Tag: Pop

Grace Potter Sets the Scene with Dramatic ‘Daylight’

Posted on by Editor

Grace Potter possesses one of the most commanding voices in popular music — which is a good thing, because on Daylight she’s got something to say.

Potter co-wrote much of the new solo album with producer Eric Valentine, with whom she fell in love while still married to a member of her band — which is now broken up, too. After their divorces, Potter and Valentine married, started a family, and now live in Topanga Canyon, California.

The overwhelming emotions of these dramatic life changes are channeled into Daylight, with many of the songs written with Valentine, and on occasion, his longtime buddy Mike Busbee, who died in September.

“Love Is Love,” a potent opener to the project, grabbed immediate attention as the first single, but in this interview with BGS, Potter goes deeper into musical pathway that ultimately led her to Daylight.

“Release” is about the aftermath of the breakup. Who was the first person you played that for when you finished it?

Grace Potter: Eric. Busbee actually texted it to Eric but it was only half the song. Our voice recorder cut off before we finished. But he just wanted Eric to hear where we were at with the writing and Eric had to pull over the car because he was bawling listening to it. And Eric doesn’t cry easily. So that was a really important moment and one that I didn’t expect.

That song, I’d started it myself in the bathtub and it had sat in my voice memo bank for like a year and a half before Eric had heard it and was like, “Let’s not sleep on that one. Let’s pursue that and see where it goes.” Obviously it went and went and went and it’s definitely the one that gets under my skin, every time. It’s hard to play live actually.

And you’re setting yourself up as the character that set this all in motion, too.

Yeah. “I know that I caused this pain…” And that really is the full taking ownership and being accountable for your choices and knowing that those choices are not always this self-righteous, “I can do no wrong” thing. Humans are vulnerable. Humans do make mistakes. Humans change their mind. Lives and careers and happiness and financial fortitude – it all shifts and changes over the time that we live. And the more I’ve lived, the more I realize that it’s okay to give yourself permission, to be that vulnerable.

You quoted the opening line to “Release,” and the opening line on “Shout It Out” sets up that song’s storyline, too. I’ve always thought that those opening lines are something you do really well, but I didn’t realize until researching for this interview that you went to film school.

Oh yeah.

So I’m curious, do you think there’s a correlation there? Because when you make a movie, you have those establishing shots in the beginning, and in your songs you have those establishing opening lines.

And sometimes I like to mislead. I like that opening line to take you in, like, a Quentin Tarantino direction. But it’s actually like a Nora Ephron romance. But I really love storytelling. It’s the same thing I do when I’m writing my sets too. Every single song and every musical experience has to take you on an emotional journey. So there’s a launch point and there’s a revelation, which you know, within the first 20 minutes of a movie, you’re always supposed to basically set up the premise of the movie and potentially introduce one twist. For me, my life was full of so many twists while I was writing Daylight that it wasn’t hard.

After the Nocturnals ended, you had to start a band again. What’s an audition process like to be in your band?

I just want to be around people I like first. Then hopefully they’re good at music. For real. Life is too short to be in a band with people that don’t fit into your ethos or feel, or just don’t feel right. You get these feelings, you get a sense when you’re in a room with someone, if they suck the air out of the room and they have that negative energy, it really changes your entire life and your entire demeanor.

You can feel yourself going kind of gray. I call it the Eeyore effect. You know, it’s this “uhhhhh” feeling. So I generally avoid Eeyores. Although an occasional well-balanced, calm person who doesn’t talk all the time is a wonderfully welcomed part of the road because we can’t all be psychotic extroverts. It’s enough with just me and my baby. But I really enjoy finding musicians who specialize in something that’s just one step quirkier than what you would expect.

Busbee, what I loved about him was that not only was he an amazing songwriter, he played the trombone. Just randomly, like, “I studied trombone.” Really? Eliza Hardy Jones, my keyboard player and singer in my band, is a next level, Olympic champion quilter. Quilting is her thing. She’s actually got a huge show in 2020. She’s doing a massive exhibition in Nebraska at the quilt museum.

