JUNO Award-winning blues singer Crystal Shawanda has released her new album ‘Homesick Indian Blues’ through New Sun Records, produced by her husband, Dewayne Strobel. The 10-track album is led by “Come Unto Me,” a cover of The Mavericks song that also serves as a tribute to the band’s late frontman Raul Malo, who died in December 2025 and had supported Shawanda early in her Nashville career.
The track features Mavericks guitarist Eddie Perez on electric and acoustic guitars and backing vocals. According to the announcement, Shawanda and Strobel had been working on the cover shortly before Malo’s passing, and Strobel invited Perez to join the recording as the project took on added significance as a tribute.
Shawanda, who is Ojibwe Potawatomi and was raised on Manitoulin Island, signed with RCA Nashville before shifting into blues, winning a JUNO Award for Best Blues Album for 2020’s ‘Church House Blues’ and, according to the announcement, becoming the first Indigenous woman to debut in the Top 10 of the Billboard Blues chart with 2022’s ‘Midnight Blues.’ She founded New Sun Records in 2012, which the announcement describes as the first female- and Indigenous-owned record label in Canada.
Based on a press release provided to Music Industry Weekly by Eric Alper, thatericalper.com.