Category: press releases

For Immediate Release
February 4, 2019

Americana/folk artist Kelly Augustine to release debut album in April

“…crystal clear… ethereal, sorrowful… stunningly impactful…” – The Daily Country

Denver-based Americana/folk singer-songwriter Kelly Augustine is set to release her debut album, Light in the Lowlands, on April 5, 2019.  Recorded and produced by Grammy-nominated producer Wes Sharon (John Fullbright, the Turnpike Troubadours, The Grahams), the album explores stories of darkness and salvation through poetic lyrics and an authentic command of a variety of Americana musical idioms. The album takes its deep grounding in folk themes and updates the songbook with today’s stories.

“There are stories in this world that need to be told,” says Augustine. “The essential human story involves pain and suffering, but it also involves beauty, hope and redemption. It’s my aim, as a songwriter, to shed light on all of it. Stories that make us feel more connected and less alone, stories that shake us up and call us to action – those are the stories I want to tell.

The title Light in the Lowlands metaphorically references hope in low personal times. The album is rich with character sketch stories of drug addiction, alcohol abuse, loneliness, and poverty, but there are also stories of resilience and healing. Light in the Lowlands is also a delight for fans of Americana who long for current, emotionally-resonant songs along the lines of Bob Dylan, John Fullbright, Lyle Lovett, Emmylou Harris, Mark Knopfler, and Lucinda Williams. Augustine’s songs brim with warmly intimate instrumentation, and each song is detailed to create distinct Americana soundscapes befitting its impressionistic story.

The album’s debut single, “Hurt Too Big,” features an elegantly essential arrangement with delicate finger-picked guitar passages supporting Augustine’s sweetly sorrowful vocals as she recounts a loss-of-innocence soldier’s tale. Although the song was inspired by the stories of veterans returning from war, its emotional quality is universal: we all survive wars in our minds and hearts. “Debbie” is a sprightly twang number replete with chicken pickin’-style guitars and brisk fiddle lines. Its pep seems in line with poking a little fun at a helpless lady in the throes of addiction. Yet, as the song progresses it details her backstory, deftly shifting the mood from outlandishness to compassion.

“Second Chances” is a teardrop 1950s-style ballad based on true stories. It is unflinchingly romantic and represents some “light” in Light in the Lowlands. It’s a sweet song that leaves the listener rooting for a win. With “Thunder On The Mountain,” Augustine shows her ability to write Americana evergreens. The song’s moodiness conjures the feel of Appalachian folk, but its contemporary bluesy guitar evokes the masterful writing of Mark Knopfler.

At Wes Sharon’s 115 Recording in Norman, Oklahoma, Sharon and Augustine were joined in the studio by multiple musicians including Gabriel Pearson of the Turnpike Troubadours on drums and percussion and legendary roots royalty Byron Berline on fiddle and mandolin. “Hearing all the musicians breathe life into my music was an emotional experience,” Augustine says. “There were moments in the studio that I’d consider golden moments of my life, and I’m so grateful to have had that experience. I’ll never forget it.”

Growing up down an unpaved road in a dirt-under-your-fingernails small Oklahoma town, Augustine saw poverty and desperation, but she also saw people rise above it. The performer was raised by parents who lived the political and social volatility of the 1960s. Her mother and father soundtracked the house with Vietnam War-era folk music. Gripped by its ethos, Augustine was moved by individual and collective narratives of struggle. She loved the idea that one could challenge reality and seek to right personal and societal injustices with storyteller music. “My heart hurts for people in chains from addiction, abuse, and self-loathing,” Augustine says. “I want to see people get free. I hope my music can shed light on human suffering in a way that pushes us toward compassion.”  After a decade working as a  physician assistant, she grew restless in her career choice and quit her job to pursue one simple goal – write songs that spoke to people. “This record started with some far-fetched dreams, and it has been redemptive and healing to see those dreams become reality,” she says. “I found myself again.”

Augustine’s literate and emotive lyrics and penchant for a variety of Americana songwriter traditions have earned her a bevy of accolades and awards. Augustine was chosen as a 2018 Kerrville New Folk Finalist as well as a 2018 Al Johnson Performing Songwriter Contest Finalist (Wildflower! Arts & Music Festival). The first single off Light in the Lowlands, “Hurt Too Big,” was premiered in 2018 by the online outlet The Daily Country as an introduction to the forthcoming album.

Augustine plans some live shows in support of Light in the Lowlands.  Tour dates and details will be announced soon.

www.kellyaugustinemusic.com

For Immediate Release
February 4, 2019

 

Tony Lucca to release new album in March

Singer-songwriter is back with a Nashville-inspired dose of Americana
Nashville-based singer-songwriter Tony Lucca is flexing his Americana muscles on his forthcoming new album, Ain’t No Storm, which he will be releasing on March 29, 2019.  Ain’t No Storm reads like a who’s who of East Nashville notables: Ken Coomer produced the record at his studio, Cartoon Moon, great Nashville players like Michael Webb, Ted Pecchio, and Joe Garcia lent their talents — and even Patrick Sweany stopped in for a cameo on “Room With A View.” Replete with songs borne of his admiration for Nashville’s rich history – the town’s creative community ultimately fueled Lucca’s return to the studio and inspired the new album – Ain’t No Storm finds Lucca embracing with reverence the process and craft of songwriting and taking his time (more than two years) to get it right.

“In Nashville when you visit, people say, ‘Anything I can do for you, just let me know,’” Lucca says. “And then you move here, and you realize those arms really are wide open and those people aren’t full of sh*t. They really do want you to be part of the community here.”

Lucca brought a workman-like mentality to songwriting in his new hometown, writing or co-writing “daily and diligently,” spending years honing his craft. “I just took up songwriting as a full-time occupation, figured I’d make another record when I felt compelled to,” Lucca says. He eventually developed a songwriter residency at Midtown venue The Local, all the while touring the country. Over those formative years at the beginning of Lucca’s Act II, the songwriter again found himself falling in love with the purity of it all. “It was restorative for me on the creative side,” Lucca says. “It was also educational as I really tuned into the creative community and Nashville rhythm.”  He eventually found a home with Demolition Publishing, which boasts one of Music Row’s more notable rosters of both young and established writers.