Our new drummer, Jordan West, was working for Roland demoing the audio equipment, but actually was hiding in plain sight for so many people. I was looking for a female drummer who could sing, or a female bass player who could sing, or a female guitarist who could sing. I just wanted two female voices that could do all the Lucius parts. So it was fitting the puzzle pieces together for me. Instead of auditioning a bunch of people saying, “I know exactly what I’m looking for,” I just waited until I found a flow of people that felt right. And if they happen to play an instrument I needed, then you’re hired.

Kurtis Keber, our bass player, who’s been with us since last year, came into our world through my previous drummer, Matt Musty, who is now out with Train. We miss him all the time, but these happy accidents happen where you find your people. I saw Kurtis the other day. I was like, “Kurtis, what are you doing? Are you in the studio?” He goes, “No, no, I’ve been building. I’m helping do some carpentry.” My longtime guitarist [Benny Yurco] is now becoming obsessed with recording and becoming one of those crazy studio guys — from the humble beginnings of not even using one guitar pedal to this mad scientist lab they have in Burlington, [Vermont] now.

I like jack-of-all-trades people who like doing lots of things. Those are the things that attract me to people. Their strangeness. Their idioms, their specific obsession with just the tiniest little thing. You know, loose leaf tea. You can talk for an hour and a half about loose leaf tea? I’m in, count me in.

I read the lineup of your Grand Point North festival this year and you did an acoustic set on that Sunday night. What is it about that presentation that you enjoy?

Well, Warren Haynes from Gov’t Mule has been a longtime collaborator and it’s been something that we have talked about doing because we share a joy of being musical and not really knowing what’s going to happen. And not having the stakes be so high that there’s an entire band behind you train wrecking. You know what I mean?

Usually you have to rehearse and really gain a mastery over every single song and arrangement, but when you’re doing an acoustic set, there’s so much freedom to explore. Warren’s musicality and my musicality are complementary to one another where we can take it in a lot of different directions and kind of wring out the towel different every night.

We’d done it a lot backstage and not in front of people, but we felt like it would be a cool thing to share because so many musicians, they just get out there and they run the Ferris wheel, they crank the thing up and they do the same show night after night. There’s been nine years of my festival. People have seen me play with my band. They’ve seen Warren play. He’s played three times in my festival. So I really wanted to treat the audience to a different experience.

Is part of that perspective because you went to a lot of festivals growing up?

Yeah. I came from the jam band world. Warren really ushered me into it. I was very much standing in the shadows of some amazingly talented people who paved the way for me. The festival circuit is really the only way that I was able to break out on my own and be noticed and stand out. I think it’s because of those festivals that I have the sense of diversity. I can take it in a lot of different directions and it’s more fun that way.

And if you’d go to a music festival, you’re going to hear seven, eight, ten genres of music in one place and love every single one of them. I think my instincts took me in that direction, to continue on in my career through creating in the moment, more than creating for a forever thing. …

I think none of my records have ever done my musicality justice because it’s like a high school photo album. It’s this one moment — and maybe it was a very manipulated moment that isn’t even the real reflection of what I was feeling in that moment. So Daylight was the opportunity to completely break that down, take away that premise, take away this idea of having to bottle lightning, and package it and sell it to the world. And instead have an experience. Be vulnerable and open to it and see where it takes you.

As you were talking about festivals, I was wondering, did you ever get an ear for bluegrass?

Absolutely. I grew up listening primarily to Appalachian and Celtic music, which have so many deep connections. And from my family’s record collection, I was obsessed with traditional English, Irish, and Scottish songwriting because the storytelling has these archetypes in it. It’s like the Brothers Grimm. There’s these really intense, very dark stories of women that are shape-shifting and there’s these evil goblins, and then they turn into a beautiful woman. This is a combination of fantasy and reality and love and lust and danger and war. There’s all these amazing cinematic storytelling moments in those songs.

