The 9513 - Country Music Blog

When the venerable Vercher boys let me know recently that things were drawing to a hard stop for this site, I can’t say that I was entirely shocked, because a) they’d made it clear, even publicly, that tending to this work was beginning to demand drastic amounts of time they’d not quite expected, a real issue for daily bloggers and site editors alike and because b) for music reporting and commentary of virtually all varieties, it’s pretty tough all over these days. This ending things just keeps on happening. So I’m unshocked—but as one of the oldest country lyrics of them all would put it, going down this road’s got me feeling bad.

I do believe that The 9513 has been providing a service that’s genuinely unique, a place where country music of any stripe—yet with contemporary mainstream country very much included, respected, and featured among those ranks—could be reported on, taken seriously enough to be subject to criticism, and provided along with an open invitation for intelligent discussion.

The invitation has often been excitingly well taken, and sometimes, it could seem, only half-taken, since a site as fundamentally open as this one has been leaves itself open to serial posting by a few who make caustic, belligerent, or allegedly clever pokes at anybody else bothering to write or comment thoughtfully their personal sport, and say so. (Not that you couldn’t tell who they are, anyhow, because sooner or later they always get around to suggesting that it’s the site-hired writers who have “ego” issues, and not perhaps obsessive self-appointed snark mongers themselves.)

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Steel Magnolia took a decidedly modern media approach to breaking into the country music business. A victory on the second season of CMT’s Can You Duet–a reality show that also helped launch the career of Joey + Rory–helped land them a record deal and launch their first single onto country radio.

But it is the relationship between the two band members, Meghan Linsey and Joshua Scott Jones that really lies at the foundation of the group. A native of Ponchatoula, Louisiana, Linsey formed the duo with Jones, her boyfriend, whom she met while serving as a karaoke host in a Nashville bar. (This meeting would become a loose basis for their first music video.)

With Big Machine Records President Scott Borchetta as one of the judges of the CMT show, their signing to his label was a natural step. In August of 2009, they released their debut single, “Keep on Lovin’ You,” which eventually made it all the way to #4 on the Hot Country Chart. A second single, “Just by Being You (Halo and Wings),” followed almost a year later in July of 2010, and “Last Night Again” is currently running up the charts. Their first album was released in January and they’ve already been nominated for an ACM award in the Best New Duo Or Group category.

Linsey sat down with The 9513 to talk about the new album and the dynamics of working day-to-day with the love of her life.

For those country music fans that are out there that haven’t heard your new album, what can they expect?

I think there’s a little bit of everything on the record. Josh and I come from different backgrounds musically and collectively, there’s a lot going on. The one common thing that we share, though, is that we’re both grounded in country music. I grew up in New Orleans and so my music is very soul-influenced. I listened to a lot of soul music growing up. Josh got into rock and we both dabbled in pop so I think there are those little influences all over the record. If you listen to the first song on the record–it’s called “Ooh La La”–and it’s kind of a new pop-country type of sound. And if you listen to the last song called “Glass Houses,” it’s a very acoustic broke-down throwback of a song. And that really speaks to the whole record. All the songs are very different and what makes it all work is the vocal blend that we have. It kind of ties it all together.

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For Sunny Sweeney, being a country music artist comes with some baggage… the good kind.

Sweeney clearly believes that she holds a responsibility to the sound and music that inspired her as a child. Names such as Haggard, Lynn, and Parton are names she owes her own brief legacy to and wherever that career may go, names that will chart her course. At her father’s side next to his turntable was the place she fell in love with classic country. At the Grand Ole Opry beside some of the greatest stars country has ever known is where she falls in love again with each guest performance.

While her debut radio release, “From a Table Away” has spent well over half a year on the charts, country music traditionalists recognize her name from her years on the Texas circuit in addition to her critically acclaimed debut, Heartbreakers Hall of Fame.

