|
August 2 - 3
|
American Songwriter describes Eilen Jewell as, “one of America’s most intriguing, creative and idiosyncratic voices.” The Boise, Idaho songwriter is one of a kind.
That singular voice springs forth from a woman of more than one mind, and she taps into many of them on Gypsy (August, 2019 Signature Sounds Recordings). By turns personal and political, pissed off and blissed out, Jewell’s first album of original material since 2015 expands brief moments of joy into lifetimes, and distills epic sentiments and persistent doubts into succinct songs.
Jewell seamlessly blends heavy electric guitars and dirty fiddles on the rollicking country rocker “Crawl” with the sweet and understated horn section of the tender “Witness. “79 Cents (The Meow Song)” skewers sexism and discrimination with pointed humor over a circus bed of musical saw and horns.
Longtime fans who love Eilen Jewell in classic country mode will delight in the pedal steel driven “These Blues” and the sole cover on Gypsy, “You Cared Enough To Lie,” written by fellow Idahoan and country legend Pinto Bennett.
Rather than pulling artist and listener this way and that, the tensions within and between these twelve tracks propel Eilen Jewell’s eighth studio album forward as a remarkably cohesive full-length.
Eilen plays the 16th Annual Sugar Maple Music Festival on Saturday, August 3, 2019.
Just one more week to get your early-bird two day passes to the 16th Annual Sugar Maple Music Festival! On sale here through May 31.
Wood & Wire’s hand-hewn approach to creating and making music reflects vital writing and instrumental contributions from all four band members: guitarist Tony Kamel fashions fierce solo licks to accompany his lead vocals; mandolinist Billy Bright provides a propulsive backbeat and exuberant treble lines; banjo virtuoso Trevor Smith peppers each song with intricate, swirling countermelodies; and bassist Dom Fisher undergirds it all with a joyful playing style that steadies the beat while adding buoyant embellishments in all the right places. Together, through words and music, they find a distinctive sense of place that distinguishes them from other bluegrass and roots bands active today.Catch Wood & Wire at the Sugar Maple Fest Friday, August 2.
In the music of Milwaukee’s breakout roots-country group Buffalo Gospel one hears the timeless qualities of the best traditional American country music. It’s stripped-down, authentic and incisive. It tells stories of the human condition: of love and loss and broken dreams and the power of dogged persistence to overcome misfortune and heartache, in spare, direct discourse that cuts straight through to the core of our shared experience. Band founder, guitarist and singer Ryan Necci absorbed the records of his youth – the honest ballads, the trucker country anthems, the heartfelt weepers – and then found himself living the stories told by these songs. With a pair of critically acclaimed albums (including 2018’s “On The First Bell”) and a lineup brimming with top musical talent, this is a band at the peak of its powers. The 2019 Sugar Maple Festival is pleased to present Buffalo Gospel, back home in Wisconsin after a tour of the Southeast US and ready to make believers out of everyone who hears them.
~written by Brad Wolbert
~
Milwaukee-based Nickel&Rose occupy the intersection of several traditional musical flavors: folk, juke-joint blues, and American roots music, with a perceptible seasoning derived from West African and classic country sources. Theirs is a unique take on the Americana sound that fits squarely in the timeless traditional mode, and yet pushes boundaries with intoxicating rhythms and transgressive lyrics. If you were to encounter Nickel&Rose in a Milwaukee or Chicago club, you would stay, order another beer, and then, intrigued and entranced, you’d stay a bit longer and order another, until the band was out of songs and the club was ready to close. Bassist Johanna Rose lays down an unerring, melodic beat, while guitarist Carl Nichols dazzles with solo forays that toggle from lightning-fast picking displays to soulful solo explorations that somehow mash up Leadbelly, Django and Johnny Cash, behind beguiling lead vocals and languid, yet spot-on harmonies, always in service of hypnotic original songs. Their song “Americana” has inspired rapturous feature-length articles in the music press. This is a band on the rise – catch them at the Sugar Maple Festival while you can!
~Written by Brad Wolbert
She is often categorized as contemporary folk, but in truth there seems to be no American musical style that Eilen Jewell can’t make her own. With her wonderfully enticing and soulful voice, she infuses everything from country weepers to rockabilly ravers, blues torchers to seductive lounge-noir gems with feeling and taste. A native of Boise, Idaho, Eilen comes to the 2019 Sugar Maple Festival by way of Santa Fe, Los Angeles and Boston, tours in North America, Europe, the UK and Australia, appearances at SXSW and on NPR, and a series of well-received albums dating back to 2005, including a new album of originals forthcoming in late summer of 2019.
Eilen and her band, which includes husband Jason Beek on drums, combine strong original material with familiar and obscure classics plucked from a surprising range of blues and country subgenres. By turns wistful, jaunty, scorching or heartbreaking, Eilen finds the beating heart of every song and delivers it with unflappable elegance and with a voice described by NPR as “sweet and clear…with a killer instinct lurking beneath the shiny surface.”
~written by Brad Wolbert