Tag: Song Premiere

LISTEN: Jane Kramer, “Hymn”

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Artist: Jane Kramer
Hometown: Asheville, North Carolina
Song: “Hymn”
Album: Valley of the Bones
Release Date: March 1, 2019

In Their Words: “This song was a kind of ‘homework’ assignment from my songwriting mentor, Mary Gauthier. She looked me in the eye and told me that all of my self-deprecation wasn’t cute or charming and asked me, ‘When are you going to drop the bullsh*t and really own your power and talent?’ She told me that only then would I write the kind of songs that were up to my full potential. She challenged me to write a song from a perspective of self-love. Like, full, real, spiritual and true self-love, and to call it my ‘Hymn,’ whatever that meant to me. I spent a few weeks after that alone, backpacking around Italy with a little travel guitar. I wrote this song in a little mountain village called Vetulonia, where I slept in a little cottage with a hammock for a bed, looking out over mountains that reminded me of home, and it sunk in then that I couldn’t really come home till I came home to myself. So I did.” — Jane Kramer

Photo Credit: Rose Kaz

LISTEN: David Huckfelt, “Everywind”

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Artist: David Huckfelt
Hometown: Minneapolis, Minnesota
Song: “Everywind” (featuring Sylvan Esso’s Amelia Meath)
Album: Stranger Angels
Release Date: February 22, 2019

In Their Words: “At the Mishipeshu Trading Post, named for a mythical Ojibwe underwater panther, at the foot of the Mackinac Bridge in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, I found an old postcard with a woman wrapped in a blanket… Photographed in 1907 by Roland Reed, and standing on the shores of what surely must be Lake Superior, the card simply read ‘Everywind.’

“Nothing else was written and nothing more could be found on who she was, or where, or how she lived. Immediately the wheels began turning on how this woman over a hundred years ago was part of this royal, nurturing, fierce and life-giving lineage of women who have endured all that men have done to them, and this planet, from time immemorial. I flashed ahead to Winona LaDuke, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Tara Houska, Faye Brown, and the countless women I know who have stood up and spoken up for the Earth from Alcatraz to Standing Rock in North Dakota; to Louise Erdrich whose novels are staggering in their beauty and whose Birchbark Bookstore in Minneapolis stands as a beacon of truth-telling of a deeper American history vibrant in its resistance ‘Everywind’ is about then and now, the link, from mother to earth, and this moment in our culture when it’s time for men to say to women: ‘You talk. We listen.'” — David Huckfelt

Photo credit: Graham Tolbert

LISTEN: Daniel Steinbock, “Pine Needles”

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Artist: Daniel Steinbock
Hometown: Santa Rosa, California
Song: “Pine Needles”
Album: Out of Blue EP
Release Date: Single, February 4; EP February 15, 2019

In Their Words: “Following in the long tradition of poets, bards, and mystics, I open the album with a dedication to the Muse in ‘Pine Needles.’ Without her, I wouldn’t be here singing to you. The song asks you to wonder, ‘Is there anything that is not holy?’ Pine needles point in every direction at the beautiful dream we live inside of. And if our very flesh is holy, what better way to worship God than to make love?” — Daniel Steinbock

Photo credit: Bradley Cox

LISTEN: Michael McDermott, “Ne’er Do Well”

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Artist: Michael McDermott
Hometown: Chicago, Illinois
Song: “Ne’er Do Well”
Album: Orphans
Release Date: February 8, 2019
Label: Pauper Sky Records

In Their Words: “The first time I heard the term ‘ne’er do well’ I must have been 8 or 9 years old. I heard it from my father describing his uncle who ended up dying on skid row in Chicago… That kind of stuck with me I guess. I became a sort of ne’er do well of my own, afflicted with drug and drink, who let his career go to hell and lived for the next fix and drink. Those are just external solutions for internal problems, and what they really need is love, faith, connection. I was always amazed that there was more real discussion about God and Jesus in crack houses than there was in the church I went to. One time in Wayne, New Jersey, I was checking into a hotel and they asked for my name, and I said ‘Ne’er Do Well.’ They asked me, ‘Can you spell that?’ and I just said, ‘Ne’er Do Well, it’s French.’ — Michael McDermott

Photo credit: Tony Piccirillo

LISTEN: Eric Brace, Peter Cooper, & Thomm Jutz, “King of the Keelboat Men”

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Artist: Eric Brace, Peter Cooper & Thomm Jutz
Song: “King of the Keelboat Men”
Album: Riverland
Label: Red Beet Records
Release Date: February 1, 2019

