Tag: Jimi Hendrix

Billy Strings Brings Nine Shows from Five Nashville Venues to Your Screen

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It’s rare for Billy Strings to play a show in Nashville. This month, he’s doing nine of them.

The reigning IBMA Guitar Player of the Year will be hopping from venue to venue as part of a livestream series that serves as a fundraiser for important organizations, as well as a reunion with his band. He’ll launch the series at Nashville’s newest venue, Brooklyn Bowl, for a pair of shows on July 16 and 17. The run concludes on July 26 at 3rd & Lindsley. (Get the details.)

“Those are my boys and I’m just lucky to play with them,” he says of mandolinist Jarrod Walker, banjo player Billy Failing, and bassist Royal Masat. “I haven’t been able to hang with them a bunch. We went from being around each other 24/7, for months and months and months on end, to never seeing each other, period. So I’m just excited to get back together with my band, and not only play music, but just to be with them, and hang out, and make jokes. I just love those guys, you know?”

With time off the road, Billy Strings says he’s been redirecting his attention to his other hobbies, including fishing and hot rods. Looking ahead, he’ll also compete for IBMA’s 2020 Entertainer of the Year – his first time nominated in that category. (He’s also the reigning champ in the New Artist category, as well as Guitar Player of the Year.) In between visits to the lake and the garage, he called in to BGS.

BGS: Do you think you’ll approach each of these nine shows differently?

Billy Strings: Yeah, we usually try to do that anyway with the set lists. Each show has its own set list and its own vibe. It depends on where we are and where we’re playing. When I write the set list, a lot of times I take into consideration geographic locations or famous people that may have lived around there. Anything like that I can throw into the set to make it relevant. So, yeah, for each show, we’re going to approach them just like we would in that way.

Also, we might cater to the specific venues. We’re playing the Station Inn and that’s a classic bluegrass place, so we might play a bunch of bluegrass that night. We’re playing Exit/In and City Winery and those are different vibes. City Winery can be our real classy, Frank Sinatra show, and at Exit/In we can get really psychedelic and rock out.

You’ll have an international audience tuning into these shows, so this is a chance for people who have never been to Nashville to see what it’s like. For those who may not understand the diversity of the music community here, how would you describe it to them?

It’s a big melting pot. Like you said, it’s very diverse. And there’s a lot of younger musicians that are on fire! Marcus King and Molly Tuttle and Sierra Hull… just so many people that are killing it. They all live around there. It’s a really great place to be as a musician. There are always people to make music with, and to pick with, and write music with. We’ll see if we can get a couple of guests to come down. Yeah, Nashville’s just crazy, man. You walk into the grocery store and you run into your favorite musician.

There’s money being raised through these concerts, and one of the beneficiaries is Backline, which supports mental health in the music industry. What is it about Backline that made you want to include them?

I, myself, personally have struggled with anxiety and panic attacks on tour, on the bus, on stage, and there’s a lot of people in the industry that suffer with the same shit. A lot of people may not speak out about it, or try to hide it, or don’t know who to look to for help. We just lost Jeff Austin and we just lost Neal Casal. There are a couple of other folks that are good friends of mine, that are traveling musicians that have been working so hard, and I think that has a huge deal to do with anxiety and depression.

I mean, when you’re in the limelight and you’re on stage and everybody wants to take your picture all the time, a lot of times it almost can be lonely. You never get any alone time and it can get weird. I know Jeff probably struggled with that. He told me about how he struggled being in the limelight and everybody critiquing his every move and everything he does is under scrutiny. That’s not a good place to be. …

The music industry can be really tough, believe it or not, for people who are on the stage and for people who are in the crews. There are plenty of organizations that help with that, whether it’s getting musicians health insurance or dental work or finding somebody a therapist. Backline is a huge, generalized hub where you can research and find all those different organizations and read about what is the right direction for you. You can even get with somebody on Backline and they’ll help you figure it out.

You also have the ACLU and the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund as beneficiaries of this event. Why was it important for you to include them?

