Tag: Music City Roots

STAY ON YOUR ASS: BGS is Open so Your State Doesn’t Have to Be

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

At this point, you know the routine. We say something like, “LOL, remember when we used to get off our asses?” Then we pause. Then we say, “NOT ANYMORE!”

Stay on your ass, okay? We’ve got plenty of musical time-fillers for you while you do, including the debut episode of Whiskey Sour Happy Hour, a livestream show from our friends at Music City Roots coming out of a long hibernation, and much more.

Did we miss something that’s helping you stay on your ass this week? (We probably did.) Let us know in the comments and on social media!

Whiskey Sour Happy Hour, Episode 1

After technical difficulties gave us a somewhat rocky start last night, Whiskey Sour Happy Hour’s debut episode was a smashing success! A surprise appearance from comedian Jenny Slate, Ed sang three-part harmony with himself on “Ocean of Diamonds,” Watkins Family Hour played through a window pane — if you missed it, you missed a joyous hour and fifteen minutes of quarantine bliss.

Good news. You can watch the entire thing on YouTube! So no cryin’ over spilt whiskey sour, get watchin’ — and get DONATING at this link.

Free Dirt Records Revue, April 25

Ardent BGS fans will recognize many of the artists on Free Dirt Records’ Revue lineup, given almost all of them have found themselves within the wordpress “pages” of the Bluegrass Situation over the years. Tune in on Free Dirt’s Facebook page on April 25, 2-7pm EDT for some of the best of folk, bluegrass, Americana, string band, country, and beyond. Your donations will directly support the out-of-work creators on the lineup.

And, you can read along on BGS while you watch! We’ve got articles and content on Allison de Groot & Tatiana Hargreaves; JP Harris; Rachel Baiman; Jake Blount; Western Centuries; Che Apalache; and plenty more, too.

Marcus Mumford: “You’ll Never Walk Alone” (Tonight Show: At Home Edition)

It has been truly remarkable to see the efforts of artists all around the world during this unusual time in history. Marcus Mumford was recently featured on Jimmy Fallon’s adapted Tonight Show: At Home, singing a masterpiece from a legendary songbook. Paying homage to two of the greatest composers to ever write for theater and film, Mumford performs a softened rendition of “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” a selection that he recently recorded for television.

In classic Mumford fashion, the performance grows from a delicate melody into an earnest decree, offering hope and comfort. Jimmy Fallon and co. are hosting a slew of performances such as this on the Tonight Show, which has been continuing with a new, socially distant M.O. With all this time to Stay On Your Ass, it’s nice to see regularly programmed content is taking strides to not only keep us entertained, but to do so in a socially responsible manner.

The Milk Carton Kids’ Sad Songs Comedy Hour

Joey and Kenneth of the Milk Carton Kids take their dry, wry, sly style of music and wit to the internet with their formerly brick-and-mortared show, Sad Songs Comedy Hour. Episodes have featured, yes, Sarah Jarosz, as well as Mythbusters’ Adam Savage, Sara Bareilles, Cecile McLorin Salvant, and others.

Each episode will champion a different charity, chosen by each week’s guest artist. Watch them all and give at sadsongscomedyhour.com.

Music City Roots Live from Quarantine, April 23

If you’ve been missing Music City Roots as much as we have, here’s a true silver lining from this COVID-19 crisis: MCR is back! Their online version of the popular Nashville radio show and weekly gathering — which had been on hold for months as they searched for their new soon-to-be home at Madison Station — will debut tonight, April 23, on YouTube, right here. Also raising money for MusiCares’ COVID-19 Relief Fund, the bill features some folk, country, and bluegrass clout.

We have read along links for MCR, too! Sam Bush; Jim Lauderdale; Sierra Hull & Justin Moses; John Oates; and Lillie Mae, too.

Justin Hiltner and Jonny Therrien contributed to this article.