Lucca’s admiration and respect for Nashville’s songwriting community, it turns out, was mutual. After moving to Nashville, he quickly found his calendar consumed with co-writes from old and new friends alike. Those include Driver Williams, tour-mate turned co-writer and “Nashville treasure” Gabe Dixon, and the Grammy-nominated Billy Montana (“Sage wisdom — bit of a mentor,” Lucca says of Montana).

Throughout that process, Lucca began “salting away” the songs that really reached out and grabbed him. “Those songs that make me sit in an empty room with an acoustic guitar and go, ‘Yeah, I’d be playing this song right now even if nobody were listening,’” Lucca says.  He found the songs that “started to feel like my expression — how I want to channel my creative energy,” as he says. “It took my whole career to get to the point where I just went into the studio and, as Ray Charles said, ‘Make it do what it do.’”
Lucca continues, “This is about as honest an album as I could ever make. There were very few takes of each song even recorded. Most of the vocals were recorded right along with the acoustic guitar. There was minimal editing and very few overdubs.”  The combination of meticulously crafting songs and freewheeling in the studio led to a record that is ready to announce Lucca as a force not just for his vocals, but also for his voice. It’s a record that delicately balances the eternal optimism of a man drawn to put newness out to the world with the road-worn realism of a man who weathered the storm ever-so-slightly more than it weathered him.

Lucca’s career is a long and noteworthy one that spans some of the country’s greatest music scenes — from his hometown Motown mecca of Detroit, to the hills of Hollywood, to the borough of Brooklyn.  It includes stints in some of the shiniest environments, from his early years in the “Mickey Mouse Club” alongside future pop stars like Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera, to his top-three finish on the second season of NBC’s “The Voice.”  But for Lucca, and for his music, Nashville just makes the most sense and is the best fit.

Lucca plans to tour in support of Ain’t No Storm (see confirmed tour dates below; more to be announced at a later date).  In the lead up to the album’s release in March, Lucca is also slated to perform at the annual City Summit Gala in Los Angeles on February 24, 2019.  This year’s event honorees and speakers include Colin Farrell, Les Brown, Kevin Harrington, Randy Jackson, and Mario Lopez.

Tony Lucca Tour Schedule:
2/4/2019 – Nashville, TN / Cambria Hotel
2/8/2019 – Kitty Hawk, NC / Jack Brown’s
3/4/2019 – Nashville, TN / Cambria Hotel
3/15/2019 – Charlotte, NC / Evening Muse
3/16/2019 – Greensboro, NC / Backyard Stage
3/22/2019 – Decatur, GA / Eddie’s Attic (w/Eliot Bronson)
3/23/2019 – Decatur, GA / Eddie’s Attic (w/Eliot Bronson)
4/1/2019 – Nashville, TN / Cambria Hotel
4/23/2019 – New York, NY / Rockwood Music Hall (w/Dan Rodriguez)
4/24/2019 – Philadelphia, PA / World Cafe Live (w/Dan Rodriguez)
4/25/2019 – Vienna, VA / Jammin’ Java (w/Dan Rodriguez)
4/26/2019 – Boston, MA / City Winery Haymarket (w/Dan Rodriguez)
4/27/2019 – Schenectady, NY / The Van Dyck
4/28/2019 – Basking Ridge, NJ / Ross Farm
5/6/2019 – Nashville, TN / Cambria Hotel
5/29 – 6/2/2019 – Kill Devil Hills, NC / Pat McGee’s Down The Hatch

www.tonylucca.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 29, 2019

 

Ike Reilly and his band The Assassination to head out on annual St. Patrick’s Day Massacre Tour in March

 

Rebel rocker and raconteur Ike Reilly is set to hit the road for select Midwest tour dates in March (see tour schedule below). The New York Times has praised Reilly’s music and live shows, writing: “Ike Reilly is a kind of natural resource, mined from the bedrock of music. All the values that make rock important to people—storytelling, melody, rage, laughter—are part and parcel of every Ike Reilly show I have ever seen. One of the best touring acts in the country, Reilly’s band takes it as a personal challenge to upend and amaze every room they play in.” With sets that are replete with true stories, tall tales, and bonhomie, Reilly will be performing this string of shows – dubbed the St. Patrick’s Day Massacre Tour (the fifth annual outing under this moniker) – with his full band, The Assassination. The Chicago show, being held on St. Patrick’s Day, is part of the Lincoln Hall/Schuba’s 30/10 Anniversary Series. Opening on all of the dates, and joining Ike and Co. on stage, will be Brendan O’Shea. Reilly plans to play songs from his full catalog with emphasis on 2018’s Crooked Love, which made many “best of 2018” lists, including the No Depression Reader’s Poll.

 

Ike Reilly tour schedule:
Thursday, 3/14 – Shank Hall | Minneapolis, MN
Friday, 3/15 – The Dubliner | St. Paul, MN (sponsored by Summit Brewing)
Saturday, 3/16 – The Castle Theatre | Bloomington, IL
Sunday, 3/17 – Lincoln Hall | Chicago, IL

 

About Ike Reilly:
Chicago, IL-based indie rock singer-songwriter Ike Reilly released his seventh studio album, Crooked Love, in 2018 via Rock Ridge Music. Since his major label debut, the groundbreaking Salesmen and Racists, Reilly has been making punk/folk/blues influenced rock ’n’ roll records that lean heavily on stories of outsiders with keen details and broad strokes that insinuate a crack in the American dream. Press praise for Reilly’s music has been extensive over the years. Chicago Magazine lauded Reilly’s “outlandish storytelling, underdog combativeness, and slapstick humor.” Minneapolis City Pages said, “Equal parts punk rocker, poet, and blue-collar barfly, Reilly’s stories are as bizarre and filthy and honest and pure as the people who come out to his shows. His songs reach out and grab people, shake them by the collars, make them jump up and down.” Chicago Tribune admired that Ike “merges his affinity for folk-punk narrative and anthemic guitar chords with hip-hop’s vocal cadences and rhythmic drive.” PopMatters.com called him “the best songwriter in America… Hilarious, unsettling, raw… but mostly just rocking.” USA Today hailed Reilly as “never less than original… ferociously intelligent… always worth listening to.” And Los Angeles Times described Reilly’s music as “…barroom rock narrated by a wiseguy who’s as comfortable regaling PhDs and poets as he is pimps and porn stars.”