Well, because there’s a huge movement happening right now that I think is very important. Black people have been treated like shit, a lot, for a long time. And I just want to be on the side of history that is not an asshole. I got a lot of Black friends and my niece is Black. I’ve got family and friends and people that I love — and it shouldn’t even matter. …There’s a lot of miscommunication, a lot of divide, a lot of crazy shit going on in the country right now. I’m just all for love, man. I’m all for equality, I’m all for peace, so I wanted to donate a portion of the proceeds from these events to those organizations, just to help out.

Who are some Black musicians that influenced you?

Jimi Hendrix, definitely. Right off the bat. That’s the first guy I think of. He was amazing. Mississippi John Hurt, you know, he was a huge influence on Merle and Doc Watson. That’s who I grew up listening to, and I heard all that Mississippi John Hurt flavor in Merle Watson’s playing. That comes from the blues, the Delta blues. It goes on to Muddy Waters, B.B. King, all those cats. James Brown, come on!

I mean, without Black music, would there even be rock ‘n’ roll? I don’t even know if there would be bluegrass! Bill Monroe learned the blues from Arnold Schultz, a Black man who got him his first job. If you think about “bluegrass” – the word “blue” is in there from the blues. It’s got blues notes in it. A lot of bluegrass is just fast blues. And that’s Black music. Arnold Schultz taught Bill Monroe about that, and then he incorporated it into his music. All the music that we’re all inspired by has roots in Black music.

You mentioned Doc Watson, and of course he was loved by the folk community and the bluegrass community. Did folk music influence you, coming up?

Yeah, I think there was a point where I really got turned onto Bob Dylan and his lyrics. A lot of the old songs that I grew up playing is considered folk music. The Carter Family stuff and a lot of the Doc Watson stuff. …My friend Benji’s family used to have these gatherings, like family reunions, where they would all play bingo. I went to one of those and won a bingo, so I got to go up to the table and pick a prize. And I picked Blonde on Blonde. …I started really getting into those lyrics and all of those words.

That’s where I started realizing, OK, I like Doc Watson a bunch because he’s such a beautiful guitar player and singer, among many other reasons. Bob Dylan does what Doc Watson does on his guitar with his words. … And then I got into John Hartford really heavy, and if you listen to John Hartford’s early music, man, it is some of the most lyrically proficient stuff you’re ever going to hear! It’s amazing! There’s that old saying, “Three chords and the truth.” I really think there’s something to that. A lot of those old folk songs are so simple, but what they’re saying is so real that it cuts you.

Photo credit: Jesse Faatz

BGS 5+5: Western Centuries

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Artist: Western Centuries
Hometown: Seattle, Washington
Latest album: Call the Captain
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Country Hammer (our first band name, since rejected)

All responses by Jim Miller

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

When I was 17 years old, living in Branford, Connecticut, the only music I considered “real” was Jimi Hendrix. Nothing else mattered. Then, for reasons I can’t recall, some friends and I went to a concert by Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys in a small venue at Yale University called The Enormous Room. His band at that time included Ricky Skaggs and Keith Whitley, who appeared to be teenagers, like I was. From that point on, my musical life was forever changed. I became a “Ralph Head” and would hitchhike pretty much anywhere on the Eastern Seaboard to see his band play. Even though it’s hard to draw a direct line from Ralph Stanley to the music I write and perform today, I hope that some spiritual elements of his music have seeped into my own.

What’s your favorite memory from being on stage?

I spent 20 years touring with the band Donna the Buffalo. One year, we were hired to play MerleFest and our set, with Peter Rowan as part of the band, was scheduled to close the main stage, going on after Dolly Parton. We of course thought that this was our big break. But it turns out that Dolly talks quite a bit between songs and certainly nobody is going to cut her off. The length of our closing set kept shrinking.

When it got down to where it would be 20 minutes long, the stage manager asked: “Do you still want to go on?” Yes! So we rushed up there and started playing in our long-winded, jammy style. The stage crew could see where this was headed — I can’t remember whether we got through two or three songs before they shut down the house PA and monitors and turned the stage lights off. But our amps still worked! So we raged on as the audience stampeded for the exit gates. Priceless.

