Sarah Borges is a student.

It has nothing to do with the fact that she has worked at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston. Sarah Borges is a student in the same sense that Alan Lomax was a student, constantly looking for authentic, heartfelt sounds. The difference is that Borges digests the sounds around her and then delivers them anew in her own distinctive and unique style. A rock n' roll background, deep fried with an admiration for American roots music and served with the finest of seasonings by legendary studio wizard Paul Q. Kolderie (Radiohead, Uncle Tupelo, The Pixies) proves a tasty recipe.

Borges' debut, Silver City has just enough spice to make you sit up straight and enough heartfelt emotion to make you think hard about why it is that you're wiping your eyes at its conclusion. “It's about me finding my place in a culture I am continually learning about,” Borges admits, speaking of a process that began with a group of friends, all renowned Boston players, gathering on Sunday afternoons to play covers. “The band was started as a Sunday afternoon get together, drink some beers and play songs that we knew as a group, lots of country covers. The obvious progression is that you want to play a show.”

So play shows she did, including an unsanctioned gig at Austin's legendary Threadgill's during last year's South By Southwest Music Conference. Among those smitten by Borges' magnetic stage presence and confident delivery was Blue Corn Records President Denby Auble. There were surely countless artists in the capital of Texas that week who had soaked up the influences of Bob Wills, Kitty Wells, Hank Williams and Waylon Jennings. But how did a girl from Boston manage to incorporate these legends with the swagger of Chrissy Hynde and the punch of such contemporary artists as Neko Case and Shelby Lynne?

“Hank Williams songs and punk rock songs are really the same thing,” Borges says with the matter of fact attitude of a serious musicologist. “I didn't understand that in such a personal way until I started doing this.”

In a process that would eventually span more than a year Borges lovingly labored over the collection of songs that would introduce her to the world. The passing of years and difference in geography is of little consequence to Borges. “Merle Haggard is a bad ass,” she explains. “Just because it's a lower profile thing than Sid Vicious doesn't make him any less hardcore or authentic.”

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