 

www.ikereilly.net | www.facebook.com/ikereilly | https://twitter.com/IkeReilly

For Immediate Release
January 23, 2019

Ellen Starski to hit the road in the spring

Her debut solo album, The Days When Peonies Prayed for the Ants, is rooted in lush indie-folk, orchestral Americana, and organic pop

“This is relevant roots music.  These songs reverberate from deep within. A sweeping concoction that will take you away and create a transcending listening experience, The Days When Peonies Prayed For The Ants is a quiet release from the mundane. …Emotional and heartwarming, these inspiration songs filled with personal anecdotes are polished and overflowing with Ellen Starski’s magnetic personality.  A very memorable album…” – Stars and Celebs

Nashville-based singer-songwriter Ellen Starski is set to hit the road this spring for six dates (see tour schedule below) in the Midwest and East Coast.  Starski is touring in support of her solo debut album, The Days When Peonies Prayed for the Ants, which was released in 2018.

“Having the chance to bring the Peonies album to new ears and rooms has me electrified with a zest that only the mysteries of music can convey,” says Starski.

On the collection, which was written over the course of 12 years, Starski explores both her homeland and herself, traveling from the coal country of rural Pennsylvania to the roots-music hotbed of Nashville, Tennessee, and creating a soundtrack to that period of self-discovery. The album is autobiographical and rooted in a lush mix of indie-folk, orchestral Americana, and organic pop.

Press support for the album has been extensive. PopMatters.com said “…the album acts as a soundtrack of sorts for Starski’s life leading up to its moment of completion, scrap-booking essential moments of her life into song. From her travels in coal-led rural Pennsylvania to the roots music capital of Nashville, the troubadour details the good, the bad, and the in-between in picturesque detail.”  Glide Magazine praised the collection, writing, “The album encapsulates Starski’s talent as both a songwriter and a singer… with lush yet quiet textures that allow her voice to really shine. Mostly quiet yet powerfully striking, the album is an impressive solo debut from an artist with much to offer.”  Take Effect Reviews wrote of Peonies: “Starski’s way of navigating indie-folk and Americana sounds through her stories unfolds with the utmost beauty… Starski has a keen ability to reach directly into our souls… As far as debuts go, this one is aces…”  Off-Center Views gave the album high praise, writing, “I always appreciate musicians who take chances and Starski’s recording ranks high among my 2018 favorites.” Music Street Journal declared the album “exceptional,” Imperfect Fifth called her music “beautiful folk-rock,” and BlastEcho.com dubbed it “pretty d*mn enjoyable.”

A record that’s as dynamic and driven as its creator, The Days When Peonies Prayed for the Ants was recorded in East Nashville and produced by Anne McCue. The album also features a handful of the town’s top players: drummer Paul Griffith (Jason Isbell, k.d. lang), bassist Jimmy Sullivan (Lee Ann Womack), pianist Carl Byron (Michelle Shocked, Jim Lauderdale), and drummer Bryan Owings (Emmylou Harris, Tony Joe White).

Sonically influenced by Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan’s Desire, and the Alison Krauss/Robert Plant collaboration Raising Sand, The Days When Peonies Prayed for the Ants offers up a combination of sweeping string arrangements, stripped-down piano ballads, finger-plucked folk songs, and everything in between, all held together by a voice that’s both emotional and elastic, singing about the triumphs, missteps, and stories she’s picked up along the way. There are songs about loss, heartbreak, and family, all of them filled with details from Starksi’s own life. Personal anecdotes are woven throughout, but The Days When Peonies Prayed for the Ants ultimately delivers a universal message: that you cannot come to grips with yourself until you come to grips with the beautiful wreckage of your past.

Starski was born in Reynoldsville, a town in the woodlands of Western Pennsylvania, amidst the beauty of rural Appalachia. She was raised on a wide spread of music — the Lilith Fair-era earnestness of Tori Amos and Sarah McLachlan; the heartland rock of Tom Petty; the moody, nocturnal music of Portishead; the articulate, lyric-based writing of Aimee Mann.  She began playing guitar at 19 years old, before cutting her teeth as the singer of a bluesy bar band. Once she settled in Knoxville, she kicked off her solo career with pub gigs and open mic performances, before she settled in her now-hometown of Nashville.

In addition to the handful of shows scheduled in the spring, Starski also plans to go back into the studio in May to record her follow-up to The Days When Peonies Prayed for the Ants.

Ellen Starski Tour Schedule:
3/23/2019 – Chicago, IL / Uncommon Ground
3/24/2019 – Youngstown, OH / Calvin Center for the Arts
4/5/2019 – Washington, DC / Vinyl Lounge
4/6/2019 – Thomas, WV / Purple Fiddle
4/7/2019 – Thomas, WV / Purple Fiddle
4/27/2019 – Ridgway, PA / Chainsaw Carvers Rendezvous

www.ellenstarski.com
www.facebook.com/ellenstarski
https://twitter.com/starskiellen
www.instagram.com/ellenstarski

For Immediate Release
January 7, 2019

 
ARI & MIA SET TO RELEASE ALBUM IN MARCH

 

Ari & Mia reference the styles of Southern and Northeastern fiddle music and the early American songbook, honoring the sounds of Appalachian cottages, rural dance floors, and urban concert halls

 

“…strikingly beautiful, distinctive and exhilarating…” – No Depression

 
With music that No Depression calls “strikingly beautiful, distinctive and exhilarating, with expressive vocals that will find a way into hearts and minds,” Ari & Mia reference the styles of Southern and Northeastern fiddle music and the early American songbook to create a realm where their own compositions cross paths with older traditions. Their stylish and sophisticated music honors the sounds of Appalachian cottages, rural dance floors, and urban concert halls. Combine this with their innovative approach to songwriting and the result is a captivating sound, compellingly evident in their new album, Sew The City, due out March 1, 2019.  The duo is composed of sisters, Ariel and Mia Friedman.

“We recorded Sew The City in the gorgeous and isolated Great North Sound Society in Parsonsfield, ME,” says Ariel.  “An old farmhouse was the perfect place to access quiet and creativity.”

The sisters produced the album themselves, and it was engineered by Ariel Bernstein, with help from GNSS intern Abigale Sullivan.  Bernstein also provided insightful input on the production side.  “We recorded all of the takes live together in one room, other than a few third harmony parts that we overdubbed and Ariel Bernstein’s added percussion on two tracks,” says Mia.  “This resulted in an album that sounds exactly like what our audience would hear at a live show. The sound is organic and full, and it features intricately designed parts for all four of our voices—two vocals and two instruments.”