In Their Words: “When we were looking at the history of the Mississippi River, it was clear that the steamboats were the biggest thing that ever happened to it and on it. But what about before the steamboats? Before steamboats were the keelboats, pushed up and down river by big men with poles. They were the rock stars of their time, from the 1700s til about 1830. The mightiest of the keelboat men was the near-mythic Mike Fink. His tale was told in stories and books and songs of the time, but we wondered what happened to him when steam took away his job. Buy him a drink, and he’ll tell you exactly what happened.” — Eric Brace, Peter Cooper, & Thomm Jutz

Photo credit: Chris Richards

WATCH: The Chapin Sisters, “Lost”

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Artist: The Chapin Sisters
Hometown: Brooklyn, New York (Abigail), and Hudson Valley, New York (Lily)
Song: “Lost”
Album: Ferry Boat
Label: Loantaka Records

In Their Words: “This song was written as a little finger-picking ditty on the guitar, but when Evan Taylor (producer/bandmate) heard it he visualized the string-like strains of the Mellotron lifting into the solo which creates a dreamlike ambiance. This song was written at the nadir of US political despair — post-election 2016 — right after Trump was elected when we were trying to navigate this fear and uncertainty. It is a meditation on remembering to stay in the now, choose hope over despair. For me regret can arise out of thin air. It can keep me up at night, chewing at my insides. The only way out of it is meditation, gratitude, hope. There is a children’s book* that says, ‘when you are lost it is the easiest place to be found.‘ And it’s true that often my songs come out of late night sleepless rambles. We need hope these days, and togetherness. This song is about that.” — Lily Chapin

Photo credit: Sita Marlier
Video directed by Alec Coiro
*children’s book is Emily Winfield Martin’s The Littlest Family’s Big Day

LISTEN: Ari & Mia, “Little Bit Like Me”

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Artist: Ari & Mia
Hometown: Boston, Massachusetts
Song: “Little Bit Like Me”
Album: Sew the City
Release Date: March 1, 2019

In Their Words: “‘Little Bit Like Me’ is a conversation between myself as an adult and myself as a nine-year-old. In the song, I reflect on the sense of creativity and openness that came naturally to me as a child, and I wonder if I’ve lived up to the expectations I set for myself back then.” — Mia Friedman

“I love ‘Little Bit Like Me’ because of its simple intention and the sweet melody that mirrors it. The song’s nostalgic message feels relatable and honest, and the process of arranging it together was seamless. It clicked right away.” — Ari Friedman

Photo credit: Kat Waterman

LISTEN: Jason Ringenberg, “Here in the Sequoias”

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Artist: Jason Ringenberg
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “Here in the Sequoias”
Album: Stand Tall
Release Date: February 7, 2019
Label: Courageous Chicken

In Their Words: “I wrote ‘Here in the Sequoias’ during my time doing the National Park Service artist-in-residency program at Sequoia National Park. To be among those giant angels made it very easy to release the songwriting muse. Immediately after writing it I felt a bluegrass direction would be best for it. We recorded most of it live in the studio. I think we can hear the spontaneity in the track. Later we brought in Robert Bowlin (who was in Bill Monroe’s band) to add in fiddles and mando. I believe the track does capture the sublime beauty of the Giant Sequoias.” — Jason Ringenberg

Photo credit. Gregg Roth

LISTEN: Terry Klein, “Anika”

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Artist: Terry Klein
Hometown: Austin, Texas
Song: “Anika”
Album: tex
Release Date: January 25, 2019

In Their Words: “I wrote this one for all of the people who’ve broken my heart, and Anika’s bad luck is that she has a cool, memorable name. She’s the first girl who ever kissed me. We were six and I remember she had a skating rink in her backyard and lived around the corner. She denied it happened for years after and then I moved away and I haven’t spoken to her since. Apparently she’s now an actress.” — Terry Klein

 

Photo credit: Valerie Fremin

LISTEN: Graeme James, “To Be Found By Love”

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Artist: Graeme James
Hometown: Wellington, New Zealand.
Song: “To Be Found By Love”
Album: The Long Way Home
Release Date: January 25, 2019
Label: Nettwerk

In Their Words: “The Long Way Home is an exploration of time and space through the motif of a journey. Most of the songs were actually written while preparing to leave my homeland New Zealand to live on the other side of the world. In that sense, the record is a journey album of someone who hasn’t yet left, filled with all the hopes, doubts, fears and excitement of someone who can’t see the future clearly. When I left New Zealand I was 100% certain that I would return at some point. I still have no idea when that will be, but by traveling to the other side of the world for an undetermined period of time I’m taking the longest possible way home, hence the title of the album. I think the lyrics of “To Be Found By Love” really capture the emotion I first felt: ‘If people ask for me, tell them I’m off on an adventure, I’m lost on purpose to be found by love.’ It has certainly been a wild ride so far!” — Graeme James

Photo courtesy of Nettwerk