SMELLS LIKE RAIN, a masterful song cycle about coming to terms with life, is his second solo release. The first single, “The Edge” comes replete with a recitation from Hunter Thompson. And that should give you enough hint that this is not your run-of-the-mill singer songwriter offering.

 

A good while back, Agabus reached the near-lofty heights playing in The J.D. Hinton Band, who morphed into The Coyote Brothers who released two well-received records. They toured with Alabama, Marty Stuart, Vince Gill and many others while also making a good many television appearances. They were poised on the brink, but, as happens to the best of us, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow wasn’t there, and The Coyote Brothers parted ways amicably in 2004.

 

Agabus’s first solo record, IT AIN’T EASY BEING ME, came out in 2006. Then, for two decades more or less, raising a family and making a living took precedence over album releases. But he never stopped writing and recording, releasing four or five digital singles every year. Now, in 2026, those kids are grown, and Agabus is back in the full-on album-making game.

 

SMELLS LIKE RAIN shows that Agabus is not just the hard-bitten Americana troubadour one might think, given his success in the country field. And with the exception of a couple of country-leaning tunes on the record, it’s not even really an “Americana” album. His slightly gruff voice, close to the microphone, lends an intimacy to things. Acoustic guitar and piano take precedence most of the time. Lovely background vocals generally lend the trappings of artists like the old tuneful versions of Leonard Cohen and Tom Waits. He doesn’t sound like them, but the subtext is there. If you like Jason Isbell or Lucinda Williams, you’ll like SMELLS LIKE RAIN. And if you like Fleetwood Mac, Bruce Horsby and James Taylor, you’ll dig it too.

 

This comes from how Agabus’s musical interests and influences are a wide river with many tributaries. Growing up in rural Ohio, he fell for the pop music he heard coming from WLS in Chicago, and from the age of 19 he played in cover bands doing what we now know as classic rock. When he first heard Alabama though, back around 1980, they made a serious impression. Proficient on guitar and keyboards, he continued in cover bands playing Loverboy, Bryan Adams and the like. And after moving to Nashville, he found himself quite taken with R.E.M., Pylon, Jason & The Scorchers, and a slew of others.

 

In the twelve songs that make up SMELLS LIKE RAIN, Agabus shows off the rare talent to make his characters live whole lives in the space of one song. He writes about people who have lived a lot, seen a lot, and are still looking for their place in the world just as much as they were decades ago - only now knowing they’re closer to the final reckoning and are either content or else tortured by the choices they’ve made. As he sings in “Grace”, “I’m just trying to live, so when I die, the preacher won’t have to lie.”

 

Agabus is ready now to go beyond periodic online singles and work in the form of whole albums. And he looks forward to a much shorter time between their releases now.

 

Welcome to the Agabus website and feel free to look around. We’re glad you’re here!