What was the first moment that you knew you wanted to be a musician?

I spent my formative years in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. When I was 7 years old, I auditioned for the Saskatoon Boys Choir and somehow made the cut. We got to wear a turquoise vest, a little white jacket, and a black bow tie. Unlike the other kids, I couldn’t read music, but I somehow faked it — learning my parts by ear. We toured the Prairie Provinces, performing in churches and schools, and it became clear to me that being a musician was my true calling.

Which elements of nature do you spend the most time with and how do those impact your work?

I’m a Lepidopterist by training, the study of butterflies and moths. I’ve hiked endless miles through the jungles of Central and South America, searching for rare species. Those travels have opened my eyes to the vastness and beauty of the natural world. They’ve also exposed me to people in different countries who speak different languages, eat different food, and live day-to-day in intimate contact with nature. Such experiences inform my world outlook and provide musical inspiration in ways I can acknowledge, but not easily explain.

Since food and music go so well together, what is your dream pairing of a meal and a musician?

I would go to Bob Seger’s house — in Detroit I assume — and ask him to cook cheeseburgers on the grill. I can make the coleslaw.

Photo credit: Bill Reynolds

BGS 5+5: Ron Pope

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Artist: Ron Pope
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Latest album: Bone Structure (March 6, 2020)

Which artist has influenced you most and how?

Springsteen has always been my North Star. First of all, he’s a band guy in solo artist’s clothes. I’ve always felt the same way; I meant to be in a band of equal partners (and that’s how I started), but in the end, I was unwilling to cede the control necessary to do that forever if I was going to have to do the lion’s share of the work. That was a tough thing for me to admit to myself, but I figured it couldn’t be that wrong if Bruce did it.

I guess it was also coming from that same kind of blue-collar background and trying to tell the stories of how real people around me were living their lives. Bruce showed me that a songwriter could reflect the world they came from and represent those who would otherwise go unrepresented. I never had to learn that, because he was doing it before I was born; I’ve always known that was possible.

What’s your favorite memory from being onstage?

The first time we played at Irving Plaza in New York my grandparents happened to be in town. They hadn’t seen me play in years. The last show they’d attended was at a shady club in Miami where there were maybe six paying customers and we’d been instructed by the management to pay some tweaker named “Speedy” to watch our van. At this sold-out show in New York with over a thousand people in attendance, my grandparents were pretty wide-eyed. At some point during the show, I called them out and had a spotlight thrown into the balcony. The whole crowd went wild. I’ll never forget my grandmother standing up there waving down at the crowd like the queen. My grandpa (who is not an easy man to impress) was very stoked. I’ve never been happier on stage than in that moment.

What other art forms inform your music?

I am constantly reading. I can’t imagine attempting to be a writer if you’re not an avid reader. I have to put words in to get words out. Recently, I’ve been on an autobiography kick. I just finished Elton’s. Now I’m reading Presidents of War. Thinking about rereading On The Road next.

If you had to write a mission statement for your career, what would it be?

My philosophy is simple: Just don’t stop. When everyone around you quits, just keep on going and eventually, you’ll get where you’re hoping to go. When I was starting out, I wasn’t the best musician in my social circle (not by a mile), but as each of them decided it was too hard to keep going, I refused to surrender. That’s what made the difference.

What is your dream pairing of a meal and a musician?

My wife and I do a silly cooking show on Instagram that we’ve dubbed “Frankie’s Test Kitchen.” (In theory, we’re teaching Frankie, our twenty-month old, how to cook; in practice, she just tries to eat fistfuls of flour and chases the dog.) We always want to have our musician friends over, but it’s rare that any of us are in town at the same time. In 2020, I’d like to find one day where I can get everyone to the house all at once and do a big Sunday supper like my grandma used to do, with my homemade meatballs and red sauce.

