Tag: Americana

WATCH: The War and Treaty, “Five More Minutes”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: The War and Treaty
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “Five More Minutes”
Album: Hearts Town
Release Date: September 25, 2020
Label: Rounder Records

In Their Words: “[This] song’s saying, ‘If I have five more minutes to love you, it’s going to be the best damn five minutes of my life.’ … After years of falling in and out of financial and mental depression, I had finally had enough. I was ready to take my own life. But in my darkest moment, where I was ready right then and there to end it all, my wife Tanya asked one last thing of me: ‘Just give me five more minutes. Stay with me. Just five more minutes to love you.’ And something in her eyes, something in her hands convinced me to give her that five more minutes.” — Michael Trotter, The War and Treaty

Photo credit: David McClister

WATCH: Buddy & Julie Miller, “Let It Rain”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Buddy & Julie Miller
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “Let It Rain” (with Steve Earle and The McCrary Sisters)
Release Date: July 17, 2020
Label: New West Records

In Their Words: “Our Black brothers and sisters have suffered so long. Their dehumanizing journey began 400 years ago. They lived lives of slaves and now of being distrusted by the law of the land, treated as ‘lesser than,’ been in danger from the stranger, danger from the law. Parents’ hearts are so worried, distraught, and broken. So much suffering and sorrow, discrimination, dehumanization, and hurt, and disappointment. This should all hurt our hearts too. It will if we have one. A beautiful revelation has been jump started in the middle of a pandemic, no less. This is my song of solidarity. And it’s my heart crying with their hearts. Let the revolution live.” — Julie Miller

Photo credit: Kate York

LISTEN: Michael McArthur, “Warmer Months” (Take 3, Acoustic)

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Artist: Michael McArthur
Hometown: Lakeland, Florida
Song: “Warmer Months” (Take 3, Acoustic)
Album: How to Fall In Love EP
Release Date: August 14, 2020
Label: Dark River Records

In Their Words: “I started almost every show last year with this song for two reasons: One, it’s great for warming up the voice and hands. Often, I didn’t have the chance to do so before walking out to center stage. And two, people have always responded so well to it. It has that ‘draw you close’ quality, like a good hug.” — Michael McArthur

Photo credit: Michael Flores

LISTEN: Laura Rabell, “This Stone”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Laura Rabell
Hometowns: Pensacola, FL & Charlotte, NC; now in Nashville
Song: “This Stone”
Album: Immortal
Release Date: July 31, 2020

In Their Words: “‘This Stone’ turned out to be prophetic. It foreshadowed some important emotional truths I ended up having to face. And I’ll be damned if the Pfaltzgraff wedding china I inherited from my grandmother didn’t literally start cracking and falling apart! Be careful what you write, I guess… ‘This Stone’ is about really trying to make something work, but coming to the realization that it never will. That you can keep on being miserable or make a change. It’s a song about walking away. After all was said and done and the recording was finished, my husband and I had survived an incredibly stressful and tumultuous year thanks to my cancer diagnosis, which inevitably spilled over into our marriage. But this song gave me a precious gift — it was an outlet for all those feelings that were deep beneath the surface.” — Laura Rabell

Photo credit: Daniel Coston

WATCH: Sarah Jarosz, “Johnny”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Sarah Jarosz
Hometown: Wimberley, Texas; now living in New York City
Song: “Johnny”
Album: World on the Ground
Release Date: June 5, 2020
Label: Rounder Records

In Their Words: “The song ‘Johnny’ was one of the first ones I wrote for my new record, and it was the first single I released back in March. I had plans to make a video for it the week that everything went into lockdown, so obviously that didn’t happen! But I was able to head over to a filming studio here in Nashville last month and do a socially distanced shoot, and I’m so happy it’s finally coming out, albeit many months after originally planned.

“Grant Claire put the concept for the video together, which we had to tweak a little bit due to filming limitations. I wound up shooting the whole thing in front of a green screen. But I really loved his vision for it being this colorful, collage-heavy, kind of trippy video for this song. I always have a lot of commentary when working on the visuals that go with my songs, and I really enjoyed working with Grant on this.” — Sarah Jarosz

Photo credit: Josh Wool

WATCH: Molly Tuttle, “Standing on the Moon” (Feat. Taylor Goldsmith)

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Molly Tuttle
Hometown: Palo Alto, California / Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “Standing on the Moon” (Feat. Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes)
Album: …but i’d rather be with you
Release Date: August 28, 2020
Record Label: Compass Records

In Their Words: “I didn’t grow up listening to a lot of Grateful Dead music, but being raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, the Dead was part of the mythology of my family and the area I grew up in (kind of how I imagine people who grew up in Tennessee, where I live now, might feel about Dolly Parton). Our specific family lore was that Jerry Garcia had gone to my high school (Palo Alto High) and my mom’s older sister, my Aunt Titia, knew them and used to take guitar lessons from Bob Weir in Menlo Park. That’s a roundabout way of explaining that this song means so much to me, because it brings me back to my roots. Even though I love Nashville, sometimes I do feel like I’m standing on the moon wishing I were with my friends and family in San Francisco. The line, ‘A lovely view of heaven, but I’d rather be with you’ is my favorite and it’s why I named the album …but I’d rather be with you. Life is messy and imperfect but I’d rather be here in it with all of you!” — Molly Tuttle

