Blues & roots Music news
ALL THE LATEST FROM THE BLUES AND ROOTS SCENE WITH ALAN NICHOL
GETTING the autumn season off to a transatlantic flier are half a dozen American acts representing a variety of styles across the roots music spectrum.
First-up – next Tuesday night – is the North Carolina-born, multi-faceted musician/producer, Jonathan Wilson. Based in the Los Angeles musical enclave that is Laurel Canyon, Wilson has half a dozen solo albums (of which the newly issued Rare Birds is the latest) but before that he released three albums with his band, Muscadine.
Aside from his own work Wilson has produced albums for Father John Misty (three of them, including the Grammywinning Pure Comedy), Conor Oberst, Roy Harper, Dawes and worked on others as a musician (on guitars, piano, percussion) for all of the above plus Roger Waters, Erykah Badu, Gary Louris (Jayhawks), Shooter Jennings, Bonnie Prince Billy and Elvis Costello among a lengthy cast. He has performed on stage with even more.
Wilson arrives at Sage Gateshead’s Hall 2 as part of a sold-out European tour – including four other UK dates – no doubt eager to let audiences hear his Rare Birds (Bella Union) album in the live setting.
Across in Hall 1 on the same night, Clare Bowen, the Australian-born actress/singer, who stars in the Nashville TV series as Scarlett O’Connor, headlines a bill which includes Striking Matches and Clare’s musician brother, Tim. Bowen has acting credits in both TV and film plus numerous stage productions, too. In her musical career she has also had both single and album chart success (the latter via albums from the TV series) in the US. She is in the UK primarily for the London’s annual Country to Country festival. Sarah Zimmermann and Justin Davis aka Striking Matches met at Nashville’s Belmont university eleven years ago at a guitar seminar. The pair, both writers/ singers/guitarists, decided there and then to combine their talents with a sound that draws from country, blues and rock and is augmented by a healthy portion of showmanship. The male/female vocals and dual lead-guitar combination obviously worked because they were quickly spotted by the production team for the Nashville TV series and they have now had a total of nine songs showcased on the popular show. Their debut album, Nothing but the Silence (2015), was produced by T Bone Burnett and subsequently charted in the US and later that year the duo won the British Country Music Association’s Best International Act award. Also on Tuesday night, Cluny 2 has a visit from David Ramirez from Austin, Texas. Ramirez has been touring hard following the
release of his We’re Not Going Anywhere album last year. He comes to the Ouseburn venue after a string of festival/club dates across continental Europe and is making his third visit to the city in little over a year.
On Wednesday, Sage Gateshead welcomes the Nashville-based Wood Brothers who have a brilliantly varied new album, One Drop of Truth, just out. The record is their sixth and features the brothers Oliver (acoustic/ electric guitars) and Chris Wood (upright bass) – originally from Colorado – plus multi-instrumentalist, Jano Rix.
The trio have really ramped-up their profile with the last three albums – The Muse (produced by Buddy Miller), Paradise and One Drop of Truth – improving on sales with each successive release. They relocated from New York to Nashville and swapped label from Blue Note to their own Honey Jar Records. The new record covers a lot of stylistic ground within the Americana field and achieves the distinction of sounding like nothing else currently out there.
On Thursday night, the Riverside plays host to the Devon Allman Project and brings together two sons of the original Allman Brothers Band in the shape of Devon Allman (son of singer/ keyboard player and co-founder, Greg Allman) plus Duane Betts who is the son of original lead-guitarist, Dickie Betts. Duane was named after the late (and truly great) guitarist, Duane Allman, who formed the band’s outstanding twin-lead motive-force with Dickie Betts. The two current bearers of the Allman/ Betts names have played in a variety of bands up to this tour. Betts worked in outfits like Backbone69 and Whitestarr (plus his current Pistoleers) and with his father’s band. Allman, too, has fronted Honeytribe, Vargas Blues Band and Royal Southern Brotherhood. Also on Thursday night , just a short distance from the Riverside, the Cluny welcomes the Rhode Island band, The Low Anthem. The experimental, folkinclined Americana four-piece ( a loose description) is powered by the invention of the two original members (and multi-instrumentalists), Ben Knox Miller and Jeff Prystowsky who have remained at the helm for all of the band’s six albums since their selftitled debut in 2006.
There have been a number of personnel changes over the twelve years since then but the band has remained stable for the last five years. The new album, The Salt Doll Went To Measure the Depth of the Sea, based on an old folk-tale, followed a spell of touring with Lucinda Williams. The recording of the album followed the band’s involvement in a serious road accident in the summer of 2016 which resulted in a suspension of their touring schedule as the members, Prystowsky in particular, recovered. Virtually all of the band’s gear was wrecked in the crash.
The Low Anthem built their own studio, Eyeland (also the name of their 2016 album), within the Columbus Theatre in Providence, Rhode Island. The theatre had been closed for a number of years and the band’s efforts ensured that it was fully restored, rather like The Low Anthem.