Everyone who’s ever gotten a dinner invite to my house could come (including Lilly Hiatt, Lauren Morrow, Michaela Anne, Katie Schecter, Kirby Brown, the Trotters from The War and Treaty, Struggle Jennings, Caroline Spence, Alanna Royale… I could do this all day; I’m forever inviting people to dinner at the house). So rather than some dream pairing where I make coq au vin for Jimi Hendrix, I just want all these people who I know and like to come eat a dish that usually makes people smile. And if you happen to talk to them, somebody tell Bruce and Patti we’re saving them two seats!

The Garden of Gospel Music: A Conversation with Phil Cook

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The motivation for Phil Cook’s unapologetically familiar gospel sound is simple: he LOVES that style of music and the people he’s learned it from. At times he veers into Appalachian instrumentation, reflecting his current North Carolina surroundings, and there’s individuality and innovation aplenty. But this Wisconsin kid and his band never stray far from a black gospel blueprint, incorporating backing choirs, tinkling piano stabs, organ that’s more Booker T. than Benmont T., and a vocal delivery that’s loose and expressive.

On his new album, People Are My Drug, Cook invites us to marvel gratefully and joyfully at the greatness of so many people whose creativity and communal originality have flourished under oppression, as well as those who hold the weight of the world within their silence.

There is a definite space that People Are My Drug lives in. I’d love to hear your thoughts on that. 

I’m lucky. If I’ve learned anything, it’s to surround yourself with people that know what they’re doing, have a lot of experience, and have something to say. I can possess those things, not all at the same damn time, but if I’m surrounded by other people, I feel safer to be that multiplicity. So my circle starts with my brother, as a producer who knows me better than any other and helps me deliver the most honest statement that I can make. He knows when I’m hiding and helps me stand up tall and be who I have to be to do the thing.

From there, all the musicians in the band – we essentially made the record in two days. Most everything was made in a studio in Wisconsin, which happens to be owned and operated by my old friend Justin Vernon. So we brought the whole crew up, and we holed up in a live room, the four of us – drums, bass, keys, and me. We played for two straight days and didn’t leave the room. We trusted the people across the house were doing their job.

And that’s where this record starts: trust. I am surrounded by musicians that I trust more than anyone else in that moment on stage or in the studio, and we made that a bubble. Then after we were done we had a nice dinner and went into the control room and listened to the record that we’d just made. We were laughing and smiling at each other. There are little moments that happen all over the place. We start out “He Gives Us All His Love,” and I was like, “Bass, I love ya.” And when we listened back to it, that’s exactly what the vibe of the entire record is, that fraternal kind of vibe.

Speaking of fraternity, “He Gives Us All His Love” stirs me to feel universally connected to humankind, more brotherhood of man than fatherhood of God. Is that what you were going for?

Yeah! It’s my favorite Randy Newman song off of Sail Away because it’s the one time he lets his sardonic humor-guard down for a very simple song about gratefulness and generosity, and I like that a lot. Funny story, we sang our version of that song for the first time and halfway through it a woman in the front row looks up at me with a little smile and goes, “How do you know it’s a ‘he’?” and immediately switched the entire perspective of the song. And the rest of the song we sang “She gives us all her love.” I was like, “Well, this is how we’re gonna perform it from now on!”

And that’s the kind of spontaneous moment that you have to pay attention to as a musician, to be open when something passes by and be like, “That’s it! Cool! Switch directions. Let’s hit this.” And you trust. It made for a really beautiful moment at a hometown show. So yeah, I do feel that the fraternity, the brotherhood of man, is the heart and soul of how gospel music plays a role in my life. It’s much more of a family, a community. That’s the togetherness of space that I think the center of this record is.

What I ultimately got out of a childhood in church was this great community that was really supportive of me being who I was. They saw a little kid with glasses in Wisconsin, and they told me to keep being who I want to be. That’s what every kid deserves. And as much as I walked away from church, when something is a part of you in your childhood, you can’t just walk away from it. It’s going to be a part of you for the rest of your life, even if you don’t have a weekly interaction with it.

And I think gospel music in general has been a part of me having this continual, ongoing dialogue with my faith and my questions in a deeper way that feels really real, that feels like a real practice, nothing about dogma, nothing about a system. It’s not gonna work for everybody, but I was able to dial back my anxiety medication after two or three years pretty much listening to quartet black gospel music and getting into it until I started to feel it.