So I grew up around that, but then bluegrass came into my world because in the festival scene, there was so much crossover. I got to meet and be in a songwriter circle early on in 2006 with Béla Fleck, Chris Thile, Jim Lauderdale, and Buddy Miller. It was such a cool lineup, pulling all these people together from all these walks of life and just playing. And it was very humbling. It made me realize I got to get my shit together, my instrumentation, because these guys know how to hold it down.

I understand that you’ve moved from Vermont to Topanga Canyon, which must’ve made your inner hippie very happy.

Oh man! My inner hippie became my outer hippie. I walked to the store two days ago in a pirate shirt with a Burberry trench coat, sweatpants, Doc Martens, and a flower crown. And I didn’t even think about it until somebody sent me a photo of it and I was like, “I did what?” That was just my usual day-to-day getup. That’s Topanga. I live and breathe that lifestyle and those people really get me.

It’s a real community too. It’s a small, small group of people. And again, I think the thing I’ve been finding that I want in life is accountability. And in a big city like L.A., you can hit someone with your car, drive away and never see them again and not really ever worry about getting caught. But if I, or anyone in town, sees anything out of the ordinary, we check in on each other. That’s how tight-knit we are, and how much we care about one another. And it’s a really, really wonderful community to be a part of.

What do you hope that fans will take away from the 2020 version of Grace Potter on tour?

You know, everything about my life has been unexpected, even to me, so I certainly can’t tell people what to expect yet because I just — every bit of it has been this ride. And as I’ve gone on as a musician, I realized that my favorite part of being a musician is inviting people into that ride with me. Instead of presenting them with a packaged thing, that is what it is, I don’t know what it is! I don’t know how this is all going to work. I’ve got a baby now and my life has fundamentally changed in so many ways. I can’t wait to see how it manifests onstage. I guarantee you there will still be headbanging, that’s for sure!

Photo credit: Pamela Neal

The Show On The Road – Gaby Moreno

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week, a folk-pop shapeshifter who effervescently sings in four languages and has rocked stages on four continents, Gaby Moreno.

LISTEN: APPLE MUSIC • MP3

Born María Gabriela Moreno Bonilla in Guatemala City, she knew she wanted more as a teenager and journeyed to the USA with that big voice and an even bigger dream. She has since lived several lives inside the dark heart of the LA music business, getting signed to Warner Brothers at 18 and then dropped and signed by Epic Records, only to be dropped again by age 20.

Why didn’t she give up and go home? Because the dream was a bit bigger than that. Over the last decade and a half, Gaby has put out a series of sonically adventurous and politically fearless English and Spanish language albums that have created an international fanbase which takes her around the world each year. Hopscotching from early jazz to introspective folk to Dap-King-assisted soul, Gaby has been filling concert halls from Berlin to Sydney, winning her a Latin Grammy in the process, setting up a dream collaboration on a new album with Van Dyke Parks, and getting her weekly appearances on NPR’s Live From Here as Chris Thile’s secret weapon. She even helped write the theme song to the beloved NBC sitcom Parks and Recreation!

While she may be multi-talented, she is also among the kindest, sweetest souls to be featured on The Show On The Road. Make sure you stick around for a new song she plays at the end and a short story she wrote on the spot about UFO’s and time travel.

Baylen’s Brit Pick: CoCo and the Butterfields

Posted on by Editor

Artist: CoCo and the Butterfields
Hometown: Canterbury, England
Latest Album: Monsters Unplugged

Editor’s Note: Look for CoCo and the Butterfields and BGS – UK at AmericanaFest UK, held Jan. 29-31 in London. 