Recording Sew The City felt freeing and exhilarating for the pair, “most likely due to being isolated in a gorgeous place where our only goal was birthing this album,” says Ariel. “We allowed ourselves to be influenced by the place itself, like when we recorded ‘Unquiet Grave’ directly after we had visited the extremely old and definitely haunted basement. It was late in the evening and raining buckets outside.”

The album has a subtle theme of paying homage to fierce female ancestors. “Til I Die” and “Sew The City” both tell the stories of their maternal and paternal grandmothers respectively. On the more ridiculous side, “Roll Away” tells the story of the once-carpeted kitchen in Mia’s home, proudly built by her husband’s grandparents in the 1940s. They also cover a song by their all-time favorite (s)hero Joni Mitchell, whose song, “The Fiddle and the Drum,” is a letter to North America.  Written in 1969 as an anti-war song, it wonders why this country has “traded the fiddle for the drum” while still remembering “all the good things you are.” “We found this to be a fitting song to resurrect and rearrange at this particular moment in our country’s political climate,” Mia says.  “It’s a poignant and thought-provoking song with which to end the album.”

With a sound that SingOut! Magazine praised as “a traditional rootsy grounding with a clear background of classical training” as well as “soothing and fresh, tasteful and accomplished,” the sisters have toured across the United States and Australia since 2008, and both are both graduates of New England Conservatory’s cutting-edge Contemporary Improvisation department. They’ve performed alongside Sarah Jarosz, have opened for the likes of Cheryl Wheeler and Catie Curtis, and have played at venues such as Shalin Liu Performing Arts Center, Falcon Ridge Folk Festival’s Mainstage Emerging Artist Showcase, Club Passim, the Parlor Room, New Bedford Folk Festival, and Jordan Hall. Both are award-winning songwriters: Mia’s song “Across the Water” won the 2010 John Lennon Songwriting Contest in the folk category, and Ari’s song “Old Man” was a semi-finalist for the 2016 International Songwriting Competition.

“Ari & Mia are not creating a new music; they are taking it to another level and exploring areas that have not been attempted in decades,” No Depression opined about their most recent album, Out of Stone. “Their all-acoustic, pure and honest approach has significance. Treading the edges of traditional folk in a more faithful manner, they share the lyrical wizardry of 70’s bands Steeleye Span, Tir-na-Nog, and the Incredible String Band, with searing harmony as good as The Beach Boys. The sisters sing in unison like two violins.” Their two previous albums, Land on Shore and Unruly Heart, ranked high on the national folk radio charts.

“We feel wildly grateful to have such a unique sisterly partnership,” Ariel says of their familial bond and performing alliance. “Our collaboration involves each of us writing song skeletons separately and then bringing the partially formed song to our duo where together we shape it into its final form. Performing and touring together is one of our favorite ways to spend time—we’re well aware of how lucky we are to be able to spend days and weeks with only each other and not go insane.”

Meet Ari & Mia:

Ariel Friedman is a multi-genre cellist, composer, and educator. A winner of ASTA’s Alternative Styles Award, she is steeped both in the music of American roots traditions and a broad range of classical repertoire. She has performed and toured with many folk-based groups including Scottish National Fiddle champion Hanneke Cassel, the Sail Away Ladies, and Childsplay. An advocate of new music and a composer herself, she is the founding cellist of Cardamom Quartet, performs with Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and has written music for and collaborated with many ensembles including Palaver Strings, Box Not Found, DC-based pianist and composer Sam Post, and the young artists of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute. In demand as an educator, Ariel teaches at Brookline Music School, has her own private studio and has taught at music camps and workshops from New England to New Zealand. Ariel graduated from Northwestern University in 2008 and received a Masters of Music from New England Conservatory in 2011. She is one of two 2018 recipients of New England Conservatory’s Alumni Award. Visit www.arielfriedmanmusic.com for more info.

Mia Friedman is a virtuosic fiddler and singer as well as a composer and educator. Her song “Across the Water” won the 2010 John Lennon Songwriting Contest in the folk category, and she was the 2006 New Hampshire Highland Games Scottish Fiddle Champion. She is largely influenced by American roots music and old-time Appalachian traditions, and blends this with contemporary music in her compositions. Mia plays with Hollow Deck—a duo of tape collage, vocals, and woodwinds—and avant-garde rock band, Creative Healing. She teaches at the Community Music School of Springfield, MA and leads elementary and high school string programs in five public schools in Springfield. She is the orchestra teacher at The Hartsbrook Waldorf School, has a private studio of fiddle students, leads adult music classes, and teaches at many traditional fiddle music camps during the summer. Mia graduated from New England Conservatory in 2012 where she studied with Anthony Coleman, Carla Kihlstedt, and Hankus Netsky.

https://www.ariandmiamusic.com/ 

For Immediate Release
November 27, 2018
DEARLING SET TO RELEASE EP IN FEBRUARY

Music explores the wide open spaces of Colorado – a little folk, a little alternative, a little rock, and very country

Denver-based quartet Dearling is set to release its new EP, Silver and Gold, on February 22, 2019.  Following the success of its debut album, Inheritance, the band knew that its second offering would have to be different and that it would need to challenge what they had already created. Silver and Gold is the result, and it hails back to band vocalist Rachel James’s modern country start in her musical career.

“The first song that ever got me a real paycheck was a country tune,” she says. “I loved going back to that and creating songs that aren’t just love songs. A couple of these tunes are real stories, people deciding to do the right thing at the right time. It’s about the heroes we never talk about culturally. We idolize people for all sorts of reasons: fame, success, money, athletic ability. I wanted to sing and create some songs that promote those who give when no one is looking, without an agenda. They just live right.”

Dearling guitarist and vocalist Dave Preston recognized the shift in direction from the moment the recording process started. “We spent so much time thinking about each part on Silver and Gold,” he says. “Everything was so intentional. I’m singing a lot more than I have in the past, and it was a huge challenge. Rachel wrote songs that made sense for me to take on. This record is us in a totally different place and at a different level than we were with Inheritance. It’s more mature with a clearer sonic direction. There is still a deep sense of the Western sound that we all feel like we came from, but there is a lot more country in this group of songs. And with the lyrics, it just makes sense.”  The band also got some help from guitarist Danny Burton on the song, “What I Don’t Need.”

