Stress Dreams, the eighth studio album from progressive bluegrass band Greensky Bluegrass, isn’t a quarantine album per se. With lengthy songs and loose arrangements suited for in-person jams, this isn’t the sort of myopic, claustrophobic work we’ve come to associate […]
Greensky Bluegrass treads on such a weird musical terrain. The quintet’s roster reads pretty close to that of a traditional bluegrass outfit, featuring dobro player, mandolinist, banjo player, guitarist, and an upright bassist. While their 2004 debut, Less than Supper, […]
They carried peace flags with doves skimming pale blue skies and huge American flags. There was a sea of tie-dye reaching across a sunny horizon and the smoky dust of lit reefers spreading an aroma I’d not smelled so prevalently […]
Part Four (of four parts) Lockn’ Festival: LOCKN’ Festival celebrates its fifth year in 2017. Located in Central Virginia, in the Blue Ridge Mountains, the festival site is halfway between Charlottesville and Lynchburg. According to their website, “We’re a group of dedicated […]
PART TWO (of four parts) The Lockn’ 2017 Talent Magazine, Inclusive, A survey of American hot music, Lockn’-Style: Delivering the Goods to the Soul: The bands and performers of Lockn’, my snapshots, interiors of the soul, mapping by angels, a […]
PART ONE (of four parts) Lockn’ Festival: LOCKN’ Festival celebrates its fifth year in 2017. Located in Central Virginia, in the Blue Ridge Mountains, the festival site is halfway between Charlottesville and Lynchburg. According to their website, “We’re a group of dedicated […]
The final day of Bonnaroo 2017 is over, Centeroo is closed, and the Farm has returned to being a farm with a lowercase “f” for another year. Sunday at Bonnaroo is always a feast for fans of roots music, not […]
Out of Kalamazoo, MI, have come winds of musical change and sonic transformation. Guys like Paul Hoffman take a mandolin and channel it like an instrument of telepathic immersion. Swimming in a third world where the spiritual erupts and slides […]
On a rainy Friday night in Raleigh, Greensky Bluegrass brought some heat to a nondescript, industrial looking space known as The Ritz. While their recordings are primarily acoustic affairs focusing on well-crafted songs, at their gigs, guitarist Dave Bruzza, mandolinist […]
As we head into IBMA week in Raleigh, I’m thinking about where we’ve come from and where we’re headed. My guide for the past few days has been a wonderful book recommended in a column a few weeks ago by […]