What is it about gospel music that connects you to that human moment?

Well, gospel music is the original garden of all music that comes out of America. On one side you’ve got the blues, which way more people in the white community are familiar with. That’s ubiquitous. A lot of people know who Robert Johnson is, Buddy Guy, B.B. King, even someone more eclipsing, like Jimi Hendrix. A lot of those artists were torn their whole lives between what they were doing for money and what they were doing on Sunday morning.

Religion never left them either. Religion gave them so much. So even blues artists weren’t free of that spiritual paradox. If you look at some of the greatest singers, they all came out of this garden of the church. Aretha, Curtis Mayfield, Sam Cooke, all the Staples Singers – a vast number that were able to have a safe space as they were growing up. The safest space they could find was church, the place where they were able to seed and plant their art and their voice.

The church was also the source of this friendly competition with players raised up there. You’ve got young kids in the wings watching every single move that you’re doing, and they’re going home and practicing. It creates a whole circle of virtuosity and innovation. It was the only place for it to thrive, and, damnit, it thrived. It changed the entire world. Most of those artists went on to big careers in soul music and left the church in some ways. The church didn’t leave them though. That was with them the entire way.

I appreciate the way in this album you direct attention toward others and away from yourself. I’ve cried twice this morning listening to “Another Mother’s Son.”

It’s heavy. I had my own experience with almost losing my youngest son when he was born to some complications with respiratory stuff. You get close to almost losing the thing that you hold most precious, even though you just met him. Your family is forced to grip with the possibility that things aren’t gonna turn out ok. I don’t know who isn’t gonna be affected by a situation like that in a way that’s gonna crack your heart wide open. And what happens after that is really important.

He came home from the hospital and I put him to bed; we’d had an incredible family day. I felt like, “Oh, my family is so strong. I’m so thankful for this family. We’re gonna get through this life together and it’s gonna be ok.” And then I checked Instagram and saw the video that Philando Castile’s girlfriend, Diamond, took of the police officer after [the officer] shot him multiple times with her daughter in the back seat of the car. In that moment it was the juxtaposition of how safe I was feeling, how strong my family felt, to seeing a young man who was such a giving soul ripped so violently from his own mother, who called him her miracle child.

She wasn’t supposed to be able to have kids and she had a son, Philando Castile. And then this broken-ass justice system completely stole him away from her and everyone else that loved him. And it just hit me way harder than it normally would have because of what I went through. Often times you go through something and then maybe days, months, years down the line, something else will happen that will give you a whole new perspective on what you experienced initially.

The second fold was one of my bandmates, a phenomenally gifted musician and gregarious, incredible human being, Brevan [Hampden], who came over one night to meet [my son] Amos. Brevan was raised by his mother, who had three boys, all black men in America growing up. We sat on the porch drinking beers, and the talk turned to all this stuff. I love Brevan with all my heart. We’ve gone through a lot in our lives as musicians together in just a few years. And I think that moment just a few days after Philando Castile’s death really delivered home the two worlds that are so separate in this country. What some mothers don’t have to worry about. And what some mothers have to live in fear of every single day. And no matter how hard they sandbag and prepare against the terrible reality that could happen, their black son is walking out the door every day with a target on his chest. There’s no guarantees.

Brevan was raised sternly about how to interact with police, body language, tone of voice, every single thing. It was so foreign to me to listen to that, growing up in northern Wisconsin, the diversity-free capitol of the world. I knew all the police officers in Chippewa Falls. They all knew my mom and dad. I don’t know how many benefits of a doubt I got because of that. I can’t ignore that. I’m gonna go through the rest of my life grateful that it’s never happened to me. It’s a poisonous system, and I moved south to get away from indifference, so I could be in more of an interactive dialogue with communities that didn’t look, think, and act like me.

Photo credit: Josh Wool (Top); Graham Tolbert (Middle)

BGS 5+5: Chris Stills

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Artist: Chris Stills
Hometown: Los Angeles, California
Latest Album: Don’t Be Afraid
Personal Nicknames: Stillsy

How do other art forms – literature, film, dance, painting, and so on – inform your music?