Rounding out the group are brothers and Denver music scene fixtures Joel and Noah Matthews, on drums and bass respectively.  The band wrote, recorded, and mixed the record all on their own – an intense process that taught them a lot about the art of creating as a team.  As Dearling has grown together, the music has become tighter, clearer, and more comfortable. The same values that guide good family guide the songs. Silver and Gold reflects Dearling’s values. It’s about real love and unsung heroes.

Being native to Colorado, to the West, to mountain ranges and vast open spaces, leads to the completely unique meaning and melodies of Dearling.  It’s not about the style as much as it is about the sounds, tones, textures, and feelings that the Western wild inspires. It’s a place of vast weather changes, high highs and mellow lows. It’s a little rough and a little sweet, a little desert and a little rain. In love with Fleetwood Mac, Chris Stapleton, Emmylou Harris, and Travis Meadows, Dearling is boldly guitar-driven with true mainstream hooks. It’s Colorado country music: a little alternative, a little folk, a little rock, and very country, with as much soul in the lyrics as in the melodies.

Dearling band member and world-touring guitarist and artist Dave Preston has played with the likes of Justin Timberlake, Kelly Clarkson, and virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro. Still, he calls Dearling his musical home.  “We are literally family, but even family doesn’t always play well together,” says Preston.  “We do.”  It’s the kind of family that has kept the band together happily since 2015, landing gigs at Red Rocks, playing with legends like Roberta Flack and Chris Isaac, and all while garnering a growing fan base.

Preston and Dearling bandmate (and lifemate) Rachel James met in the middle of Preston’s whirlwind career at a songwriter event in Denver. “I’ll never forget his extraordinary and unique guitar playing and songwriting,” James says.  “He stopped the whole room with his song, ‘Rain Down.’ I had no idea who he was at the time, but I knew I would never forget him.” James didn’t forget him – soon the two were great friends, and she started taking guitar lessons from him, which led to something more.  “We’d spent every lesson laughing hysterically, and I knew we had something special,” James recalls. “After a long string of bad relationships, Dave was my first great one. And he’ll be my last.”  They gelled equally well on the music front. “Musically, he felt like a long-lost friend,” she recalls. “We were always going to do a project together. We just needed time to know it.”

The two married in 2014 and immediately began writing and creating together. James, an award-winning songwriter, had placed multiple songs with country and pop artists alike (Jess Moskaluke, FACE Vocal Band, Tyler Ward, etc.) and Preston had played in every genre and with major artists all over the world.

The band plans to tour in support of Silver and Gold, including a hometown album release show.  Details and dates will be announced soon.

http://dearling.virb.com/

For Immediate Release
October 22, 2018

Ike Reilly and Johnny Hickman set to hit the road together

Rebel rocker Ike Reilly and guitar slinger Johnny Hickman (from the band Cracker) plan to trade songs and stories of love, lust, patriotism, and dissidence when they hit the road on tour together this fall.  The friends will be playing on the West Coast in November, in the Midwest the first week of December, and in Colorado the second week of December.  (Confirmed tour dates are listed below; other dates will be announced soon.)

This politically charged collaboration is heartbreaking and hilarious. Hickman and Reilly’s musical friendship goes back light years, and the rock ’n’ roll camaraderie they share will be on full display.  “I was a fan of Cracker and Johnny before I even considered trying to make a living writing and singing songs,” says Reilly. “Johnny is a master of the killer riff, songs of anthemic defiance, and of the road itself. We’ve become friends, comrades. Our love of real songs and the romantic lies we tell each other about being on the road as troubadours is what helps bind us together.  We’ve killed time in bars, clubs, studios, airports, bus stations, green rooms, and motels. Now we’re gonna kill time and audiences from stages together as we set off in search of the slimy, noble America we believe is out there.” Hickman is equally excited about this road outing: “I’ve been an ardent Ike fan for years and consider him one of the best songwriters of his generation, as well as one of my very best friends. We’ve had a few great times performing, hanging, and recording together thus far and have often discussed hitting the road, just the two of us. I’m thrilled and mildly terrified of what might happen!”

About Ike Reilly:
Chicago, IL-based indie rock singer-songwriter Ike Reilly released his seventh studio album, Crooked Love, earlier this year via Rock Ridge Music.  The New York Times has praised Reilly, writing: “Ike Reilly is a kind of natural resource, mined from the bedrock of music. All the values that make rock important to people—storytelling, melody, rage, laughter—are part and parcel of every Ike Reilly show I have ever seen.  One of the best touring acts in the country, Reilly’s band takes it as a personal challenge to upend and amaze every room they play in.”

Since his major label debut, the groundbreaking Salesmen and Racists, Reilly has been making punk/folk/blues influenced rock ’n’ roll records that lean heavily on stories of outsiders with keen details and broad strokes that insinuate a crack in the American dream. Press praise for Reilly’s music has been extensive over the years.  Chicago Magazine lauded Reilly’s “outlandish storytelling, underdog combativeness, and slapstick humor.” Minneapolis City Pages said, “Equal parts punk rocker, poet, and blue-collar barfly, Reilly’s stories are as bizarre and filthy and honest and pure as the people who come out to his shows. His songs reach out and grab people, shake them by the collars, make them jump up and down.”  Chicago Tribune admired that Ike “merges his affinity for folk-punk narrative and anthemic guitar chords with hip-hop’s vocal cadences and rhythmic drive.”  PopMatters.com called him “the best songwriter in America… Hilarious, unsettling, raw… but mostly just rocking.” USA Today hailed Reilly as “never less than original… ferociously intelligent… always worth listening to.” And Los Angeles Times described Reilly’s music as “…barroom rock narrated by a wiseguy who’s as comfortable regaling PhDs and poets as he is pimps and porn stars.”

www.ikereilly.net
www.facebook.com/ikereilly
https://twitter.com/IkeReilly

About Johnny Hickman:
Johnny Hickman is best known for co-founding the band Cracker in 1990 with David Lowery, his childhood friend from Redlands, CA, but his talents and musical styles run far deeper. His spirited co-writing and fiery lead guitar sound achieved platinum status with Cracker’s alternative radio hits “Teen Angst,” “Low,” “Get Off This,” and “Eurotrash Girl.” Cracker released ten albums, and Lowery and Hickman together are seen as godfathers of the alternative music scene, who turned gently away from plaid-clad grunge in the 1990s with more countrified and bluesy stylings.

