After a few lifetimes as a Telecaster-slinging rocker, farm manager, studio producer and engineer, and award-winning research scientist, Rick Todd turned his creative talents to making music once again.

The result is Diesel Town, a tapestry of tales drawn from the Empty Quarter of America – the often forgotten expanse of dusty roads, dry rivers and huddled towns in the country’s middle. The songs are alive with railroad bulls, wailing ghost ponies, wandering monks, Dust Bowl survivors, guitar slinging pirates, road-worn pilgrims, broken lovers and those made whole by love. These intimate songs are rooted – in landscapes, in lived experience and in the heart.