It is impossible to read the interview below and do Sweeney’s enthusiasm any justice. With eyes wide open and an unbridled passion for what she’s doing, she is clearly having the time of her life. She sat down just after her new EP was released with The 9513 and talked about that, her upcoming full album and a side project with Jessi Colter.

You call yourself a country music history buff. How much of that comes out in your music?

I think quite a bit. There are some songs that are way more traditional than others. There are a couple that are really really country. I’m super proud of that because that’s just what I grew up on. And that’s actually one of my biggest pet peeves–when people say I’m a huge country music fan and then you listen to their music and it’s synthesizers and stuff like that. I would like say there’s tons of history in my stuff. On my new record, we have some great old guitar work and lots of space musically. You just don’t hear much of that anymore. My producers allowed me to have tons of input on this record and it made me feel so good because I know with every ounce of my being that I can go to bed with my musical integrity every night. I’m really proud of that. Not many people can say that–I’m really proud of this record. I really am.

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With his fourth album, Mission Bell, folk-pop singer-songwriter Amos Lee has been propelled into the national consciousness. The album, defined by his raspy, soulful voice, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 earlier this month. It was an impressive feat for an artist who until this year hadn’t shed the journeyman tag despite his high-profile connections. Signed by Blue Note Records (musical home of Norah Jones) in 2004, he’s toured with an impressive cast of artists including Jones, Bob Dylan and Merle Haggard. Mission Bell, which features cameos from heroes Willie Nelson and Lucinda Williams, further advances his reputation as one of the brightest talents in folk and Americana. More impressively, the album is comprised of 12 songs all solely written by Lee. In this interview with The 9513, the Philadelphia native and former schoolteacher speaks about his life as a musical troubadour and his love for a couple of Als.

What’s the biggest change in your life now that you’ve had a No. 1 album?

It was exciting for sure. It was so unexpected. I’ve never…if we’re talking about Billboard placement, I don’t think we’ve ever had a record in the Top 20. (Editor’s note: Lee’s last album, 2008′s Last Days at the Lodge, peaked at No. 29). We just wanted to do the best we could during the first week and just get the songs out there. Everybody worked really hard. I’ve been running since, well, we really started a year ago. I was super happy to, you know, get these songs out to the most people without defying the sanctity of these songs.

Because the core of your craft has been there for years, but now it’s getting national exposure.

Right. That was always the sort of thing with me. When I first started with Blue Note, I was drawn to them and the philosophy that they had. It wasn’t about hit songs. It was important for me to grow as an artist and songwriter and stay grounded in some sense.

When listening back to the album, how do you feel about the finished product?

I’ve always found there’s an incessant relationship (during the sessions). At first you’re still feeling the songs, but then it becomes an intellectual trip when you’re running through everything and keeping a steady eye on it. I need to take some time and get away from the record. My favorite way to hear a record that I made is to wander into somebody’s house party or a bar or a music venue where a song of mine is being played. At that point I’m just sort of in the room with the tune. When my friends are sitting there listening to me or my parents are listening, that’s different. When you walk into the room, there’s a casual relationship and not that added pressure. When I play it for a friend, I’m like ‘(expletive), man! This is going to be uncomfortable. (laughs) And you won’t see me listening to it when I’m pulling up to a red light or something like that. But it’s been really cool in the past to walk in the room and be a casual observer and remember all the things that went into the music. It’s always ultimately been fond memories and good times because it’s all about just making music.

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Editor’s Note: The following transcript contains explicit language.

“There’s a fuckload of squirrels out there!” exclaims a surprised Todd Snider out of nowhere. He’s speaking to The 9513 from his home in East Nashville, which is apparently under siege “They’re having a meeting. Holy shit, here they come! Get help!”

This is the sort of stoner non sequitur one might expect from Snider, who has detailed his drug use, both recreational and destructive, in casually witty country-folk songs for nearly two decades now. But this is no pot-motivated outburst, just Snider joking around. Whether defending himself from squirrels or singing story-songs about tripping pitchers, conniving politicians, or bumbling criminals (himself included), Snider is a keen observer of the unlikely, displaying a big-hearted curiosity about the world.

