Town Mountain Performs at Bandstand Bluegrass in Washington Park on Thu 8/13
~ Bluegrass With Swagger
Free
7pm: Hu Town Holler / 8pm: Town Mountain
Washington Park 1230 Elm St., Cincinnati, OH 45202
http://washingtonpark.org
ASHEVILLE, NC — Town Mountain’s hard drivin’ bluegrass sound, tight harmonies, and stellar in-house songwriting have become the band’s trademark. They light up the stage with their honky tonk edge and barroom swagger, featuring a Jimmy Martin-style bounce and confidence that is countered at times by a laid-back John Hartford-esque groove. Town Mountain includes Robert Greer on vocals and guitar, Jesse Langlais on banjo and vocals, Bobby Britt on fiddle, Phil Barker on mandolin and vocals, and Adam Chaffins on bass.
Town Mountain is heading into the studio for an impromptu recording session during the summer of 2015. For this impromptu summer project, Town Mountain will be cutting two songs to pay tribute to The Grateful Dead at Echo Mountain Studios in Asheville. The Dead has had a huge influence on Town Mountain as a whole and each of its members. Banjoist Jesse Langlais says, “We want to honor their 50 year mark tour with Town Mountain renditions of two of our favorite Grateful Dead songs.” Look for these two new tunes this festival season.
Town Mountain just wrapped up the final touches of their 5th studio album. Produced and engineered by GRAMMY winner Dirk Powell, the album was recorded in Powell’s studio The Cypress House in south Louisiana. For a sneak peek at what to expect on the future album, watch the band perform a new original song, “Wildbird,” in this wonderful session filmed by Hype Music Festivals at the 2015 Suwannee Springfest in Live Oak, FL → http://bit.ly/Wildbird_byTownMountain_HYPE.
They released their first official live album Town Mountain: Live At The Isis in the summer of 2014. The concert was recorded in their hometown of Asheville, NC at Isis Music Hall and features live versions of previously released studio material including crowd favorites “Lawdog,” “Tarheel Boys” and the fiddle tune “Four Miles.” The audio was mixed by Scott Vestal, acclaimed banjoist with the Sam Bush Band, who also mixed their fourth studio album Leave The Bottle [Pinecastle Records 2012]. Leave the Bottle and 2011’s Steady Operator were both produced by Mike Bub, five-time IBMA Bass Player of the Year.
The group has focused on the goal of creating a unique sound and brand while still giving a nod and a wink to the traditional side of the bluegrass genre. Juli Thanki of Engine 145 says, “Phil Barker’s ‘Lawdog’ sounds like an unearthed classic, and the group’s tight harmonies alone make this record [Leave the Bottle] a treat for any bluegrass fan.” Town Mountain was nominated for the International Bluegrass Music Association’s 2014 Award for “Emerging Artist of The Year” following 2013’s honor of receiving IBMA Momentum Awards for “Band of the Year” and lead singer Robert Greer for “Vocalist of the Year.”
“I feel like we’re closer to original bluegrass than a lot of bands out there today,” says Langlais. “I listened to a radio show recently that featured Ricky Skaggs and he flat-out said that Bill Monroe influenced rock and roll. He said that folks like Elvis and Carl Perkins and those guys were looking up to Bill Monroe. So, I feel like our band has a lot of that influence as well, of the blues and early rock. If you go back and listen to Monroe pre-Chuck Berry, those are Chuck Berry licks. A lot of music in the 1940s and 50s was so over-lapping. It is easy to put genre labels on it today, 60 years later. But to be honest, it was all so new and it was influencing each other at the same time.”
The festival season has been off to a great start with hefty tours throughout America including a show at Folk Alliance in Kansas City. Recently they were honored with their first appearance at CMA Fest (The Country Music Association) in Nashville. And a true highlight for the band was playing the closing Saturday night set at The Festival Of Bluegrass in Kentucky, A festival they have played for five years and traditionally one of the band’s musical heroes, The Seldom Scene, played that slot for the past 29 years or so. Langlais calls the experience, “Truly humbling!”
Town Mountain continues their Summer Tour 2015, traveling from coast to coast. The award-winning Asheville-based group is excited to debut at Yonder Mountain’s Northwest String Summit in Oregon where Bobby Britt will also be teaching a fiddle workshop with Darol Anger and Alex Hargraves. Other tour highlights include a performance at Steep Canyon Ranger’s Mountain Song Festival in Brevard, NC and the honor debuting their music at this year’s Americana Music Association Festival and Conference in Nashville.
Town Mountain is in it for the long haul… check out out where they’ll be travelin’ to next and keep and eye on TownMountain.net for further dates as well as a brand new selection of merchandise. For updates from the road, please visit facebook.com/TownMountain, twitter.com/TownMountain, and instagram.com/townmountainbluegrass.
