a lady like me

Crazy cool Valerie June

June’s debut album, “Pushin’ Against a Stone,” which came out Aug. 13, relies on trumpets, fiddles and those banjoleles from the 1920s. Her music could be described as some kind of hybrid of country-blues-Americana- Appalachia-Brooklyn. Over sushi in Greenpoint, she called it “an amalgamation of blues and folk and country and gospel.” Or “organic moonshine roots,” in shorthand. “It’s a little bit of Memphis,” she told me. “I went to two churches — one was black, and one was predominantly white — and I learned about all kinds of music.”