Hickman is also a successful and critically acclaimed solo artist with two releases to date: Palmhenge (recipient of NYC’s The Village Voice‘s “Voices Choice” accolades) and the more recent critically acclaimed and successful Tilting.  No Depression magazine called Palmhenge “wildly diverse – from the arena rock of ‘Harvest Queen’ to the Bakersfield country of ‘Friends’ to the splendid folk rock of ‘Little Tom’ and ‘The San Bernardino Boy’ – it blends those genres with a dash of alt-rock to create a surprisingly coherent whole.”

Occasionally, Hickman ventured away from solo work and Cracker to spearhead side projects, including his Colorado-based outlaw country band The Hickman-Dalton Gang. Retired side projects include All Thumbs Trio (with moe. guitarist Chuck Garvey, and East Coast guitarist Gibb Droll), and Crazysloth, an Arizona-based band he formed while recording Palmhenge. Film and TV work to date include one full film score for the independent “River Red,” placement of “Lucky” from Palmhenge in the FX series “Sons of Anarchy,” as well as the placement of Cracker songs in several popular movies and TV shows.

www.johnnyhickman.com
www.facebook.com/johnny.hickman.7

Ike Reilly & Johnny Hickman Tour Schedule

November 10 – Redlands, CA – house concert (tickets)

November 11 – San Juan Capistrano, CA – house concert (tickets)

November 12 – Los Angeles, CA – Hotel Café, Second Stage (tickets)

November 13 – Los Angeles, CA – Hotel Café, Second Stage (tickets)

November 14 – San Francisco, CA – The Lost Church (tickets)

November 16 – Boulder Creek, CA – Skyhouse Music Series (tickets)

November 29 – Youngstown, OH – West Side Bowl

November 30 – Pittsburgh, PA – Kollar Club

December 1 – Ft. Wayne, IN – B-Side

December 5 – Milwaukee, WI – Shank Hall

December 6 – Madison, WI – The Condon’s Folk Punk House

December 7 – Libertyville, IL – Diamond City Studio

 

For Immediate Release
September 6, 2018

 

Award-winning songwriter Martha Scanlan to release new album in October

The River and The Light full of moments of profound intimacy and belonging

Montana-based Americana/folk singer-songwriter Martha Scanlan is set to release her fourth album, The River and The Light, on October 19, 2018 via Rock Ridge Music.  Full of moments of profound intimacy and belonging, the album hosts some of the finest writing yet from the award-winning Scanlan. Produced by her longtime musical collaborator, Jon Neufeld, and recorded at Type Foundry Studios in Portland, Oregon (where Scanlan recorded her third album), The River and The Light is a journey: there is a sense of aliveness and wonder throughout each song and throughout the album, a sense of anticipation of what awaits around the next bend.  The album will be available for pre-order starting on September 21, 2018, and fans who purchase the album at the pre-order stage can enjoy the first single, “Brother Was Dying,” as an instant-gratification track.

About the album title and theme, Scanlan says, “Rivers have been a theme throughout the process of working on this record; time spent in a landscape of rivers in Western Montana, exploring different narratives running through a song and the way they weave in and out of each other, the musical collaboration with Jon Neufeld and the way we sink into these deep grooves, the way music and writing occur for me as winding currents.”

The aforementioned single, “Brother Was Dying,” is also the first song on the record, and it pulses with rich electric guitar tones, somehow lush and spare all at once, the tension of so many opposites – hope and despair, intimacy and inclusion, birth and death – weaving seamlessly in and out of each other in one winding groove.  Adding to the vibe of the album, the addition of haunting old-time fiddles and Cajun accordion thanks to Dirk Powell and Black Prairie’s Annalisa Tornfelt seem to invoke something ancient, something deep in the American psyche, in songs that are already layered with the complexity of belonging; this is not only a journey of the soul, but a journey of the times we are living in.  Something about the sense of discovery and wonder here, even in the midst of heartbreaking vulnerability, feels essential until the last beckoning, twisted fiddle lines fade into the distance, closing out the album on “Revival.”

“Recording is always such an interesting process – the end result is always different than you anticipated – but this was much more so because we didn’t have many expectations going into it,” says Scanlan. “We had never played electric guitars together, so it was very present and playful.  All of the tracks are live, some of them just one take.  Jon added different elements afterwards but even overdubs for Jon are very improvisational.  What was surprising about listening back to the record was this sense of being on a journey – like something we were experiencing instead of something we created, if that makes sense.  It will be interesting to put it out into the world and see how it occurs for other people.  I love that process of releasing a record – it’s as though it takes on a life of its own; it interacts with other people’s stories and returns changed.  The songs cease to become my own and I am reminded that they were never mine to begin with.”

Anyone familiar with Martha Scanlan and Jon Neufeld’s unique alchemy on stage will not be surprised by the sense of being taken into the moment – their shows are in and of themselves a journey of improvisation; the way Jon Neufeld’s brilliant innovative guitar playing weaves effortlessly around Scanlan’s timeless songwriting is simply magical.  They met playing together at Portland’s indie-roots festival, Pickathon, in 2010, shortly before recording Tongue River Stories, a beautifully stark album of field recordings captured on film at the 120-year-old family ranch where Martha was living and working in a remote corner of southeast Montana (“The Meadow” on YouTube is a stunning introduction).  “I wanted to record songs in the places where they were written,” Martha says. “There is such a beautiful intimacy with the landscape in ranch work and in the place itself, stories inside of stories inside of stories.”

This exploration of place and belonging has been a long-running theme of Scanlan’s music, but really came into focus before that while being immersed in old-time music in East Tennessee.  “The interwoven relationship – between music and landscape, people and stories – really impacted me, just this profound sense of belonging,” she says. “I started writing songs there, songs about my own landscapes back home in Montana.  I missed them.”

After touring with the innovative, old-time string band Reeltime Travelers, those songs evolved into her debut solo album, The West Was Burning.  Recorded at Levon Helm’s barn in Woodstock, New York, with Dirk Powell and Levon and Amy Helm, it was heralded as an instant classic, one of those rare albums that defies genre and generation.  Dirty Linen opined, “Scanlan evokes western landscape as effectively as Georgia O’Keefe did on canvas.”  Scanlan toured the country and Europe solo, with North Carolina’s Stuart Brothers, and in other various configurations, and eventually began her collaboration with Jon Neufeld.  She moved back to Montana, and after her second album, Tongue River Stories, came The Shape Of Things Gone Missing, The Shape Of Things To Come, recorded mostly live in Portland, Oregon with members of Black Prairie and The Decemberists.  It was a featured album by World Café’s David Dye and No Depression’s Amos Perrine.