He’s been called one of his generation’s greatest songwriters, which is no exaggeration, but he’s also one of his generation’s greatest stage presences. He has a sense of humor and better timing than most stand-up comedians (not to mention better material), and is known to ramble at length about all manner of subjects, from Bill Elliott impostors to the dangers of playing in a Memphis country band. His latest is a double live album appropriately titled The Storyteller, and he devotes as much time to his between-song ramblings as to the music itself.

Snider held off the squirrel marauders long enough to talk to us about getting tackled on stage, receiving death threats, working with Elizabeth Cook, and losing his mentor.

Why did you decide to make a live album—especially a double live album—right now?

I always assumed that when a live album came out, it meant that a band wanted more time to work on their new shit. That’s what I did. I’m not ready to make a record record. I will be in probably a month from now. But I only had about eight or nine songs and I want to make up about 15 at least, then throw away five of those. What else could we do? Well, we could put out a live record. My friends made it for me—my tour manager Elvis [Hixx] and this kid named Brian [Kincaid] who comes and records all our shows. And my buddy Eric [McDonnell] who lives around the corner and those guys all got together and went through about two years worth of shows and picked what they thought was pretty representative of a night, although some nights I won’t talk that much. I think there ended up being a little more talking on the record than there is at the show.

Where do you think this storytelling impulse began?

My first teacher of making up songs was a guy named Kent Finlay from San Marcos, which is right by Austin. My first few songs I wrote I took to an open-mic at his club. He let me stay with him and he taught me how to make up those story songs. Shel Silverstein was probably the person I studied most to work on that stuff. It was at the same time that I noticed that there was “Mister Bojangles” and there was some Billy Joe Shaver stuff, where the story was true. I try to find the balance in there. Most of my stories are true, but not all of them. There’s one on there called “Is this Thing Working,” which is just a story that I made up to try to make some kind of point. But most of them I won’t make up. I haven’t been doing that too much lately because I’ve done it to death in my life, to the point where people don’t hardly do shit around me anymore.

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On her first radio tour in two years, momentum has been interrupted by the monster winter storm that hit most of the lower 48 states. Country artist Star De Azlan got turned around in Philly, barely catching a flight, and came back home to Texas to wait it out–only to be affected once again by Mother Nature.

“It’s actually snowing here in San Marcos… isn’t that crazy?” Located between San Antonio and Austin, her town just isn’t used to this northern-like weather, and as cabin fever sets in, the young Curb recording artist is fired up to return to finish her current leg of the tour.

“Really good to be out on the road! Some of the stations I’m visiting I’ve already visited promoting ‘She’s Pretty,’ so it’s good to see familiar faces, as well as seeing fresh faces. I’m getting great feedback on the song.” The song she’s referring to is her latest single: “A Man Who Can Dance.” This is De Azlan’s follow up release to 2009’s “Like a Rose” and her 2008 debut single, “She’s Pretty,” which peaked at #51 on the Billboard Country chart.

“Doug Johnson produced it, recorded it in Nashville. We took some time trying to find the right song–what we thought was going to work for radio and what was going to best represent me, while staying true to myself. Doug Johnson and Mike Curb found it and brought it to my attention, and said, ‘Listen to this–we think it’s going to be a good fit.’ So I did… and I liked it.”

The lyric tells the story of Carmelita, who uses dancing as her litmus test for a good life-partner. The song’s uptempo country production with a Tex-Mex flair of classical guitar and hints of Latin percussion is catchy and a little seductive. “We switched it up a bit from the original [demo] and kind of made it our own. We went into the studio and spent many hours on it. Doug Johnson is really, really good. He’s an amazing producer… and songwriter.”

