Tag: kenny chesney

The Show On The Road – Aubrie Sellers

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

This week on the show, we catch up with a rising star in boundary-bending country and take-no-prisoners rock ‘n’ roll, Aubrie Sellers.


LISTEN: APPLE PODCASTS • STITCHER • SPOTIFY • MP3

What have you been doing since the pandemic hit in late February? Somehow Aubrie Sellers has managed to release a striking new LP of twisty, guitar-drenched originals on Far From Home (collaborating with her roots rock heroes like Steve Earle) while also pushing herself to make a EP of beloved covers on the aptly-titled, World On Fire. In rejuvenating a faded favorite like Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game,” she takes a song we all thought we knew and twists it around until it seems like a poisonous, reverb-zapped revelation that just arrived out of nowhere.

Sellers was prepared to make music earlier in life than most. Growing up, she often found herself in nontraditional school situations, doing her homework on tour buses, hanging out in green rooms, and getting her feet wet on stages in Nashville’s tight-knit country community; you might know her mom, twangy-pop icon Lee Ann Womack and her dad, Jason Sellers, had a few chart toppers of his own, writing for folks like Kenny Chesney and playing in Ricky Skaggs’ touring band.

Sellers made her major label debut in 2016 with the more straight-ahead, but tightly crafted New City Blues, and earlier sang on a compilation record with the late Ralph Stanley. But at only 27, Sellers feels and sounds like an old soul — one less interested in climbing the current country charts than mining thornier material like her history of anxiety and stage-fright. She harnesses the punky, poetic outlaw energy that more cerebral songwriters like Steve Earle and Lucinda Williams have become known for. And audiences are taking notice, as Sellers’ scorching duet with Earle, “My Love Will Not Change,” was recently nominated for the Americana Music Association’s Song of the Year.

Stick around to the end of this episode of The Show On The Road to hear an acoustic, live-from-home rendition of her tune “Far From Home.”

Photo credit: Scott Siracusano

Ruston Kelly, ‘Black Magic

Posted on by Editor

On a good day in Tennessee lately, you're lucky to find 80-degree weather in the shade: The South is currently in full-on sticky Summer mode, where being covered in sweat or mosquitos (or both) is a daily occurrence. There are a few remedies out there — good air conditioning, a frozen beverage, a dip in the lake — but one, from Nashville's Ruston Kelly, cools things down in a more unusual way. And that's through the eardrums.

As a successful songwriter for the likes of Tim McGraw and Kenny Chesney, you might guess that Kelly's solo offerings would be well-suited to parties with pool floats and festivals where a corn-dog grin and jean shorts are the most appropriate uniforms, but that's not his style — or his season. His new debut EP, produced by Bright Eyes' Mike Mogis, says so in the title: It's called Halloween, and is full of tracks that have more in common with Ryan Adams and Butch Walker than any chipper country jam, fully evoking the moody taunt of fickle Fall, when both the people and the leaves change their colors. One of the chilliest moments is "Black Magic," which takes its cues from the likes of Elliott Smith, who could feel the inherent darkness in the hollows of an acoustic guitar, and stretches it through a virulent chorus. "I drank your poison, fell under your spell. Love is hell and nothing more than black magic," he sings. Sure, Kelly could have waited until after Labor Day to unleash this antithesis to the sometimes artificial, ephemeral joy of Summer, but why? It's good to be reminded that everything — from oppressive heat to rapturous romance — ends, eventually.