Artist:Martha Spencer Hometown: Whitetop Mountain, Virginia Song: “Wonderland” Album:Wonderland Release Date: September 2, 2022
In Their Words: “‘Wonderland’ is the title track, and I hoped it would be a good kickoff journey into the album. I thought of the album as a bit of a storybook of songs, from home and from afar, and wanted the tracks to have an atmosphere of sounds to take you somewhere. My full name is Martha Alice Spencer, and I had a show on Radio Bristol called the Hillbilly Wonderland show, so I thought it would be a good tie-in, too.
“But I wrote the song itself thinking about the things or people you meet sometimes that help you see and feel the magic and beauty in life, and that feeling of falling into love with someone or something you’re passionate about. Some of the lyrics of ‘here I go falling down a rabbit hole’ could be the things you just can’t help but fall into like the passionate side of yourself, embracing and having fun with your own and others’ eccentricities. I see Wonderland as a place to be able to do your own thing and shine — glitter, rhinestones and all.” — Martha Spencer
Artist:Amy Martin Hometown: Harrisonburg, Virginia Song: “Travelin’ On (42)” Album:Travelin’ On (produced by Chance McCoy) Release Date: August 5, 2022
In Their Words: “This song started in 2014 when my then-guitarist, Carlton ‘Bucky’ Greenawalt, wrote the chorus and gave it to me to finish (it’s actually the first voice memo in my phone of hundreds of partial ideas and recordings). Flash forward to August 2021 when I went back home for my first visit to Harrisonburg, Virginia, after having moved to Denver earlier that same year. I was driving down Route 42 — a two-lane 55mph highway that I drove for 20 years — and Bucky’s chorus smacked me in the face. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. As soon as I got on the plane back to Denver, I wrote the rest of the song, laid chords to it and later recorded it with Chance McCoy at his studio. This track is one that acknowledges the pain of hardship/losing love but also sends a message of hope in moving forward. It gives a nod to the resilience gained through trials, hardship and heartbreak, while dripping with the nostalgia of driving down a familiar road where all these thoughts take place. I think each and every one of us has our ‘Route 42’ — the road we traveled more times than we can count and where a lot of reflection takes place. My hope is that this song meets the listener where they are and takes them where they need to go.” — Amy Martin
Photo Credit: Ayla RM Photography Video Credit: Kelsey Arneson
Artist:Lonesome River Band (answered by Sammy Shelor) Hometown: Floyd, Virginia Latest Album:Heyday
Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?
Tony Rice. Tony changed the sound of bluegrass music through the 1970s and ’80s with his rhythm and lead guitar. He made rhythm guitar the leader of the band. His album Manzanita was the best practice tool for a banjo player ever. It was a bluegrass album without a banjo so I could play along with it and create my own ideas without being influenced by another banjo. I was fortunate to get asked to play some Tony Rice Unit gigs in the late 1990s and early 2000s. He then did some gigs with Lonesome River Band a couple of years later, and we learned a lot of the early Tony material and Bluegrass Album Band stuff. Nothing more memorable than playing shows with your hero!
What has been the best advice you’ve received in your career so far?
Most of my influences in music became my friends, so I had access to a wealth of knowledge and advice about the business. I would say the best advice was treat your audience with respect on and off stage and make them your friends. They will support you forever.
What was the first moment that you knew you wanted to be a musician?
I started messing with banjo at the age of 5. I learned as much as I could from my grandfather who played and other local musicians. In the 1970s, Wayside Park in Stuart, Virginia, became a really big bluegrass festival and brought in the top names in bluegrass at the time. After seeing bands like the Osborne Brothers, Seldom Scene, JD Crowe & the New South, and many others, I began to dream of doing what they were doing. I spent my teenage years putting in a lot of practice learning from all of those bands and listening to as many different banjo players as possible to learn everything I could.
Which elements of nature do you spend the most time with and how do those impact your work?
I grew up and still live in the rural areas in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. I can take 10 steps from my house and be in the woods and enjoy walking and taking in all nature has to offer. It keeps your mind from getting cluttered and open to your surroundings. Everything in nature is musical.