While currents of deep Appalachian mountain valleys and vast Montana landscapes wind through Scanlan’s songs, it’s really the accessibility and intimacy that defines them, and how they seem to find their way onto soundtracks by T Bone Burnett, pages of celebrated American novelists like Rick Bass (“For A Little While”) and Joyce Carol Oates (“Little Bird of Heaven”), shared mixes by Emmylou Harris, covers by roots musicians from Sarah Jarosz to Andrew Marlin to Solas, quiet song circles and camp fires.  “They all seem to end up being songs about the human experience,” Scanlan explains.

Scanlan has collaborated and shared the stage with a variety of roots musicians, including Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris, Levon Helm, Ollabelle, Black Prairie, Ralph Stanley, and Norman and Nancy Blake.  She is planning several album release shows, in Portland, Oregon, and Missoula, Montana (details and dates to be announced soon), and she is also slated to perform multiple time at the Sisters Folk Festival in Sisters, Oregon on September 7th and 8th.

www.marthascanlan.com

 

For Immediate Release
August 20, 2018

 

Salim Nourallah track “Tucumcari” premieres at Mxdwn today

 

All 21 tracks from double-album to be unveiled in order online prior to album release via weekday premiere series

 

Nourallah to tour in Texas in October

 

Respected Dallas, TX-based singer/songwriter/producer/musician-of-many-trades Salim Nourallah is set to release a sprawling double-album, Somewhere South of Sane, on September 28, 2018 on Palo Santo Records.  His seventh solo album, it is Nourallah’s boldest work yet, exploring the desolation of peace in America (“Relief”), the implosion of a marriage (“A Betrayal”), madness of a life lived among the record stacks (“Boy in a Record Shop”), and is nothing short of a musical odyssey.  The main radio single from the album, “Tucumcari” (which also appears on his EP, South) premieres today at Mxdwn.  (The video for “Tucumcari” will be premiering on August 23, 2018 at Innocent Words.)

To introduce each track from the album prior to the release date, Nourallah has a “song a day” premiere series planned, set to run for the 21 weekdays leading up the album release date.  For this series, Nourallah has partnered up with a slew of premiere outlets large and small (including Mxdwn, Atwood Magazine, Blast Echo, Independent Clauses, Blue Ridge Outdoors, Vents Magazine, East of 8th, AXS.com, GhettoBlaster, Magnet Magazine, Imperfect Fifth, PopMatters, Ghost of Blind Lemon, Glide Magazine, Ground Sounds, and others), and each track from the album will be unveiled in order, starting on August 29th.  Nourallah will be posting about each song and premiere on socials on the premiere date as a way of rolling out the album, song-by-song, in the order the tracks appear on the double-record.

“This record has been different for me in a lot of respects – not just the obvious one, it being my first double album,” Nourallah says.  “The waiting period between completion and release of an album is usually excruciating for most musicians. I’ve experienced it many times, but this is the first time I’ve actually enjoyed the process. My publicist’s idea to roll out four EPs and then premiere one song a day three weeks in advance of the album’s release has ended up being a fun and completely different way to fill that waiting-period gap.  It’s amazing to celebrate each individual premiere, and I’m excited about Mxdwn premiering ‘Tucumcari’ today.  I appreciate their help in spreading the word about truly independent music!”

Nourallah plans to tour in Texas in October to celebrate the release of Somewhere South of Sane in the live setting; joining Nourallah on the road are Marty Willson-Piper (from The Church) and Danny Green (from Laish).  Confirmed tour schedule:

October 11: Fort Worth, TX – Fort Worth Live
October 12: San Antonio, TX – Tobin Center for the Performing Arts
October 13: Austin, TX – Cactus Cafe
October 14: Houston, TX – TBD
October 18: Denton, TX – PAAC Arts Center
October 19-20: Dallas, TX – Palo Santo Galactic Headquarters

About Somewhere South of Sane:
Recorded and mixed mostly at Salim Nourallah’s Pleasantry Lane Studio in Dallas, the self-produced album is an honest, often brutal introspective exercise that is relatable, heartbreaking, and amusing all at the same time. With the two-fisted melancholy of John Lennon and the elegant bluntness of Neil Finn, Somewhere South of Sane elevates Nourallah to the apex of his art, trading rock riffs for a classical guitar and assisted by the mind-bending instrumentation of guitarist Nick Earl, Nourallah’s bandmate in the Travoltas and a musician he calls a “total freak genius.” Nourallah further explains: “He has this ability to create worlds. Music is very visual to me, and I’ve always seen music in colors. Each of these songs has a sonic world, and Nick is responsible for that because he doesn’t play conventional guitar.”

The 21 tracks that comprise the four-sided Somewhere South of Sane are what the respected musician/producer admits is “the work of a functional crazy person.” He adds, “Spending a lifetime dedicated to any form of writing is a particular form of madness. Especially in the face of the unlikely event that you will ever see much or any monetary compensation.”

Nourallah, who is equal parts songwriter and producer, creates a shifting sonic landscape that could easily be mistaken for the work of multiple artists. From the gorgeous trance-inducing psychedelia of the opener “Boy in a Record Shop,” to the gut-wrenching self-realization in “I Missed My Own Life,” to the dueling Lennon/McCartney lyrical/melodic axis on display in “Tucumcari,” and the Nick Drake-esque “Moving Man,” Somewhere South of Sane traverses more artistic landscape in one album that some artists could in an entire career.

In the tradition of nakedly stark, confessional songwriters like John Lennon and Bob Dylan, Nourallah makes no bones about confronting his inner demons on Somewhere South of Sane. “When I was a kid, I was struck by the violence, greed and insanity of the ‘grownup’ world,” he says, “and the only way I found I could deal with it was music. I guess I’m still using the same, crude method of self-therapy.”