Sounds Like: Bellowhead, Seth Lakeman, Florence and the Machine with added indie pop

Why You Should Listen: CoCo and the Butterfields are just joyful and January should be joyful. Ok, I know we are all trying to stick with our “new year new you” goals. New fitness regimes, meditation apps, veganuary, dry January, etc., but come on, surely we can all get on board with more joy!? Great, we are agreed! First thing to do then is listen to this rowdy good time group of multi-instrumentalists who combine folk, bluegrass, hip hop, indie pop, Celtic, and country. Hell, there’s even some beatboxing thrown in for good measure. I said they are rowdy and they can be, in the best possible way, but they also do soft and sad, again in the best possible way.

I first met the band when they rolled up for a session on my radio show in a multi-colored minivan they had painted themselves. They all piled out looking like a touring version of Hair, the musical, and I knew they were my kind of people. Incidentally they do all have amazing hair, but that’s beside the point. The main thing for us to note is their music is wholly and completely original, it’s a sound only they could make and I’m so glad they do. A true ensemble band, sharing vocals and switching instruments at will. They are crowd pleasers and joy makers. I’ve seen them in a packed out basement club and in an expansive field in the middle of the country and they are at home in both.

I think the reason they aren’t bigger in a “mainstream” type of way, is because they are so undefinable. A great thing in my book. So, let’s all treat ourselves, close that fitness app, and open up the playlist below and let’s start the year in the way we mean to continue, with more joyful music and fantastic hair.

As a radio and TV host, Baylen Leonard has presented country and Americana shows, specials, and commentary for BBC Radio 2, Chris Country Radio, BBC Radio London, BBC Radio 2 Country, BBC Radio 4, BBC Scotland, Monocle 24, and British Airways, as well as promoting artists through his work with the Americana Music Association UK, the Nashville Meets London Festival, and the Long Road (the UK’s newest outdoor country, Americana, and roots festival). Follow him on Twitter: @HeyBaylen

Photo Credit: Nicky Johnstone

STREAM: Twisted Pine, ‘Dreams’

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Twisted Pine
Hometown: Boston, MA
Album: Dreams
Release Date: June 8, 2018

In Their Words: “As a band, we have a diverse range of influences in many genres of music. Dreams is an experiment in stretching our stylistic boundaries, mixing bluegrass instruments with some of our favorite pop music, and represents just a glimpse of the many artists we are inspired by.”

Small World: How Paul Simon Found Himself in the ‘60s English Folk Scene

Posted on by Editor

In 1965, a dejected Paul Simon went for an extended stay in England. When he returned home to New York toward the end of the year, he brought Anji with him.

Well, “Anji.” A piece of music, not a woman.

“Anji” — sometimes spelled “Angi” or “Angie” — was written and first recorded in the late 1950s by English guitarist Davy Graham, considered by many the first star of the U.K. folk guitar renaissance. It’s a snappy little fingerpicked number, a series of trills over a descending bass line. Really more jazzy than folkie. By the time Simon first heard it, apparently via the playing of another young star of the scene, Bert Jansch, it had become the touchstone for English acoustic guitarists. This was the piece they had to master to gain entry into that world and in the process serving to popularize the dark modal DADGAD open tuning as the scene standard.

Simon’s recording of “Anji,” with the writing credit originally going to Jansch before later being corrected, served as an instrumental interlude at the end of side one of The Sounds of Silence, the second album he made with Art Garfunkel. But in the context of the sweep of Simon’s eventual status as one of the modern era’s supreme songwriters (and Simon and Garfunkel’s standing as one of the key pop acts of the 1960s and ‘70s), “Anji” marks a turning point.

“One of the things he found [in England] was a welcome, warm music community,” says Robert Hilburn, author of the new biography Paul Simon: The Life. The book is a comprehensive and colorfully enlightening look at the artist, done with his full cooperation. It was published in May, on the eve of what he says will be his final full concert tour. He’s named it the “Homeward Bound” Tour, after a song he wrote while in England.

