Tag: BGS Podcast Network

The String – Yola

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

The British singer songwriter known as Yola made her first significant stateside impression at the 2016 AmericanaFest in Nashville. She returned the following year and won the Artist of the Year honor at the AMA’s UK counterpart awards.

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Her charisma, her intelligent update of country soul and her astonishing voice made her an instant favorite of music fans and critics. Soon offers to record began flowing in, but the one that seemed to have the greatest potential for reaching a new level was Dan Auerbach and his Easy Eye studio and label in Nashville. The resulting debut LP Walk Through Fire is an exquisite album with classic textures and an unmistakable esthetic. We first spoke with Yola as part of a round-up review of AmericanaFest 2017, so with this in-depth conversation, she becomes the first-ever repeat visitor to The String! Also this hour, a talk with Erika Wollam Nichols, general manager of The Bluebird Cafe and instigator of a new documentary about the famous venue that premieres this week at SXSW.

The String – Colin Linden

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

Colin Linden – guitarist, singer, songwriter and producer – is one of Nashville’s most interesting musicians. You may have seen him in the Americana Awards house band, or as a key live musician on the TV series Nashville or in the dynamic Canadian country rock band Blackie and the Rodeo Kings.

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He wasn’t born into the blues but he sure found the music early and made it his own, through a very early meeting with Howlin Wolf and a pilgrimage through the Deep South in his teens. He’s also been a long-time band leader and producer for Bruce Cockburn. We talk about all that, as well as the project he’s just completed with fellow blues musician Luther Dickinson and others, a suite of vintage love songs called Amour. Plus, a visit with the new owner and proprietor of a revived historic studio in Nashville, the former home of Cowboy Jack Clement.

The Show On The Road – Celeigh Cardinal

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week host Z. Lupetin speaks with the high priestess of Canadiana soul, Celeigh Cardinal.

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Growing up without having much connection to her Indigenous heritage, Celeigh recently reconnected to the vibrant native community in Edmonton and has become a role model for young singers who may never have had the courage to make a name for themselves in Canada’s rich festival and concert circuits. In 2018 she was named the Indigenous Artist of the Year in Western Canada, and she just became the first Indigenous DJ to get her own show on CKUA radio, which reaches far across the Canadian prairies.

The Show On The Road – Bhi Bhiman

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week, Z. speaks with multi-talented songwriter, singer, guitar-slinger, and activist Bhi Bhiman. His newest project is called Peace of Mind, and is being released week by week as an interactive political podcast album.

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For nearly a decade Bhi Bhiman has been diligently crafting poetic, protesty earworms with his masterful guitar work and fuzzed out harmony. Along the way he’s gained some powerful friends and fans — like the late Chris Cornell who had Bhiman sing each night on tour a few years back. He writes about our broken immigration policies, our abandoned mental health system, the continued fight for women’s rights, voter suppression, and that’s just the first few songs off Peace of Mind. Somehow, he’s not preaching at you while he’s doing it. He’s simply putting a stunned smile on your face as you sing along with a renewed faith in the democratic process and freedom of speech.

The String – Mindy Smith

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

Fifteen years ago, Mindy Smith rocketed from local sets in Nashville to the national stage in a matter of a few months on the strength of a duet on “Jolene” with Dolly Parton and the January 2004 release of her debut album One Moment More.

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She became the first winner of the Americana Music Association Emerging Artist award, and wide audiences embraced her empathic songs and translucent voice. The years since have seen periods of high profile touring and periods of quiet. She’s preparing to step back out and working on a new album. On the occasion of the 15th anniversary release of One Moment More on vinyl, we catch up about her life and path and a recent discovery.

The String – Bill Lloyd

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week, the long, diverse career of Nashville’s Bill Lloyd.

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From country hits as a writer and artist to collaborations with leading lights of rock and pop, Bill is a dynamo. And he’s got a fantastic new album out called Working The Long Game.   He met fellow writer Radney Foster and they shot to fame in 1987 as Foster & Lloyd, with a sound that swam upstream from the country radio mainstream. In more recent years, he’s led the band the Long Players, Nashville favorites that perform live cut-by-cut covers of full classic albums. He keeps up a steady run of solo albums that blend top-flight Nashville songcraft with the timeless sound of pop music.

The Show On The Road – T Sisters

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week on the show, Z. speaks with Oakland’s soulful singing T Sisters. For this trio of sisters, singing harmony-rich songs isn’t just their full-time job, it’s a way of life. It’s what they do — and damn do they do it well.

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Sisters Erika, Chloe, and Rachel Tietjen are harmonic masters. Whether it’s demonstrated in their sassy originals accompanied by upright bass, guitar, banjo, and mandolin, or with their delicious vocal-layer-cake covers of hits by Kylie Minogue and Paul Simon, family runs deep through the music. T Sisters will be releasing their next EP, We Are Bound, produced by Oliver Wood (The Wood Brothers) in March 2019.

 

The Show On The Road – Jordie Lane and Clare Reynolds

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week, we’re talking with Australian singer/songwriter Jordie Lane and his Aussie producing/harmonizing partner Clare Reynolds. Jordie has been making dark-hearted, voluptuously verbose folk music with a grinning rock ‘n roll spirit for nearly a decade.

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While he’s just making a name for himself in the US, Lane has been playing huge venues all over Australia for years as one of Melbourne’s most beloved and respected roots music artists. Have a listen, and then tell your American amigos to give this Aussie kid a shot — you won’t regret it.

The String – Ruthie Foster

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

If Americana values all American roots forms and the fusion thereof, then nobody’s more Americana than Austin singer/songwriter Ruthie Foster.

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She grew up singing in church in rural TX, developed a variety of skills in bands while serving in the US Navy, then became a folk troubadour who slips from country to soul to blues to gospel with ease. She has been one of if not the flagship artist for Austin’s excellent Blue Corn Music record label since 2002. She’s been featured on a guitar blues tour with Jorma Kaukonen and Robben Ford, and that’s just one fragment of a rich collaborative life. She’s won the Blues Foundation’s Koko Taylor award for best traditional blues female singer SIX times, and she’s nominated again this year. She’s also a charming person who radiates kindness.

The Show On The Road – The Accidentals

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

Z. chats with Michigan electric folk trio, The Accidentals. The two leading ladies of The Accidentals met as violin- and cello-playing high schoolers in Traverse City, Michigan, where it was love at first jam, and soon after they had the courage to say no to a full scholarship to Berklee College of Music. They have been making records and touring non-stop ever since–all before they could even buy themselves a beer.

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The Accidentals’ empowered cocktail of classically infused, funky Americana got even more potent when they officially became a trio in 2014 as drummer Michael Dause joined in, and they quickly became precocious Michigan musical celebrities, opening for Brandi Carlile, Andrew Bird, and Rodriguez, among others. This momentum got them national attention following an appearance at South by Southwest (notably adored by Billboard) and eventually led them to sign to a major label.

Z. met up with the three of them in a hotel room at the Sisters Folk Fest in Oregon.