My favorite way to get inspired is to go see other people play, because you see the human being on stage with their songs and not just the music. There is a depth there that informs you with so much more information on what the artist is about – the nature of their style, the way they wield that style and talent on stage and in front of their audience. I mean, you can get the record and listen to production, but to really get an artist, you see ’em live. It’s all about the banter which, to me, is actually the hardest part of playing in front of people.

Movies and docs are cool … paintings and poetry … I like watching people speak at readings. Anything can strike a chord, inspire a thought … it’s up to you to seize upon it and write it down, record it, spend time with it, honor it. It’s like a laser beam from the universe – not to sound too hokey but it’s true. You gotta put yourself in the position to not just receive it, but to translate and interpret it.

What was the first moment that you knew you wanted to be a musician?

I heard “Little Wing” on the radio when I was about 10 years old. That song changed the way I listened to music forever and, from then on, I started to dive into playing more and wanting to recreate the magic that I was suddenly privy to.

If you could spend 10 minutes with John Lennon, Dolly Parton, Hank Williams, Joni Mitchell, Sister Rosetta, or Merle Haggard how would it go?

Truth is, I have spent time with others like them and, when I was younger, I’d want to hide in a corner and just observe. I never thought I had anything important enough to say, or that they would ever want to hear what I had to say. Now, with age, I realize that it’s not about being important; it’s about being yourself. It’s that thing where you realize that your existence is no different than theirs and you just need to go with yourself. Be your badass self, no matter who you’re in the room with. That actually can be enough to attract the best of them. And with a cast like that, anything could happen. How would it go? Well, dinner would be nice.

What’s the toughest time you ever had writing a song?

The toughest time, for me, is mostly getting my shit together to actually finish them. There is a finality to songs that can sometimes fuck with me. Like I’m going to ruin it. I’m going to miss its potential. Dealing with some unrealistic fear that there will be no songs after that. Like when you don’t want your kids to grow up. Because when they grow up, they’re not yours anymore. I’m still finishing songs I started 20 years ago. Sounds crazy and stupid, but that’s my self-inflicted cross to bear. Still working on that one.

As you travel around the world, what is the overriding sense you get of the people?

When you start out, every crowd is different. They present different difficulties but every one is an opportunity. You learn to take the right chances at the right time to grab them and win them over. What’s funny is, when you come back around, those crowds are more than likely the same as they were when you were last there. Just more of them! I love the humanity in that. And it plays into local traditions, and local credence to music, and their understanding and love of it.

 

Photo credit: Laurence Laborie

BGS 5+5: The Teskey Brothers

Posted on by Amy Reitnouer

Band Name: Sam Teskey (of the Teskey Brothers)
Hometown: Warrandyte, AUS
Latest Album: Half Mile Harvest
Personal Nicknames: Sammy

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

I’ve gone through a lot of stages that different artists have influenced me more, but I would have to say B.B King has always been there, and I’ve always come back to his work.

I feel there are two elements to great music — the song and the soul behind it. The marriage of the two really is something special. For example, take the Beatles song “With a Little Help trom My Friends” and give it to Joe Cocker … say no more. B.B does this with ease in his music — simple, but great songs played in just the right way with so much soul behind it.

What was the first moment that you knew you wanted to be a musician?

Well, firstly, I saw a Jimi Hendrix DVD, and I was sold then. But also, I think growing up around St. Andrews pub (near where we grew up) got me very interested. Seeing working musicians come through every weekend showed me that it was possible if I worked at it.

What rituals do you have, either in the studio or before a show?

When we are recording, I usually get to the studio early, before the band arrives, so I can get the tape machine warmed up and aligned. It takes the length of a record to get it ready, so I choose one for the morning to also align my head and ears. Most commonly Traffic or Neil Young’s Harvest.

Which elements of nature do you spend the most time with and how do those impact your work?