“He hadn’t felt accepted in folk circles of America — Greenwich Village put him down because he came from Queens,” says Hilburn, who was the pop music critic and editor at the Los Angeles Times for more than three decades (and with whom this writer worked for more than 20 years). “But there, he was from America and people listened to him and liked him. And he said that the folk clubs in England were generally away from the bars and people listened to the songs. In America they were in bars and people chatted and ignored the music.”

Simon was feeling that rejection acutely when he moved to England. While Simon and Garfunkel had been signed to Columbia Records by tom Wilson after some furtive steps under the name Tom & Jerry (and some solo Simon work under the name Jerry Landis), their debut album, the acoustic folk-tinged Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M., had flopped and the partners were at odds — a common state through their lives. In England he found something to give him new artistic life, new purpose, a setting in which he could define his own goals and ambitions, and in which he was valued.

He released a 1965 solo album featuring acoustic performances of his own songs (The Paul Simon Songbook, not issued in the U.S. until its inclusion in the 1981 Paul Simon: Collected Works box set), co-wrote with Australian-born musician Bruce Woodley (including the bouncy “Red Rubber Ball,” a 1966 hit by the band the Cyrkle) and produced an album by fellow American ex-pat Jackson C. Frank, including the song “Blues Run The Game.” (Simon & Garfunkel recorded the song as well.) The composition became another standard of English folkies and later came to mark the tragic life and death of its writer. In the process, Simon discovered key things about who he was, and who he wasn’t, as an artist.

“Most of those musicians there were guitar players and played old folk music,” Hilburn says. “They didn’t write as much of their own. He couldn’t play guitar like they did. Martin Carthy [another rising star of the scene] was particularly helpful in teaching him things, but he realized that it was words that would distinguish him. That’s what the other English musicians wouldn’t do. He wasn’t a fan of the old-time English ballads. When he heard Dylan, he said, ‘That’s what I want to do, write about the world today, not just “I went down to the river and killed my baby.”’”

Now, to be fair, those “down to the river” ballads were just as much core to the American folk revival as the English one. But by and large they originated in England and elsewhere in the British Isles and Europe. The songs of murder, treachery and heartbreak arrived on these shores with the many waves of immigrants, mutating in various ways but still very recognizable in the forms associated with Appalachia and the Delta, bluegrass and blues alike, Cajun and country, you name it.

Of course, that all found its way back across the Atlantic where American folk and blues (and, of course, rock ’n’ roll) influenced and inspired a generation of English musicians looking for meaning and authenticity, even if borrowed, first in the “skiffle” movement, and then in both the folk revival and with the Rolling Stones, the Animals, of course the Beatles and the others who, in the mid’60s British Invasion, brought blues back to America.

Davy Graham was heavily influenced by American blues and jazz, and his early ‘60s albums were full of his arrangements drawn from that repertoire. And one of Graham’s frequent collaborators, singer Shirley Collins, traveled through the South in 1959 with American folk and blues collector and preservationist Alan Lomax, researching and recording the music on porches, in churches and prisons and at social occasions, documenting various forms that were threatened with extinction in the face of “progress.”

It is, in fact, a blues song that kicks off the upcoming Live in Kyoto 1978 concert recording by English folk great John Renbourn, who passed away in 2015. Renbourn, who in addition to his own long and fruitful solo career co-founded the revolutionary jazzed-up folk band Pentangle with Jansch, started this show with a version of “Candy Man,” a raunchy ragtime tune first recorded by Mississippi John Hurt in 1928. But the second song of that concert? Yup. “Anji,” with an introduction by Renbourn explaining that it was a “tune that started me, and a lot of other people, trying to play the guitar.” The album is a wonderful slice of a remarkable career from a stellar guitar talent who regularly tied together Medieval Italian and French dance tunes with American blues and jazz, all fixed around the English folk traditions of such songs as “Banks of the Sweet Primroses.”

It’s the Circle of Folk.