About the 2018 EP Series:
In advance of the album, Nourallah is in the midst of releasing four pre-album “bundles” that include tracks from the album as well as bonus material: previously recorded but unreleased songs or acoustic re-imaginings of tracks from past Nourallah albums.  Each bundle (EP) is accompanied by new online video content.  Already released bundle one, North (out June 1, 2018), bundle two, West (out June 29, 2018), and bundle three, East (out July 27, 2018) precede bundle four, South, which comes out on September 7, 2018. The four EPs give fans a sneak peek into what is in store for them on Somewhere South of Sane.

About Salim Nourallah:
As a solo artist, Nourallah has long mined the terrain between catchy and devastating. After gaining initial acclaim with the Denton, TX-based Nourallah Brothers, he went on to release six solo albums. His debut, Polaroid (2004), had Rolling Stone calling him “a singer-songwriter who can stop time.” 2015’s Skeleton Closet was cited by Dusted as a “masterful balance of the said and the unsaid… like a good novel, full of implications and shadowy contradictions and complexities.” As a producer, Nourallah boasts quite an impressive C.V. of production credits (Old 97’s, the Damnwells, Rhett Miller, the Deathray Davies). He’s also been involved in numerous other projects, including co-founding and running A & R for the Palo Santo music group. Over the years, his work on both sides of the sound booth has won him an armful of Dallas Observer music awards. That, and the consistent quality of Salim Nourallah’s music, have proven that some musicians actually can continue to stay relevant.

http://salimnourallah.com
https://twitter.com/salimnourallah
https://www.facebook.com/salimnourallah

For Immediate Release
August 9, 2018

 

Acclaimed singer-songwriter Vanessa Peters set to release Foxhole Prayers 

via Idol Records on October 5th

“a true poet and a brilliant songwriter” – Rootsville

Dallas, TX-based indie-folk singer-songwriter Vanessa Peters is set to release her new album, Foxhole Prayers, on October 5, 2018, via Idol Records.  In Foxhole Prayers, Peters’s already-considerable songwriting prowess has risen to its fullest stature, presented as a concise, gut-punching collection of songs composed of piercing observations of both the outside and inside worlds.

“I’m a literature geek at heart and for years I’ve wanted to do an album somehow influenced by The Great Gatsby, but the idea seemed much too nerdy and abstract,” explained Peters. “But after I re-read it last year, it dawned on me that we were literally reliving the Gatsby years. Suddenly I could see all the corrupt and self-indulgent characters from the book all around me, with Trump as some kind of PT Barnum-meets-Warren G. Harding character.  I was on tour in Europe at the time and had some time off between shows, so I holed up in a tiny apartment in Utrecht for four days and began writing the songs that would become the basis for the new album.”

Peters shines a bright light on the modern world, illuminating the perilous rise of populist politics, the seemingly incessant swirl of violence around us, the struggle to remain positive in dark times, and the need to stand strong against hate and desperation.  The album is dark at times, but Peters reminds us on upbeat songs like “Lucky” and album opener “Get Started” that we forge our own luck from sheer determination and in finding gratitude even in the face of hardship. Never before have we heard Peters speak out as forcefully as she does in “Carnival Barker,” one of the album’s most pointed tracks which takes direct aim at not just populist politics but also the frightening way that history repeats itself.  And it is impossible to remain dry-eyed throughout the starkly-honest “Fight,” in which Peters movingly bares her deepest fears as a songwriter.

In Foxhole Prayers, Peters demonstrates that she has not only reached an entirely new level of lyricism, but has vaulted into a new echelon of musicality. The album reflects a pleasingly diverse yet cohesive collection of styles, effortlessly weaving modern electronica elements and drum machines into more familiar acoustic and rock arrangements. The result is a splendid musical tapestry that unfolds from the first insistent notes of “Get Started” and keeps the listener sonically mesmerized throughout. For the record, Peters turned to producer Rip Rowan (Old 97’s, Rhett Miller), producer John Dufilho (Deathray Davies, Apples in Stereo), and what has now become her established stable of all-star musicians, including longtime sideman and Grammy-winner Joe Reyes (Buttercup) and Dallas guitar hero Chris Holt (Don Henley) on electric guitar.  Dufilho and bassist Andy Lester form the rhythm section for most of the album, while Peters’s European bandmates (Federico Ciancabilla, Andrea Colicchia) also make an appearance on a couple of tracks.

On the deeply personal “Fight,” the track opens simply and builds to an emotional climax on a swell of interlocking guitar melodies evocative of Bends-era Radiohead. “Before it Falls Apart” is an instantly striking, minimalist arrangement of drum machines, acoustic and electric guitars, and a rich vocoder that suggests a more analog version of Imogen Heap. On “This Riddle,” producer Rowan gives the track a decidedly Neil Finn treatment, with intersecting live and looped drums and swirling mellotrons. The album also showcases the band’s ability to deliver punchy raw rock on tracks like “Trolls” and “Carnival Barker.” Throughout the album, Peters’s voice is lush and blissful as never before, dominating the mix and commanding the listener’s attention to every word. And that’s the point: these are big songs, full of weight and meaning, demanding to be heard – and Peters makes the listener feel every syllable.

Over the years, Peters has gotten comparisons to songwriters like Suzanne Vega, Beth Orton, Aimee Mann, Josh Ritter, and others.  Rootsville called her “a true poet and a brilliant songwriter,” while No Depression praised her “metaphor-rich songs” and “the depth and substance of her skillfully-crafted lyrics.” The Dallas Observer called her “the best kind of singer-songwriter.”  Peters has released 11 albums and has played over 1000 shows in 11 countries as an independent artist.  She has been crowdfunding her albums for over a decade, long before Kickstarter ever existed.  She was nominated as Best Folk Artist by the Dallas Observer.  The Ft. Worth Star-Telegram praised her most recent release, The Burden of Unshakeable Proof, for its “10 gorgeously-sculpted tracks, a blissful shuffling of folk, pop, and jazz bound together by Peters’s peerless voice.”  Peters spent 2016 and 2017 touring the US and Europe with her band, while The Burden of Unshakeable Proof received airplay on over 100 different AAA, college, and public radio stations across the country. The album was found on a number of “best of” lists at year’s end, including No Depression’s “Alt-Country and Beyond” list.

In early 2018, Peters performed solo at 30A Songwriters Festival, and she has opened for artists like John Oates, 10,000 Maniacs, Horse Feathers, and Griffin House.  Peters plans to tour – both solo and with her band – in support of Foxhole Prayers, both in the United States and abroad.  Tour dates will be announced soon.

https://vanessapeters.com/