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Singer/songwriter Lori McKenna likes to think of herself as a housewife first. Married to her husband for 22 years (she has known him since third grade), mother of five children, and life-long citizen of small town Stoughton, Massachusetts, she takes pride in her home and family more than anything else. At age 27, she began performing locally at open mics and released three albums of self-penned material before her breakthrough in 2004, when friend and fellow artist Mary Gauthier passed her songs to Melanie Howard in Nashville. This led to signing with Harlan Howard’s publishing company and eventually to Faith Hill hearing them in 2005. Hill had just completed recording her album, but added three of McKenna’s songs to the roster: “Stealing Kisses,” “If You Ask,” and what would become her CD’s title cut, “Fireflies.”

Hill said of McKenna, “I don’t remember ever being impacted by a songwriter the way I was with her. Her writing is masterful, with a pureness that is completely unaffected. The songs are such a great combination of depth and realness…there’s just this indescribable collision of innocence and honesty in her writing.”

In 2007, Tim McGraw and Byron Gallimore produced McKenna’s Unglamorous, and she toured with McGraw and Hill on their Soul2Soul Tour. Other outside cuts from her catalog include Sara Evans’ “Bible Song,” Tim McGraw’s “I’m Workin’,” Jimmy Wayne’s “True Believer,” and most recently on Keith Urban’s deluxe edition CD Get Closer, a song McKenna has now herself recorded, the emotional “Luxury of Knowing.” The new Country Strong soundtrack features the McKenna co-write “Chances Are.”

In early 2011, she will be releasing her sixth album, titled Lorraine. The artist is named for her mother Lorraine, who died when McKenna was just seven years old. She admits that this is her most personal album she has ever made.

Two days before I spoke with her, McKenna was in Washington, D.C. to perform for the CMA Songwriter Series at the Library of Congress, along with Bob DiPiero, Little Big Town and Brett James. Following the show, her beloved Collings OM-1 acoustic guitar was tragically left behind in a taxi cab, which is where our interview begins.

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In the press release for his new album, James Otto is quoted as saying that he’s the symbolic “love child of Ronnie Milsap and Barry White.” Barry White’s deep soulful baritone became synonymous with groovy love-making songs in R&B and if there was ever an album that tried hard to be the soundtrack to getting your groove on with the special love of your life, Otto’s Shake What God Gave Ya could be it.

The country-soul genre has a long and rich legacy. Artists such as Conway Twitty, the before-mentioned Ronnie Milsap, and Delbert McClinton all have pioneered that crossover country-soul sound and made successful careers out of it. Otto has a clear concept of that rich country history and hopes to etch his name along those that came before him.

Otto was kind enough to carve out a little time out of his relentless touring and promotional schedule to talk with The 9513 about his new album, heroes and inspirations.

A new baby, a new CD and a hospital visit all within a two week period this fall…what on earth were you thinking?

The hospital visit was the only one that wasn’t planned. I had no choice on that one. Obviously the album has been planned for a long time. The baby wasn’t necessarily planned but it’s been the greatest thing ever. This whole year has been incredible. We moved into a new house and sold the old one while my wife is pregnant–and while I’m one the road doing all this stuff. Two weeks after my baby is born, I end up in the hospital. And that was supposed to be my launch week so I missed all this press and all this stuff that was supposed to be going on. It’s been crazy.

Any jokes from your wife or crew that your hospital visit means you’ll go to any great lengths to get out of changing diapers?

(Laughter) There have been some jokes, to be sure. But I am like a NASCAR pit crew when it comes to changing diapers. I’m in and out in like four or five seconds flat.

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With musical influences that include jazz, country, classic, pop, swing and bluegrass, it’s not very easy to quickly describe The Belleville Outfit. It’s extremely easy to get hooked by their music, however. The young sextet plays with both virtuosity and energy and is quickly becoming known for a live act that’s won them fans across the country.

