DAVID MCCLISTER/PRESS BOB DYLAN: WILLIAM CLAXTON/PRESS
BORN IN THE Midwest but having made his name in Nashville, with his early material Jared James Nichols established himself as a blues-rock force to be reckoned with. Now, the 33-year-old’s self-titled third album is both heavier and more vulnerable – the result, he tells us, of a potentially career-ending injury, the death of his father and the freedom to follow his muse for the first time.