Best of: Brandi Carlile

Posted on by Editor

For years, Brandi Carlile has been turning out beautiful tunes about the human experience. Her newest release, By the Way, I Forgive You, being no exception. The album is a powerful collection of 10 songs spanning themes such as love, loss, memory, addiction, and so much more. Take a listen and I’m sure you’ll have it playing on repeat all year long.

Can’t get enough of February’s Artist of the Month? Here are five videos to celebrate Carlile’s amazing career so far:

“Turpentine”

Uploaded in 2008, this performance of “Turpentine” from Carlile’s second studio album, The Story, is the oldest video on the Brandi Carlile YouTube page. Pick a part and get ready to sing backup vocals with the rest of her Boston audience!

“Dreams”

Carlile debuted on Music City Roots live from the Loveless Café on June 16, 2010. She and the band give it their all in this high-energy performance of “Dreams” from her 2009 album, Give Up the Ghost.

“A Promise to Keep”

“A Promise to Keep,” from Carlile’s Bear Creek album, is a touching song full of keen observations about the way life works. The ambling guitar picking beautifully mimics the ways in which we continue on in the process of moving on from loss.

“The Things I Regret”

“The Things I Regret” is one of my personal favorite Brandi Carlile songs. In this video from the Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, Colorado, Carlile shows off her skill as a performer. Flanked by twins Phil and Tim Hanseroth, Carlile brings an energy and power to the stage that is truly captivating.

“The Mother”

There is no mistaking the pure love in Carlile’s eyes as she serenades her daughter, Evangeline, in this performance of “The Mother” from By The Way, I Forgive You. The song is just one example from Carlile’s newest album of the ways in which the artist has grown and gained new life experiences to share with her listeners.

Photo credit: Alysse Gafkjenh

Best of: Music City Roots

Posted on by Editor

There really is nothing quite like live music, and what would Wednesday nights be without Music City Roots live from the Factory? If you aren’t lucky enough to be in Nashville, be sure to catch the live stream each week at 7 pm CT. In the meantime, we’ve scoured the MCR YouTube channel to pull together this collection of must see performances you don’t want to miss:

BGS Favorite: Elephant Revival, “Grace of a Woman”

Get ready to sing along to this high-energy song by Elephant Revival. Although no longer a member of this band, Sage Cook’s electric banjo solo is not to be missed, and everyone could use a little more washboard in their lives!

Fresh off the Press: Dori Freeman, “You Say” 

Twenty-five-year-old Dori Freeman made her MCR debut recently with a performance of “You Say.” This live rendition showcases what we at the BGS have already praised Freeman for: an honest voice and lyricism that wrenches right at the heart.

Blast from the Past: Pokey LaFarge, “In the Jailhouse Now” 

Before the Factory, there was the Loveless Café. This 2011 rendition of the blues and vaudeville standard is titled “In the Graveyard Now” on LaFarge’s album Riverboat Soul. The only question we keep asking is why didn’t we learn how to play the harmonica like that!

Seeing Double: The Brother Brothers, “Cairo, IL” 

Part of the beauty of the Brother Brothers lies in the simplicity of their instrumentation and the haunting harmonies that result from the similarity of their vocal tone. Can you tell who is who in this live performance of “Cairo, IL” from December?

The Jam: Nashville Jam, “I’ll Fly Away” 

One of the most popular jams to celebrate the collaborative spirit of Music City is a rendition of the spiritual and bluegrass standard “I’ll Fly Away” performed by host Jim Lauderdale with guests Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, Sierra Hull, Liz Longley, Maureen Murphy, and T Bone Burnett. Make sure to watch til the end for an amazing guitar solo by Rawlings on his classic 1935 Epiphone archtop.

Bluegrass Underground Takes the Genre to New Depths

Posted on by Editor

If you’re a fan of bluegrass, PBS, or both, there’s a good chance you’ve seen the Emmy-winning show Bluegrass Underground. The series, which features the biggest voices in roots music performing in an actual cave, has been on the air since 2011, with shows first taking place 333 feet below the earth in McMinville, Tennessee’s Cumberland Caverns in 2008. Since the show’s inception, it’s featured a who’s-who of bluegrass and Americana’s finest artists, including Old Crow Medicine Show, Del McCoury, and Lucinda Williams. 