“One of the greatest feats as a musician, in my opinion, is taking a Grateful Dead song and creating a version of it that goes beyond the stigmatized identity of a ‘Dead Cover.’ It’s hard to do and takes a lot of courage to make it happen. But Molly reached for that brass ring and then somehow even went beyond it. Her version has given the song new parameters, makes me feel new things, and surpasses any sort of referential quality and becomes Molly’s own song. I’m just happy I got to be one small part of bringing it to life.” — Taylor Goldsmith

Photo credit: Zach Pigg

LISTEN: Cary Morin, “Valley of the Chiefs”

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Artist: Cary Morin
Hometown: Lives in Fort Collins, Colorado; from Great Falls, Montana
Song: “Valley of the Chiefs”
Album: Dockside Saints
Release Date: August 7, 2020

In Their Words: “A true story told by my great grandmother at my Crow naming ceremony when I was about four years old. It tells of when she was a teenager and was kidnapped by a neighboring tribe. When women were kidnapped back then, they were destined to a life of servitude. She and her friends escape the warriors and are able to steal their horses and ride back home. The moral of the story from my great-grandmother to me was that there is nothing in life that you cannot overcome. I believe she was giving me this story to teach me perseverance in the face of any obstacles in my life. The story is familiar to me for my whole life.

“I wrote it as a memory of my life and my culture. I’ve written songs about the Crow side of my family for years. Not many of them were ever published until recently in my career. Earlier in my life, I probably thought that sharing these stories and family history was too personal. It would be interesting to ask other Crow people what their specific naming ceremony stories are. There are many… Now, I feel it is important to share this history and continue the oral history of my people. I’ve always wanted to hear this song with a different presentation. I had previously recorded it as a solo tune. I wanted a presentation with sweeping melodic lines.” — Cary Morin

Photo credit: Reggie Ruth Barrett

WATCH: Margo Price’s “Letting Me Down” Won’t Let You Down

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Soulful songbird Margo Price is making the most of her quarantine with an inventive music video for “Letting Me Down” from her latest album, That’s How Rumors Get Started. It’s the singer-songwriter’s debut project for Loma Vista Recordings and first collection of new music since 2017’s All American Made.

On “Letting Me Down,” Price harnesses her inner badass with the cutting hook, “You have a way of letting me down.” That’s How Rumors Get Started is an encapsulation of Price’s energetic live show, which is wrought with the same high-flying spirit and tenacity seen in this artfully-captured music video. Already respected as a country singer, this project from exudes rock ‘n’ roll and firmly places Price in a category with other country rockers.

The video’s director Kimberly Stuckwisch drove an RV from Los Angeles to Nashville to film in Margo’s home and an abandoned hospital. She recalls, “We bought a cheap ’80s travel trailer with a bathroom, kitchen, and a propane-powered refrigerator, so we wouldn’t have to go inside anywhere for food or bathrooms. We were able to abide by the six-feet social distance CDC recommendation as we set up a remote head for the camera that we operated from a closet outside of the room. We wore masks the entire time and Margo supplied us with multiple bottles of hand sanitizer and spiked seltzers. We parked our RV in her driveway and worked solely out of there and the room we were filming in. We wanted to speak to what was going on at that moment, to a world that was/is shut down, to the fear we all feel, and to the hope of breaking free.”

Watch “Letting Me Down” and check out Price’s “Runaway Horses with Margo Price” live stream, too.

Photo credit: Bobbi Rich

LISTEN: Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, “Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Gillian Welch and David Rawlings
Song: “Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss”
Album: All the Good Times
Release Date: July 10, 2020
Record Label: Acony Records

In Their Words: “TO OUR FRIENDS AND FANS, for reasons better discussed in the history books, in the Spring of 2020 Gillian and I dusted off an old tape machine and did some home recording. Sometimes we bumped the microphone, sometimes the tape ran out, but in the end we captured performances of some songs we love. Five are first takes and five took a little more doing, but they all helped pass the time and held our interest in playback enough that we wanted to share them with you. We sincerely hope that you enjoy All the Good Times.” — Gillian Welch & David Rawlings

Photo of Gillian Welch by Gillian Welch

WATCH: Stephen Mougin, “The Song That I Call Home”

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Artist: Stephen Mougin
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “The Song That I Call Home”
Album: Ordinary Soul
Release Date: July 31, 2020
Label: Dark Shadow Recording

In Their Words: “I discovered years ago, like many of my peers, I only really feel like myself when I’m onstage, in the studio, writing songs, or somehow involved in the creation of music. The normal world seems wild, unfamiliar, and uncomfortable until I have the chance to get back inside a song. Erin McDermott and I shared that sentiment back when we wrote ‘The Song That I Call Home’ as an homage to our muse: ‘Lyrical directions for an ordinary soul/ Look past my imperfections while the music makes me whole.’ It’s always a blast to have Sam Bush and Ned Luberecki in the same place, both musically and comically! This was an extra treat, as it’s the first music video I’ve released as an artist AND it includes my wife, Jana. I’m proud of our DSR Video team for their hard work, especially since I had to be on the ‘wrong’ side of the camera for much of this shoot!” — Stephen Mougin

Photo credit: Elliot Lopes