What rituals do you have, either in the studio or before a show?
I always try to find some quiet time before a show to get my head together. Then try to warm up on banjo for at least 30 minutes prior. I have two young sons at home, so rehearsal time at the house is nonexistent these days.
Since 1999, Hackensaw Boys have been pioneering and pushing the boundaries of alt-country. Now with a dozen albums to their name, the group out of Charlottesville, Virginia, continues to do so with their new, self-titled and self-released effort.
Colored with hints of punk, country, bluegrass, folk and pop, the project contains some of the most raw and wide-ranging songs from guitarist David Sickmen’s extensive catalog, with arrangements from Caleb Powers (fiddle/banjo/mandolin), Chris Stevens (upright bass) and David’s son, Jonah (charismo). Throughout the 11 tracks, Sickmen ruminates on everything from how people hide their grief and project it onto others (“The Weights”) to long-ago breakups (“Old New Mexico”).
“Old New Mexico” is one of several tracks from the album that Sickmen penned over a decade ago but never had a home until now. With his older cuts sprinkled between songs written in the past year or two like “The Weights,” the album offers a comprehensive look at the evolution of Sickmen and his art before and after he was treated for vocal polyps in early 2016. The album has also provided him much needed clarity, particularly in reference to “Old New Mexico.”
“[This song] lightens my mind because it made me realize that breakups aren’t new to me. I’ve been writing about them for 20 years,” says Sickmen. “I’ve been falling in and out of things for a long time now, so going back and finally recording this was a bit of a pressure release because it helped me to understand that despite all of these changes I’m still alive, well and moving forward with purpose.”
The self-titled project is one that Sickmen is prouder of than any previous album from the group, which was at one time a launching point for songwriters Pokey LaFarge and John R. Miller. However, despite Sickmen’s confidence, he stresses now more than ever about how he’ll get his work noticed in an era of overwhelmingly accessible streaming options.
BGS: I can see how streaming can be a double-edged sword. It helps to get your music out there, but at the same time it does the same for everyone else, too. It can be easy for your work to get lost in the shuffle of endless options.
Sickmen: It’s funny because as an artist I hate Spotify, but as a music listener I love Spotify. I now have more music than I can even fathom at my fingertips, but like you said there’s so much to consume that it’s easy for your work to get buried and forgotten. It can be discouraging, especially with how much money it costs to record and promote an album nowadays and releasing it independently like we are with this one.
I feel like the same can be said for social media. It’s critical to promoting yourself as an artist (if you’re able to correctly work the algorithms), but it can also be a very toxic, depressing and distracting space.
I’ve never been able to figure out the algorithms. Man. To be honest, I’m terrible at using Instagram and Facebook. I can’t help but post political stuff in support of things like reproductive rights and Black Lives Matter that I’m sure turn some people off. I care about that stuff just as much as I care about the band. I feel like as an artist it’s our duty to speak up about the ills of the world to hopefully help push the needle toward positive change.
Early in the pandemic I took a break from social media for a couple months and it was so refreshing. I found myself happier, less stressed out and more invested in the moment. The last thing I want is to be on my deathbed thinking, “Jesus, I spent 55,000 hours of my life on social media?!” It’s insane how much of a distraction it can all be while at the same time being essential to promoting a business or brand in our modern world. It’s a necessary evil in that regard.
What led to y’all opting to self-release this collection of songs?
Our last few albums have been on Free Dirt Records, but when I brought this project to them they told me their release slate was already full for the year. As a result I ended up hiring them a la carte out of my own pocket to help with distribution and publicity. I’m literally in debt to this record, which is fine, but it just goes to show how much independent artists put on the line for a return that’s far from guaranteed. All those worries aside, this album feels like a more full-scale Hackensaw Boys project than anything we’ve done prior.
Turning to the songs now, one of my favorites on the record is “Strangers.” I love the line “Go on and take a chance on a stranger / understand our lives are all in danger.” I feel like it succinctly captures the essence of how we’re all going through our own struggles and owe one another more empathy and less animosity. Is that what you were aiming to channel with the song?