And it circled back when Simon found himself moving home to New York due to an unexpected turn of events. While he was in England, producer Tom Wilson — without Simon’s knowledge — added some folk-rock instruments to the acoustic version of “The Sound of Silence” that had been on the S&G debut. Suddenly it was the right song at the right time, a perfect fit alongside the Rubber Soul Beatles, the sparkling folk-rock of the Byrds and, of course, the newly electrified Dylan himself. That new version became both the title song of the next album and the launching point for new approaches that would quickly distinguish the duo.

How did the time in England make an impact, aside from “Anji”? Hilburn sees little direct evidence of the English folk scene on Simon’s writing, though there’s certainly some of the mood and filigrees of the guitar styles in the fingerpicked lines of “April Come She Will.” And there is “Scarborough Fair,” an actual English folk song that Simon took almost note-for-note from Carthy’s arrangement into an unlikely pop hit, its refrain providing the title of the third S&G album, Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme.

Carthy has said he was “thunderstruck” when he saw the song credited as “words and music by Paul Simon” on the original S&G release. Later it was discovered that while royalties were paid, the money was never forwarded to Carthy by his publisher. Simon years later made sure that new payments were made to the English artist, an act Carthy deemed “honorable” per Hilburn’s account.

But it remains a controversial episode for some, presaging later controversies of proper crediting and cultural appropriation that saddled Simon, particularly regarding his Graceland work with South African musicians at a time of a cultural embargo due to the countries brutal apartheid policies. (And, for Carthy, it was a second case of an American artist nicking one of his arrangements, as Dylan himself used Carthy’s version of the traditional “Lord Franklin” for “Bob Dylan’s Dream.” In addition, “Scarborough Fair” was liberally adapted into “Girl From the North Country,” with the source noted readily in the liner notes of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan as well as in various interviews by Dylan over the years. A duet by Dylan and Johnny Cash made for a highlight from the later Nashville Skyline album.)

If the direct impact of what he learned in England was not an ongoing presence in Simon’s writing and performance, it did seem to stimulate a hunger for exploring music from various cultures and countries, which soon emerged in a variety of ways — the Andean folk-tune on which he based in “El Condor Pasa” (in turn making it virtually inescapable for later travelers in Peru), reggae in “Mother and Child Reunion” (recorded in Kingston with Jamaican studio mainstays), and gospel in “Love Me Like a Rock.” Then he took that giant leap into South African music with the landmark Graceland album in 1985 and various Afro-Brazilian and Latin American inspirations and collaborations on Rhythm of the Saints in 1990, profoundly the batucada drumming on the song “The Obvious Child.”

And, with this all in mind, it was striking during one of Simon’s Hollywood Bowl shows on his farewell-ish tour how well the song, “Dazzling Blue,” which had been on the 2012 So Beautiful or So What album, could have fit alongside many things done by Graham, Jansch and Renbourn. In this performance, Simon’s fingerpicked figures and lilting melody were weaving through the Indian-derived rhythms and modes carried in Jamey Haddad’s ghatam (clay pot) percussion and the veena-like melisma of Mark Stewart’s slide guitar. Ultimately it’s all of a piece, the band on this tour anchored by South African bassist Bakithi Kumalo, who has been Simon’s partner on much of the music he’s made from Graceland on. Young Nigerian guitarist Biodun Kuti steps in with grace and aplomb to the hole left by the death last December of Cameroonian musician Vincent N’guini, who had been with Simon since Rhythm of the Saints. But still the music is threading back to the epiphanies of London in the ‘60s. And yes, even Greenwich Village.

“He loves roots music,” Hilburn says. “What was interesting to me is that as a songwriter he doesn’t come up with a theme first. If you or I were writing a song, we might go, ‘Let’s write about ecology, or about breaking up with a girlfriend.’ He lets the music inspire him, plays guitar or piano and if something sounds interesting, he thinks, ‘What do those notes mean to me?’ and tried to put that into words. One line, then to the next line, and he discovers the theme as he’s writing. So he constantly needs new musical inspiration. He started with doo-wop and blues, then rock and folk. But by the end of 1969 he felt he couldn’t go any further in folk. He didn’t want to be part of that. So he goes to classical and jazz and gospel and bluegrass. And then South African music. He has to have fresh inspiration.”

