We're excited to announce the signing of Denver's Joe Sampson to the Hidden Shoal family of artists.

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Joe Sampson is the champion of the musical understatement, each song exuding a gently mesmerising beauty. His music evokes the comfortably sad acoustic tones of Nick Drake or Leonard Cohen, ornamented with often darkly humorous lyrics, intoned in a soft yet road-worn baritone. Sampson’s intimate, emotive songs draw you in, gradually weaving their subtle magic.

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Since his childhood days singing in his family’s barbershop quartet, up through his years collaborating with celebrated musicians like Nathaniel Rateliff and Esme Patterson, Joe Sampson has steadily sharpened his sound and style, becoming one of Denver’s most celebrated songwriters. After being named Westword’s Songwriter of the Year in 2008, the alt weekly described his work as “combining the emotional weight of acoustic breakup albums like Beck’s <i>Sea Change</i> or Ryan Adams’ <i>Heartbreaker</i> with an aw-fuck-it humour.”