You’re spot on. The band was rehearsing one day and that line you mentioned just popped into my head. For a long time after that, the lyric just sat in my list of ideas. I knew what I wanted the song to say but was having a tough time figuring out how to say it. Then it finally came to me the night before going to record it. What I ended up with is a story about not being afraid of those perceived as different from you, because in reality we’re all human and have much more in common than we don’t.
Another song on the record that ties into those themes is your cover of Bob Dylan’s “All I Really Want to Do.” I understand that it made its way onto the album after you started jamming on the song one day with your son Jonah. What’s it been like having him become a part of your musical family?
It’s an incredible feeling. He was always around my music growing up, but he didn’t start playing himself until he got to college at Belmont University in Nashville. Despite getting a late start he’s caught on to things very fast and will soon be a better guitarist than me. He brings an immense amount of talent to the group on charismo and anything else he touches and has a great feel for the songs. At the same time he’s also my firstborn son, so getting to share time and make memories with him on the road when most touring musicians are spending extended time away from their loved ones is something I’ve been cherishing and don’t take for granted.
Is that what you’re singing about in “Only on The Brightside”?
It is. That song is my favorite on the album. It really captures the relationship between loneliness and happiness while out on the road. You can be happy with what you’re doing making music while also longing for the loved ones you’re away from. It’s a very melancholy tale, which is a writing style that I’ve always been drawn to, only now I’m a little less lonely on the road with Jonah around.
Artist:49 Winchester Hometown: Castle, Virginia Song: “Russell County Line” (Acoustic) Album:Fortune Favors the Bold Release Date: May 13, 2022 Label: New West Records
In Their Words: “This is one of those songs that lends itself to a stripped back, more subdued performance. Even though the studio version has that big, electrified outro, the heart of the song really is still that acoustic guitar. A simpler approach is sometimes hard to pull off, but with this song, it works. I hope to always be able to write songs with that kind of adaptability. Good songs can be rearranged and experimented with instrumentally and still be good songs, and I think ‘Russell County Line’ is like that. I’d love to do a bluegrass version of the tune with a banjo bouncing along and carrying that melody.” — Isaac Gibson, 49 Winchester
Artist:Palmyra (Sasha Landon, (they/them), Teddy Chipouras (he/him), Mānoa Bell (he/him)) Hometown: Floyd, Virginia Song: “Park Bench” Album:Shenandoah Release Date: March 25, 2022
In Their Words: “‘Park Bench’ paints a very vulnerable picture of the person I see in the mirror every morning, and it can be overwhelming to think about its public release. My biggest comfort for this release is the fact that the three of us are doing it together. Often when we sit down to write and arrange together, we run into the same issue; when one person brings a song to the group, what can Palmyra do to better the tune without losing the intentions that the song grew from? I’m really proud of how we went about it with ‘Park Bench,’ and I am so grateful to Teddy and Mānoa for breathing more life into the tune and for always having my back. Even though ‘Park Bench’ started as something that I wrote to give voice to my own experience and anxieties, we collectively were able to turn it into a celebration of marginalized voices and queer identity by putting it out into the world together.” — Sasha Landon, Palmyra
Artist:Justin Golden Hometown: Richmond, Virginia Song: “Ain’t Just Luck” Album:Hard Times and a Woman Release Date: April 15, 2022
In Their Words: “The main phrase of this track is something I started saying to myself years ago as sort of a mantra to push through the hard times. Every time I felt like I was taking a step forward something knocked me back two, but ‘it ain’t just luck’ that I made it this far. This track is basically my letter to myself acknowledging that I’m in some rough water, but I’m building towards something that will be worthwhile and that I wouldn’t let ‘the man’ or my feelings of impostor syndrome derail me. The line ‘I sold my soul for a slice of the life / Now I’m comin’ back round for another piece of the pie/ Feels like the devil’s the only on my side’ is one of my favorites on the record. I did everything I could in order to make it this far, maybe even make a deal with the devil.” — Justin Golden