New episodes for the 2017 season taped over the weekend with three days of shows that featured Conor Oberst, Parker Millsap, Rhonda Vincent, and Marty Stuart, among others. This new season — the series’ seventh on television — is its biggest yet, a lineup that had Larry Nager, who serves as the show’s resident journalist and blogger, as excited as ever to get down to the cave. 

Prior to getting involved with Bluegrass Underground, Nager worked as a journalist, musician, and bluegrass historian. His first brush with the series came in 2008, when he attended one of the very first shows — featuring the likes of Tim O’Brien, Bryan Sutton, and Stuart Duncan — at the behest of Bluegrass Underground founder Todd Mayo. He cites that lineup as inspiring him to join the show’s team, but also is quick to explain that the venue itself played a large role in getting him on board.

And it is quite a sight. After trekking down a dimly lit, winding path flanked by rock formations and crystalline pooled water, visitors descend upon a grand “room” made of rock, at once cozy and breathtaking, lit by a large chandelier that can only be described as prehistoric chic. 

“There are artists who won’t go because they don’t like the idea of being in a cave,” he says. “That, in itself, is interesting. But there’s kind of a magic that happens underground. It takes everybody out of their usual zone. For bluegrass bands or any working band, it’s gig after gig after gig and they all kind of run together, but when they come down there they say, ‘This is one we’re gonna remember.’”

Though Nager has seen countless shows over the years, there are a handful of moments from his time in the cave that rank among his favorite musical memories. One of the most treasured of those memories is his experience seeing the late Dr. Ralph Stanley perform in 2011.

“Ralph did two shows down in the cave,” he says. “To get him in the cave is just a cool thing. He did ‘O Death’ with a pin-spot on his face in the dark cave. That was one of those moments … It was transcendent. That’s definitely one of the moments I’ll remember.”

Nager noted that moments like those are made available to viewers beyond the lucky few hundred in the venue by PBS, an entity threatened by budget proposals by the Trump administration. Without the support of PBS, there likely won’t be a home on television for Bluegrass Underground or similar roots-centric shows like Music City Roots. 

“There really is a message there, in that PBS, for people who love roots music and love bluegrass … you’re not going to see it anywhere else, not on broadcast television. There’s also an underserved rural population that, the influence of PBS there, is not often stated, but for a lot of places that’s the alternative TV they get. Otherwise, it’s Dancing with the Stars.

“If you’re open to it, the beauty of it, the strangeness of it, the uniqueness of the experience is inspiring. It’s just old-fashioned magic.”

COMING SOON: The Bluegrass Situation Radio Hour

Posted on by Editor

On September 2, WMOT-FM, Middle Tennessee State University’s public radio station, is changing its menu to one of Americana with the Music City Roots team stirring the pot. WMOT: Roots Radio will be Middle Tennessee's only channel programming the musical gumbo of bluegrass, folk, gospel, soul, country, and blues music that is Americana … andThe Bluegrass Situation Radio Hour will be one of numerous specialty spices, along with Music City Roots and Bluegrass Underground.

The 100,000-watt station, which first aired in April of 1969 and currently plays jazz on 89.5 FM, boasts the clearest and strongest radio signal in greater Nashville reaching from Bowling Green, Kentucky, in the north to the Alabama border in the south.

Rodney Crowell, for one, is very excited about the announcement: “Imagine, in our neck of the woods, a radio station with real people playing music they actually care about, even love. WMOT is bringing Middle Tennessee real music when we need it most. Miracles happen.”

The new WMOT will showcase and celebrate the past, present and future of American roots music with a focus on Nashville’s unparalleled track record of artistry and songwriting, while also highlighting regional and stylistic “roots and branches” from around the country and across the world.