We have our studio upstream of Melbourne on the Yarra River in a beautiful town called Warrandyte. This is where we all grew up, among the trees, swimming and jamming by the river. It is a very refreshing place to write music and share song ideas. There seems to be a lot of musos making music out there. Must be something in the water, or just a great space to make music. Whatever it is, we feel at home there.

What’s the weirdest, hardest, nerdiest, or other superlative thing about songwriting that most non-writers wouldn’t know?

The strangest thing about songs for me is, where do they come from? I imagine them to be something that is always floating around us like microscopic dust. Learning to write a song is like trying to catch them all and fitting them together like a puzzle. Once you’ve completed one puzzle, you don’t know how you are going to find the next one … but they always seem to find you. You just have to be open to finding them or letting them find you.

3×3: Jesse Terry on Hendrix, Harrison, and Hotel Room Exercise

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Artist: Jesse Terry
Hometown: Stonington, CT
Latest Album: Stargazer
Personal Nicknames: JT, J-Breeze, Breeze-daddy, O’Terry, Breezy

If you could go back (or forward) to live in any decade, when would you choose?

Oh definitely the ’60s. I can’t imagine what it would be like to hear the Beatles for the first time, when everything was brand new. Or hear Hendrix, for that matter, when he was brand new and freaking everyone out. That would have been unreal. It’s still unreal and it’s 50 years later. There was no time like it.

Who would be your dream co-writer?

Gone or still with us? I would choose George Harrison for folks that have left this world. I love them all, but George was probably my favorite Beatle. He seemed like such a gentle soul with such a beautiful, humble spirit. And, wow, George wrote the most amazing songs — some of my favorite Beatles songs, not to mention his work on All Things Must Pass and his other solo albums. I have this feeling that co-writing with him would be really relaxed. I picture us drinking tea in his garden and just talking about life and spirituality until an idea hit us.

If we’re talking about someone still with us, I’d probably choose Jeff Lynne, one of George’s best friends and one of my biggest heroes. He’s another guy that seems very grounded and chill — and he seems like a hilarious, sharp dude in his interviews. I’d love to see how Jeff’s mind works, as he’s writing. He plays like seven instruments, and I’m sure that would affect his writing process. I wonder how much he’s producing and thinking about arrangements as he’s writing. I think he’s one of the best melody writers of all time and certainly one of the greatest producers. I’d take that co-write.

If a song started playing every time you entered the room, what would you want it to be?

“All You Need Is Love” because that’s totally true, huh? What a simple and perfect lyric. And that melody makes me forget about all of the negative things in the world.

What is the one thing you can’t survive without on tour?

Exercise. Well, my wife and dog, too, but we’re a trio, so that goes without saying. We always make time to take our pup Jackson out to a local park when we’re traveling. Or we do some exercise together using this great app my wife found. This very calm lady on the app has us do a bunch of crazy moves in our hotel room and it totally kicks our ass. I think we get a better workout on the road than we do at home at the YMCA. If I don’t get exercise, I can get down and go a little batty. I tour so much that we really don’t have much time to drink or party, but I really don’t mind at all. I dig what we’ve got going on. ROCK ‘N’ ROLL!

What are you most afraid of?

Clowns and zombies … okay, mainly clowns.

Who is your celebrity crush?

My wife already knows this one … Scarlett Johansson.

Pickles or olives?

I don’t like either, but if I had to choose, I would go with pickles.

Plane, train, or automobile?

I dig all three big time, but if you can take one of those trains that goes from Italy to Switzerland with the glass roof, JUST DO IT! Wow, that was the best freaking transportation of my life. You go right through the Alps and over all of these crazy bridges and cliffs. You have a sneaky feeling that you might not survive the journey, but it’s almost okay at that point. What’s left to see after that?

Which is worse — rainy days or Mondays?

You’re talking to a touring troubadour and a coffee addict. I LOVE rainy days and Mondays. Rainy days are a great excuse to wear pajamas all day and drink an excessive amount of coffee with the windows open. And Mondays are like the weekend for me, after a long week of shows. We hardly ever book shows on Mondays, so they are usually my recuperating/movie watching days, too. What’s the best kind of day for me? A rainy Monday.

