Cedar Rapids, Iowa
Published in The Blog. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos, Video.
Video and photos of the Relay for Life event—featuring the Saturns and Ron Dee & the Music City Soul Dancers—taken June 26, 2014 at the American Cancer Society’s Hope Lodge in Nashville, TN.
Published in The Blog. Tags: Media.
“TV Buddha” is a forty year old piece by artist Nam June Paik. Its visual — that of Buddha staring at himself on a television, as captured through a closed-circuit video camera — is striking, through my interpretation stands beyond its original meaning, slightly, given the four decades of technological indulgence that have passed since […]
Published in Strays.
A restless mind of late has called for sleeping aids, but despite the deep slumber a knock at the door woke me at three. It couldn’t have been my door, I thought. What if it had been? Who could have been knocking at my door? Is it really three? Maybe it was the old lady […]
Published in Strays.
I’m sitting at a desk with my headset on and the caller is asking me if this is what we do. I’m sorry, what we do? Yeah, he says, work like this. He asks why I shipped him something in a bucket, suggesting that the lack of packaging damaged the product, and I tell him […]
Published in The Blog. Tags: Nashville, Photos.
Photos taken June 15, 2014 at Shelby Park in East Nashville, TN.
Published in The Blog.
I don’t remember when, exactly, but a few weeks ago I woke up in a funk, rolled over, grabbed my computer, opened it, and began typing. “I feel like I’ve reached the end of the tape. This is where I’m supposed to hit eject, turn it over, close the lid, and hit play again — […]
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos.
Photos of Chris West and the Junkyard Horns taken June 12, 2014 at The Building in East Nashville, TN.
Published in The Blog.
The mind is focused. The weight goes down. The mind turns sour. The weight goes up. Forever it’s felt as though the cycle harms only myself, but now there’s another, who my blips of self-collapse become issue for. This is something new, something real. The choice, then, is to continue allowing for slips in judgement, […]
Published in Strays.
“I had a book with me I stole from a Hollywood stall, ‘Le Grand Meaulnes’ by Alain Fournier, but I preferred reading the American landscape as we went along.” —Jack Kerouac, On the Road So much of it has passed through me, barely contemplated and quickly forgotten: The Landscape. How many trips have there been […]
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos.
Photos of Jeff Blaney taken June 6, 2014 at fooBAR in East Nashville, TN.
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
“I don’t strive to be a famous rapper,” says E.T., the MC drawing out his mission statement via email. “I strive to bring good hip hop music, a positive vibe, a positive atmosphere, [and work with] positive people with positive messages who just want to be themselves and join in the celebration of hip hop […]
Published in Strays.
As soon as the words came out of my mouth I regretted saying them. A few times a week there’s a police cruiser or private security making a visit to my strip of apartments. But did I really feel like I was beginning to paintbrush all my neighbors as trash, because some refuse to clean […]
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
At the time of his move, Jeff Blaney was playing in a pair of cover bands and an acoustic duo, while also holding down gigs as an open mic host, music teacher, and producer. “Moving to Tennessee made me realize that doing that much at once doesn’t really allow me to see any of [my […]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville, Photos, Video.
“It was a big blessing in disguise.” Early in 2012, six songs that had been recorded for Penicillin Baby’s debut LP were mistakenly deleted. Someone got ahead of themselves at the studio and in an attempt to clear up some hard drive space, wiped the session without double-checking to make sure it’d been backed up. […]
Published in The Blog. Tags: Lists, Media, Music.
Just because you know some online basics, your high school friend is your “manager,” or your Rap Genius page is pending verification, does not make you a Professional Musician. What follows is a jumping-off point for those looking to make the leap, five New(-ish) Rules written for amateur artists looking to go pro. #1) Educate […]
Published in Strays.
I was in New York, or maybe it was New Jersey because I could see the city off in the far distance. This was a new National September 11 Memorial & Museum. In my mind the phrase “hypothetical” was repeated over and over. It was a hypothetical memorial museum. Instead of being a location, a […]
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Nashville, Photos.
Photos taken May 26, 2014 at Two Rivers Park in Nashville, TN.
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos.
Photos of Kai Welch and Charles Butler & Associates taken May 22, 2014 at The Building in East Nashville, TN.
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Music, Nashville.
In “Just Let Go,” the most raw and emotionally satisfying track from Sturgill Simpson’s Metamodern Sounds In Country Music, the singer looks within before turning his gaze outward and graduating to a feeling of wholeness. “Woke up today and decided to kill my ego / It ain’t ever done me no good no how / […]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
“The old me and the new me are in a fist fight!” As howled in PUJOL’s “Manufactured Crisis Control,” the lyrics help paint an obvious scene of conflict, revealing an individual struggling for an objective view while commentating on an overbearing I against I scenario. While the new album, KLUDGE, “idiosyncratically captures life as it […]
Published in The Blog. Tags: Photos.
Photos taken in May of 2014 at Liberty Meadows in Bucyrus, Kansas.
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
Does Sturgill Simpson ever consider giving up? “Every fucking day,” he said over the phone, speaking to the internal doubt that haunts his professional direction, emphasizing how the well being of his soon-to-be expanding family rests on his success as a musician. It’s a conflict that breathes through Metamodern Sounds in Country Music, and one […]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos.
Photos of Sturgill Simpson taken May 13, 2014 at Grimey’s New and Pre-Loved Music in Nashville, TN. [These photos were first published on villin]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Music, Nashville.
William Tyler‘s Lost Colony isn’t quite a rebirth, but for being only three tracks deep there’s a surprisingly bold message that breathes through the release. “Tailor made for epic, exploratory road trips,” the EP is led by a pair of the guitarist’s catalog songs — now revisited with the support of a band — and […]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos.
Photos of Penicillin Baby taken May 10, 2014 at The Basement in Nashville, TN. [These photos were first published on villin]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
“I’ve been back and forth between Cleveland and Nashville a lot in the past five years,” writes Christopher Wild, emailing en route to Nashville from L.A., returning from a trip to the Mojave Desert. “Both cities feel a bit like home,” he continues, “but also a bit less than a place that I feel like […]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Live, Music, Nashville, Photos, Video.
Photos and video of Sturgill Simpson taken May 8, 2014 at The Station Inn in Nashville, TN. [These photos and video were first published on villin]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
The roots of D’ark wind through Nashville, back to Portland, and all the way to Maui, where six years ago the band Copperfox was conceived between partners Lisa Garcia and Rory Mohon. Their 2011 debut, From The Den, ended up running four tracks deep, revolving around a sound that Garcia calls “moody alt-country.” While those […]
Published in Nashville Fringe Festival, The Blog. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
“You aren’t a human,” begins one of the top comments on Charles Butler‘s YouTube cover of Daft Punk‘s “Get Lucky.” “You are a Banjo god!” It’s one of nearly a thousand comments on the video, which has seen over 1.7 million views since it was uploaded a year ago. On the surface the rendition seems […]
Published in The Blog, villin. Tags: Interviews, Music, Nashville.
“Her parents gave her the best of things, but they never gave her the best of them.” Taken from his 2013 TEDx presentation, this potent line speaks to Rashad Rayford’s flare for provocative commentary, a quality which has earned him his place as one of the key voices among Nashville’s spoken word community (in addition […]