Working My Way Down, the new album from Mike Stinson & Johnny Irion, began twenty-five years ago in the San Fernando Valley, where Stinson and Irion lived and wrote songs in an old farmhouse behind a rehearsal studio named The Alley. The album features eleven songs from Johnny, Mike, and Andy Jones recorded to analog tape on the STUDER tape machine that was housed in Jackson Browne’s studio that is now planted in Johnny’s home studio. When they weren’t writing songs, the two played as sidemen in other bands, as well as working day jobs. In his day job, Mike worked with his friend Andy Jones, who had a prog-rock band called Bigelf. A wizard at songwriting, Andy, inspired by Mike and Johnny’s sound, wrote some songs radiating the very essence of the twosome’s country rock vibe. Then life...