Photo credit: Lester Cohen

 

 

12 Boss Bluegrass Covers of Your Favorite Pop Songs (Part Two)

Posted on by Editor

Some say the true measure of a song’s merit is whether it sounds good with just vocals and acoustic guitar. But that’s poppycock; the real way to test a tune’s mettle is to break out the banjos and mandolins and see whether it stands up to the bluegrass treatment. In the list that follows a variety of old-timey pickers, pluckers, and strummers tackle modern-day pop, rock, and rap favorites, using bluegrass like one of those Instagram filters that make digital photos look like dusty old Polaroids. In doing so, they remind us that good music is good music, and that certain songs transcend time and place and instrumentation. The history of pop music is just one big crazy train, and when Nicki Minaj passes Bill Monroe en route to the party in Ozzy’s car, she gives him a funny little wink that he totally gets. Enoy the best bluegrass songs now.

Watch 12 Boss Bluegrass Covers:

Banjo Billybo, “Someone Like You”

One takeaway from Adele’s “Someone Like You”: Love makes you act like a goddamn fool. In the 2011 smash, the heartbroken British songstress sings of stopping by an ex’s house in hopes of rekindling the romance, even though the bloke’s happily married. Now, this Banjo Billybo character doesn’t much care for the song, as he explains at the beginning of this YouTube clip, but that doesn’t stop him from hee-hawing his way through a chuckle-worthy version. If Billybo’s rendition lacks love, there’s plenty of goddamn foolishness. This is one of the best bluegrass songs.

The Gravel Spreaders, “Crazy Train”

These Bay Area dudes are all about metal covers, and their take on Ozzy Osbourne’s signature song is silly yet also kind of sincere. Dig how Doc Buck Knife lovingly adapts that classic Randy Rhodes guitar intro for mandolin, and how doghouse bassist Bud Hole delivers the lyrics in a plainspoken everyman style that underscores Ozzy’s message of peace, love, and understanding. Now all the Spreaders need are some polka-dot flying-V banjos.

Rob Scallon, “Raining Blood”

Bluegrass and thrash metal share a fundamental need for speed, so banjoist Rob Scallon’s rendition of this Slayer gem isn’t such a stretch. It is a hoot, though — especially when his buddy in the straw hat shows up with a pair of spoons and adds some crazy clatter to the satanic jamboree. Forget the Charlie Daniels Band; when the devil goes down to Georgia, he goes partying with guys like Rob.

Robin Adele Anderson, “Anaconda”

Mad props to Ms. Anderson and her band for transforming a salacious 2014 hit (Nicki Minaj’s “Anaconda”) based on a sample from a similarly saucy 1992 hip-hop jam (Sir Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back”) into a classy bluegrass/ragtime number suitable for grandmas and small children and everyone in between. “Oh my gosh,” sings Anderson at 2:10, taking things to the hokey-jokey extreme, “Look at that banjo!”

The Blueshine Brothers, “All About That Bass”

Technically speaking, these guys are all about that treble, as their version of Meghan Trainor’s 2014 pop triumph is decidedly lacking in low end. That’s probably part of the joke — not that three burly bluegrass dudes singing a quasi-feminist ode to full female posteriors really need extra comedic ammunition.

Lowhills, “Careless Whisper”

Even without that silky saxophone so integral to the original, the Lowhills do right by George Michael’s chart-topping 1984 hit about doing a lover wrong. This is Americana of the jazziest, swankiest variety — think Sade transplanted south of the Mason-Dixon. Were these Charleston cats to try “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go,” they’d probably make that seem suave, too.