Artist:Lonesome River Band Hometown: Floyd, Virginia Song: “Mary Ann Is a Pistol” Release Date: February 4, 2022 Label: Mountain Home Music Company
In Their Words: “The LRB has been doing the Jimmy Martin classic, ‘Mary Ann,’ since around 1985. And it’s been a mainstay in our live shows ever since. Last year, I was digging through a bunch of cassettes I had from the ’80s and ’90s — I still love the sound of them — and ran across one of my favorite records ever by Brother Phelps (check them out if you haven’t heard these albums) recorded in 1995. They did a rocking version of this Dennis Linde song, and the more I listened to it, the more it became a bluegrass song in my head and a perfect song to follow the Jimmy Martin ‘Mary Ann.’ We hope you enjoy our version of ‘Mary Ann Is a Pistol!’” — Sammy Shelor, Lonesome River Band
Artist:Robin and Linda Williams Hometown: Staunton, Virginia Song: “Old Lovers Waltz” Album:A Better Day A-Coming Label: Oakenwold Recordings
In Their Words: “‘Old Lovers Waltz’ is one of our favorite songs off the A Better Day A-Coming release. It has personal meaning to the two of us, and we think Deep Structure Productions did an excellent job of producing the video. The ‘old Robin and Linda/young Robin and Linda’ idea, based around the banjo painting, was their vision, and they did a great job making the concept of a lifetime partnership come to life in four minutes. Their video captured the essence of our song. We wrote this after being married for 46 years. It’s not essential to be married that long to write such a song. You might be able to do it after only 30 or 35 years. ‘When you’re gliding with ease and stepping light/Then the Old Lovers Waltz, you are doing it right.'” — Robin and Linda Williams
For Dr. Ted Olson, Appalachian music has always been much more than a collection of songs. It’s been nothing short of a passion. The Eastern Tennessee State University professor has spent much of his life writing, researching, and documenting the music that has played and recorded throughout the southeastern United States during the 1920s and 1930s. His respected work on Bear Family Records box sets covering sessions in Bristol, Johnson City, and Knoxville, Tennessee, have brought those long-ago recordings to new generations of listeners. For example, the single-disc set Tell It to Me: Revisiting the Johnson City Sessions, 1928-1929 was named Best Compilation Album of 2019 by the Independent Music Awards.
Now, Olson has teamed up again with Bear Family to release We Shall All Be Reunited: Revisiting the Bristol Sessions, 1927-1928, a single CD distillation of these legendary sessions. Commonly called “the big bang of country music,” the recordings in Bristol by the Carter Family, Jimmie Rodgers, and others became unexpected bestsellers, positioning country music as a viable commercial format. Along with reams of new liner notes, the CD delivers not just those familiar names, but also Ernest Stoneman, Blind Alfred Reed, and more, reminding listeners of the diversity that crowded around producer Ralph Peer’s microphone.
BGS: What inspired you to revisit the music from the original Bristol sessions for this album?
Olson: I found that the story of the Bristol sessions had grown significantly, for me. I’ve changed my interpretation of the Bristol sessions, its historical significance, and how one interprets that legacy. This gave me the opportunity to set the record straight about how that story needed to be told. That new narrative is in the liner notes, which are 44 pages. That is the maximum that can fit in a jewel box. I was pretty adamant that this is the story that needed to be told and this is the length it should be.
We have new documents to learn from, new research that was unavailable to us before. New interviews and new artwork. To me, it’s revisionist history in the best sense of the term. When Sony released a single CD of the Bristol sessions in 2003, they focused solely on the 1927 sessions. To my mind, the 1928 sessions are equal to the sessions of the previous year. With this new CD, we celebrate both of those sessions. We have new masters for the songs as well. An engineer in Germany, Marcus Heumann, produced new masters for this release. They’re very exciting and they sound like they were recorded yesterday.
