Matt Winkelmeyer\/Getty Images for Garden State)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Ryan remembers playing dive bars and having to ask bartenders to turn off the beer fridge because the hum was louder than their whole show. \u201cOr we would bring folding chairs and people didn\u2019t really know what to make of it,\u201d he jokes. \u201cThere\u2019s always been sad songs, obviously, but at the time that we came up, it was much more congregational. Everyone wanted to sing along and clap their hands. Thank God Phoebe Bridgers came along.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ryan proudly tells the story of how she used to attend the Milk Carton Kids shows in L.A. when she was a teen. He follows it up with a funny memory starring another new gen folk star, Noah Kahan. \u201cWe got to sing a Paul Simon song with him at the Americana Awards a few years ago. And we felt very old because when we talked to him for the first time, he was like, \u2018Nice to meet you. By the way, \u2018Michigan\u2019 was my mom\u2019s favorite song when I was in middle school.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Jokes aside, there\u2019s a strong argument for the pathway the Milk Carton Kids helped pave for today\u2019s moody ilk. If Bridgers and Kahan hadn\u2019t found the duo through sneaking into shows or being introduced with the music at home, they could\u2019ve just as well have been proud alumni of Ryan and Pattengale\u2019s Sad Song Summer Camp\u2014a three-day intensive program in upstate New York where songwriters get in touch with their inner tortured poet through the tutelage of the founders.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe goal is that everybody has written a song that they perform, ideally in harmony and collaboration with other campers. We create a space where people feel safe and vulnerable to share their deepest and darkest stuff, and there are a lot of tears and a lot of lifelong friendships made in a very short process,\u201d says Ryan of the program, which takes place again this July. He calls it the most rewarding week of the year for him and Pattengale.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBefore this camp, the main way that we had interacted with this community of folk music writers, performers, and fans was one-directional, by putting out our creative productions and then receiving attention for them,\u201d he explains. \u201cBut now we\u2019ve turned the whole thing around to become the teacher rather than the performer, and I can\u2019t think of anything more fulfilling.\u201d Somewhere in there is a joke about the Milk Carton Kids doing a body of artists \u201cgood,\u201d but they\u2019ve probably already heard that one a million times, too.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>To see our running list of the top 100 greatest rock stars of all time, <a href=\"https:\/\/spinmagazine.com\/2021\/07\/the-greatest-rock-stars-of-all-time\/?utm_source=yahoo&amp;utm_medium=bottomlink&amp;utm_campaign=yahoolink\">click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Milk Carton Kids. (Credit: Max Wagner) Joey Ryan waited 15 years for this moment. The day when someone wouldn\u2019t automatically associate his folk group the Milk Carton Kids with&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,24,5948],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","category-pushly","category-the-milk-carton-kids"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10483\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}