Love Canon, “Touch of Grey”

As a self-described “super ‘80s bluegrass hits machine,” Love Canon probably doesn’t face much competition in its hometown of Charlottesville — or anywhere else on the planet for that matter. But even if there were other outfits copping the band’s gimmick, it’s doubtful they’d do this, the Grateful Dead’s one and only Top 10 pop hit, with a slicker, defter touch. This is bluegrass meets yacht rock — just look at the banjoist’s captain’s hat.

Red, White & Bluegrass, “Friday”

Can genuine musicianship and quality singing redeem a song that’s beloved by millions of YouTube viewers purely because it’s terrible? The fellas in Red, White, and Bluegrass attempt to answer that question with their cover of Rebecca Black’s 2011 viral sensation “Friday.” As an ironic YouTube parody of an ironic YouTube hit, the trio’s version raises enough questions about musical authenticity and Internet culture to fuel about a dozen think-pieces. As something to giggle along with on Friday at 4:30PM when the boss is down the hall and you don’t feel like doing a lick more work, it’s about a dozen times more valuable.

O Bardo e o Banjo, “Ace of Spades”

If Yanni, John Tesh, and Celine Dion were to perform Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades” in a public library while being shushed by old ladies reading Agatha Christie novels, it would still rule. Such is the power of the hard-rocking, harder-living British trio’s 1980 speed-metal anthem. In the hands of Brazil’s most badass bluegrass outfit, “Spades” is a rollicking hellbilly freakout that’s half Lemmy, half Opry, all the way fantastic.

Paul Harris and the Cleverlys, “Gangnam Style”

There could’ve been more dancing, as the banjo player does a decent job of copping Psy’s moves from the original “Gangnam Style” video near the end, but even so, this self-styled “GrassHipPop” combo from Stone County, Arkansas, deserves lots of credit. To work out the arrangement, Harris and the boys probably had to watch Psy’s 2012 viral video at least three or four times in a row — with the sound on. It’s a lot of work for a joke with limited shelf life.

Mustered Courage, “September”

The fact that September in Melbourne means spring, not autumn, hasn’t affected this Aussie band’s understanding of Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September,” a wedding-reception staple regardless of the season. The boys move briskly and joyously through the tune, and by the look of the disco lights swirling all around them, they’re rocking a party where their efforts — though perhaps not their headbands and polyester shirts — are much appreciated.

Cornmeal, “Dear Prudence”

Fun fact: John Lennon’s first instrument was a banjo, not a guitar. That means that had things turned out differently for the Beatles, the original “Dear Prudence” might have sounded something like Cornmeal’s take. Then, George or Paul would’ve needed fiddle skills like the dude in this clip, who’d be a natural for a DMB cover band.

3×3: Tameca Jones on Ravenous Applause, Graphic Design, and Potential Touring Essentials

Posted on by Amy Reitnouer

Artist: Tameca Jones
Hometown: Austin, TX
Latest Album: Naked
Personal Nicknames: Meek Meek

 

A photo posted by Tameca Jones (@starlightjones) on

Your house is burning down and you can grab only one thing — what would you save? 
Anything that's living. Everything else is meaningless. 

If you weren't a musician, what would you be?
A graphic template designer 

If a song started playing every time you entered the room, what would you want it to be? 
That would be really annoying to have music constantly played when I entered rooms. I'd rather have a canned track of ravenous applause and cheering played. 

 

A photo posted by Tameca Jones (@starlightjones) on

What is the one thing you can’t survive without on tour? 
I've never been on tour but, when I eventually go on tour, I wouldn't survive without my narcolepsy medicine and maybe a dildo.

If you were a car, what car would you be?
I have no idea. I'm not into cars. 

Which King is your favorite: B.B., Billie Jean, Martin Luther? 
Martin Luther, obviously, because I'm Black and he fought for my rights.

Vinyl or digital? 
Vinyl

Who is your favorite superhero?
My mom

Summer or Winter?
Spring