New Orleans-based and San Francisco- born, Slow Motion Cowboys are a band of buzzards drifting over the bones of the past; dark, slow, and essential.
The band’s fifth record, 2025’s Wolf of St. Elmo, was a dark horse,
released to little hype then unexpectedly reviewed by UNCUT
Magazine with a score of 9/10 and a full page article comparing it to
Desire-era Dylan and Drive-By Truckers. There are perks to being a
songwriter’s songwriter, and this is one: Uncut only found out about
Slow Motion Cowboys when Margo Cilker started covering album-
opener Invisible Stars in her live shows. “Pete Fields is my favorite songwriter,” said Cilker of the band’s frontman, who joined Cilker onstage at 2023’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. Slow Motion Cowboys capitalized on the press, headlining a two week long UK tour this fall after an earlier full U.S tour supporting friends The Pine Hill Haints.
Wolf of St. Elmo, released on the Muscle Shoals’ label Arkam
records, is a swampy, alt-country gem with thick grooves, heady lyrics,
and a rough and tumble swagger. With a sound sharpened over months
of gigging on the New Orleans scene and opening for artists like The
Deslondes, Margo Cilker, and Willy Watson, it is the band’s most
cohesive statement yet, well deserving of whatever flowers get thrown
its way.