Curated by the programming team of Music City Roots, the Roots Radio playlist will be deep and wide. Listeners can expect live radio hosts from 6 am to 7 pm on weekdays, including veterans of roots music broadcasting. Anchoring the team and directing musical programming will be industry icon Jessie Scott, the first roots music director on satellite radio and a founding board member of the Americana Music Association. Music City Roots’ founder, John Walker, will host morning drive. Grand Ole Opry veteran Keith Bilbrey will handle midday, tapping his expertise in country music. Long-time radio man Whit “Witness” Hubner will work early afternoons.

Beginning September 11, Chris Jacobs will host The Bluegrass Situation Radio Hour on Sunday evenings at 8 pm CT, bringing the music from the BGS website to life. From Sitch Sessions to Squared Roots, Artist of the Month to Song of the Week, The BGS Radio Hour will offer a whole new way for fans to engage with the music they love.

Those of us who grew up making mixtapes and watching WKRP in Cincinnati are pretty excited!

Music City Roots Launches Live Album Series

Posted on by Editor

Since its inception eight years ago, Music City Roots has become an institution — for Nashvillians, it's one of the best places in town to catch amazing live music; for the United States, it's perhaps the only way to enjoy the best and brightest roots musicians from the comfort of home, whether online or, since 2013, on PBS. Now the famed show is bringing you yet another way to enjoy great roots music: their new live album series.

Kicked off in June with a release from Johnson City, Tennessee, band Bill and the Belles, the series brings listeners a handful of songs recorded at a recent Music City Roots broadcast. The inaugural release features seven songs and is available across a variety of digital platforms, including Spotify and iTunes. 

According to Music City Roots associate producer Ashlee-Jean Trott, whose background prior to joining the Music City Roots team in 2010 was in artist management and music festivals, the idea came to life after she attended DelFest and saw fans' excitement over getting to purchase live festival recordings shortly after they happened. "We have so much content every week, and we have a very large fan base that comes to the shows every week and watches online," Trott explains. "They always want to hear the music afterward." 

Trott and her team decided that the series would be selective, with a goal to release one album every two months instead of releasing recordings from each week's show. She hopes that frequency can increase to once a month in 2017.

"I book the bands for the show, so usually I know what all the bands sound like before," she says. "Usually, the bands that blow me away or blow our crew away at the show are the ones that we choose. So, this first band that we did — Bill and the Belles — I had heard them at IBMA and I really liked their music and I booked them on the show. But when they played at the show, it was one of those moments that I’ll never forget. It was just so good and the audience gave them a standing ovation. Those are the kind of bands we want to do a live album on, some kind of special moment we had on the show. "

The process for artists selected for live albums is simple enough, with Music City Roots and each artist splitting revenue from digital streaming and sales 50-50, after the cost of mixing is taken into account. "The cost is very low because we’re already recording it at the show, so that isn’t a cost," Trott says. "It’s just mixing. Once that cost is covered, we split the money down the middle with the artist for digital sales. We also give the artist the option to print the album physically for free. If they want to print it, they have to pay for the printing, but we don’t take any money from that."

Currently, the Music City Roots team doesn't plan to release physical versions of the albums themselves. They're hush-hush about which artists they plan to tap for future live albums, but Trott assures they're exciting picks. And with the hundreds of submissions Trott receives from hopeful artists on a monthly basis, there's no shortage of material to cull from. She cites the live album series as being "all about artists and making their careers explode," a feat they've already accomplished numerous times through their regular weekly shows and broadcasts.

"I saw St. Paul & the Broken Bones in Birmingham," Trott says. "I grew up in the same town as Paul Janeway, so I already knew the band, but I didn’t know the music. I saw them at a club called the Bottletree Café in Birmingham before anybody knew who they were. There were maybe 30 people in there. I went up to the bass player and said, ‘Y’all need to come play Music City Roots.’ And he said, ‘No, no, we aren’t ready.’ I booked them on the show a couple months later and I invited a bunch of people out and they ended up getting signed on that show with Traci at 30 Tigers. They were opening for John Mayer a couple months later."

So keep an eye out for the next live release from Music City Roots … it just might be the next great album from the next big thing. 

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