3×3: KALO on Hendrix, Heat, and Her Majesty Madonna

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Bat-Or Kalo (of KALO)
Hometown: Haifa, Israel  
Latest Album: Wild Change
Personal Nicknames: B

 

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If you had to live the life of a character in a song, which song would you choose?

“Angel” by Jimi Hendrix

Where would you most like to live or visit that you haven’t yet?

I’d love to visit Bali!

What was the last thing that made you really mad?

Getting heat exhaustion from riding horses too long in the sun.

 

Things happen when you’re in the car too long. #littlerock

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If you had to get a tattoo of someone’s face, who would it be?

Jesus! 

Whose career do you admire the most?

My career, for real. Or Madonna’s. She’s had an incredible career.

What are you reading right now?

Just finished reading The Shack.

 

Breakfast of champions !!! 3:40am

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Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

It all depends where I am and what I need to get done. I’m definitely an extrovert while on stage; maybe more of an introvert in day-to-day life.  

What’s your favorite culinary spice?

Salt and pepper. 

What was your favorite childhood toy?

I didn’t really play a lot with toys. I was one of those imaginative kids who could make believe anything and who loved to just go and play with my friends.

Photo credit: Jack Mills

3×3: Devon Gilfillian on Led Zeppelin, Lori McKenna, and Losing Teeth

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Devon Gilfillian
Hometown: Morton, PA 19070 (Delco)
Latest Album: Devon Gilfillian EP
Personal Nicknames: Dev, D

If you could go back (or forward) to live in any decade, when would you choose?

I would love to live my 20s from 1965-1975. That era of music has shaped my core as a musician. Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Otis Redding, the Allman Brothers, Stevie Wonder, the Beatles … the list goes on and on. It was just a classic era of music for me. The times were rough. The civil rights era was a trying time for our country, but out of that came some really inspired music.

Who would be your dream co-writer?

Lori McKenna

If a song started playing every time you entered the room, what would you want it to be?

Isaac Hayes — “Walk on By”

 

I’m dead. #redrocks

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What is the one thing you can’t survive without on tour?

Sadly, as a millennial, I guess I’d have to say my phone. I usually try and work from the road, if I didn’t have that, I’d be pretty screwed.

What are you most afraid of?

I always have a nightmare where all my teeth fall out. That’s pretty terrifying.

Who is your celebrity crush?

I think it’s between Janelle Monae or Monica Martin, from the band PHOX.

Pickles or olives?

Pickles for sure.

Plane, train, or automobile?

Automobile — I like to be in control. Unless it’s one of those trains that you can sit down and eat dinner on … that’d be cool.

Which is worse — rainy days or Mondays?

I guess rainy days. My schedule doesn’t abide by the normal off-on-the-weekends rule, so Mondays are cool with me.

Photo credit: Lindsey Patkos

3X3: Ryan Harris Brown on Brussel Sprouts, Smoky Mountains, and Soundtracks

Posted on by Amy Reitnouer

Artist: Ryan Harris Brown
Hometown: Scranton, PA
Latest Album: Stranded in the Present Tense
Personal Nicknames: RHB

If your life were a movie, which songs would be on the soundtrack?

Jimi Hendrix, “Wind Cries Mary”

Ben Folds Five, “One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces”

Ryan Adams, “Come Pick Me Up”

John Mayer, “No Such Thing”

Paul Simon, “Graceland”

How many unread emails or texts currently fill your inbox?

A big fat ZERO on both fronts.

How many pillows do you sleep with?

Two to three, but the third usually ends up on the floor by morning.

 

New blog post up. Link in bio. #nashville #nashvillemusic #indiemusic #indieartist #tumblr #blog

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How many pairs of shoes do you own?

10

Which mountains are your favorite — Smoky, Blue Ridge, Rocky, Appalachian, or Catskill?

Well, I’ve only seen the Smokies and the Blue Ridge Mountains, so I’m going to go with the Smokies.

What’s your favorite vegetable?

Brussel Sprouts

Fate or free will?

Fate    

Sweet or sour?

Sweet

Sunrise or sunset?

Sunrise