The Hackensaw Boys have the Blue Ridge Mountains in their DNA. An acoustic aggregation — upright bass, fiddles, banjos, guitars, harmonica, charismo, dobro, mandolin — the Hackensaws make primitive American music, born of specific place. Their songs are steeped in […]
You know Nashville as Music City USA? Not us. We think of our Tennessee home as Hot Chicken Epicenter of the Known Universe. Most any chain or mom and pop joint will give you the option of take-out chicken in […]
In 1995, singer-songwriter John Bunzow seemed on the verge of a career breakthrough. After years touring the rough-and-tumble bars of the northeastern United States, he’d moved to Nashville, inked a major-label deal, and was about to release his debut recording, […]
Take I-23 north from Kingsport, Tennessee, or south from Wise, Virginia, and you’ll find more or less the same mix of old and new Appalachia: roadside flea markets within sight of Wal-Mart Supercenters, generations-old strip mining operations alongside latter-day pulp […]
The title of Johnny Gimble’s newest CD, Just For Fun, goes a long way toward explaining the man and his music. It would be naive to say that the money hasn’t been important to him; Gimble, after all, has been […]
Maybe all Kim Richey wants to do is have some fun. She’s contended that her 1995 self-titled debut, produced by Steve Earle collaborator Richard Bennett, was considered a country album only because she was signed to a country label — […]