Dr. Ted Olson
What emerges from listening to both the Bristol and Johnson City collections is that they each demand your attention, albeit with different qualities.
The Johnson City sessions were an essential part of the rest of the story. They were echo sessions, just months after the Bristol sessions. They involved many of the same musicians, and yet the Johnson City sessions explored a different side of the Appalachian music that the Bristol sessions didn’t get to. The Bristol sessions accomplished certain things that are valuable and important, but they didn’t explore other facets that Johnson City was able to get more deeply into, because it had a different producer. It also was a different company, with different priorities and fortunes.
Some people prefer the Johnson City sessions to the Bristol sessions. They find the Johnson City recordings wilder, more exciting. Less controlled by the producer. Ralph Peer was a very controlling producer, very interactive in shaping the sounds, whereas Frank Walker of Columbia had the attitude of anything goes in this music. He was more documentarian, in a way. “What do you have? Let’s hear it.” Rather than shaping something into a package, which is what Ralph Peer’s modus operandi was at the Bristol sessions. I love them both. I’m not going to play favorites, but I’m also not going to acquiesce into the idea that Bristol sessions were more important because they were a year earlier.
How did you come to choose one song from each artist for the new Bristol Sessions album?
I knew that I wanted to match the length of the Johnson City CD, which had 26 recordings. I committed to 26 tracks, because that’s as much as we could fit on a CD, but there was also a licensing limitation. I also wanted a new template, where the ’28 Bristol sessions were as important as the ’27 sessions.
There were 28 artists that performed at the Bristol sessions, which meant that I could include one track from everyone except two. I had committed to including performances that in 2020 would be enjoyable by those who aren’t initiated into the sounds of the 1920s musical world. The stylistic approaches back then have changed over the years. We’ve listened to the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers through the years, so they sound familiar to us. Other artists from those sessions were such talented performers that we can still appreciate their recordings for talent alone.
How did you select the song from the Carter Family? All six of the songs that they recorded in Bristol are amazing.
I came to the conclusion that while “Single Girl, Married Girl” or “Bury Me Under the Weeping Willow” had gotten a lot of attention from these sessions, it’s “The Poor Orphan Child” that, for me, is the one that has captured my ears as the definitive Carter Family debut performance. A.P. is part of it. He’s not on “Single Girl, Married Girl.” He was out fixing their car tires that morning. To my mind, his best singing at the Bristol sessions was on “The Poor Orphan Child.”
Jimmie Rodgers’ recordings in Bristol have always suggested to me a person with a distinctive musical identity that is still seeking a comfort level in front of the mic. His two songs seem a bit tentative, a little nervous. Rhythmically, he’s very loose, which was always part of his persona. I think those recordings show his great charisma. He didn’t invent the singing yodel, but he first demonstrated it on the track that’s on this CD, “Sleep Baby Sleep.” Several months later, he records “Blue Yodel No. 1 (T For Texas),” and that was his breakthrough record.
The Bear Family box set about the Bristol Sessions received two Grammy nominations in 2011. It should have been a high point for you. How did you come to realize that you had much more to do?
It was fascinating for me to watch the press reaction to the Grammy nominations as well as the box set itself. I found that the press reactions were a little bit uncertain of what the Bristol sessions were. It was as though they were all falling lockstep into rapt amazement at the mythic importance of this thing called the Bristol sessions. It was obvious to me that people were changed by a myth, which revolved around two notions. One was that the Bristol sessions were “the big bang of country music.” But what does that mean? It was where Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family made their first records, but there were many other artists there as well.
The other notion was that Bristol is the birthplace of country music, which has been promoted by both Bristol, and the state of Tennessee, but that statement has often left other important sessions to be overlooked. I came to see that critics didn’t know how to unravel the myth. So, there I was at the Grammys, and as a scholar I felt I had only cracked the surface of what these sessions really were. I, too, was under the spell of the myth. And I needed to get past that. It was quite clear to me that there was more to the story. I remember flying home from that event, thinking that this was a life’s work in front of me.
Photo of Dr. Ted Olson by Charlie Warden
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