Since its formation, the group – consisting of Rob Teter (guitar, vocals), Connor Forsyth (piano, B3 organ, vocals), Jonathan Konya (drums), Phoebe Hunt (violin, vocals), Marshall Hood (guitar, vocals) and its newest member, Nigel Frye (bass) – has released two independent albums and won the 2009 Americana Music Association award nomination for Best New/Emerging act.

The Belleville Outfit is wrapping up 2010 with a tour through the Southeast and Midwest U.S. and will work on wrapping up its third album, due for release Spring of 2011. Teter took a few minutes to talk with The 9513 about the band’s sound and its future plans.

How did The Belleville Outfit get together in the first place?

When we first started, there was definitely more of a jazz and swing element. The piano player, the drummer and myself started the group in New Orleans, and the gypsy swing scene was kind of happening down there – the Django Reinhardt, Stéphane Grappelli style of swing music. Having met these two guys in college and found a mutual admiration for that style of music, we started doing it on our own, but more beefed up, more than fiddle and guitar. We had pianos and drums, and it came across with more power than if we had an acoustic trio.

We really got into that, and we wrote a lot of that, but there are so many songwriters in the group, and we’ve got people coming from Austin, the Carolinas and the Midwest, so the original writing along the three years we’ve been together has taken out some of that swing element. It’s still there, it’s still very present, but we’re doing a lot of [other] things.

Growing up, what were some big musical influences for you?

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It was supposed to be a simple, fun band that would get together every week and pick a few bluegrass chestnuts. Along the way though, The SteelDrivers found a distinctive sound, landed a record deal and released a stunning debut album that garnered them a loyal following and multiple award nominations.

The band’s second album, Reckless, was released in September to rave reviews. The 9513 recently spoke with mandolin/guitar player Mike Henderson about the band’s formation and success. Prior to The SteelDrivers, Henderson released two solo country albums and two blues albums (under Mike Henderson & The Bluebloods), and he’s also been busy as a session musician and songwriter.

To see Henderson as one of the best guitar players around, check out this video. To read about him as a bluegrass songwriter, mandolin player and reluctant National guitar player, read on.

Did the success of your first album affect the way you put Reckless together?

Yes and no. More than anything, we wanted the first record to be a reflection of what we sounded like live, and we cut it all live. We were all in one room, and the mics were all bleeding into one another, so there was no way to go back and overdub. So, if someone made a terrible goof, we just had to go back and play the song again.

On this second record, we wanted to take it a step further and do a live-in-studio album, where we were separated enough that we could do overdubs, and on certain songs we knew that we were going to have additional things added to it. Another difference from the first to the second was that on the first, we were recording songs that we had been doing live, and we had them down. We knew how they went, and we were used to playing them. On the second one, some of the songs we had never really performed out in public before, so we were still in the arranging process with them. A few of them we tried several different ways.

The fact that the first one was a success was a great surprise to us all and a great thing to have happen. To get a Grammy nomination and all that, we certainly weren’t ever anticipating anything like that.

Most of the songs were written by you and Chris Stapleton. What do you think makes you such an effective songwriting duo?

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No doubt Dean Brody is a gifted storyteller. The rising Canadian country music star proved his singing and songwriting readiness last year with three hit songs off his self-titled debut album on Broken Bow Records–all three broke the Top 10 at Canadian country radio. His smash “Brothers” peaked at #26 on the U.S. charts and went on to be honored as the 2009 Single of the Year at the CCMA Awards. He also earned five 2010 CCMA nominations: Single of the Year (“Dirt Roads Scholar”); Album of the Year (Dean Brody); Songwriter of the Year (“Dirt Roads Scholar”); CMT Video of the Year (“Wildflower”); and Male Artist of the Year.

With a new label behind him, the soft-spoken British Columbia born and bred artist recently released his impressive sophomore effort, Trail in Life. Its first two singles are still on the airwaves: “Roll That Barrel Out,” an island lullaby slash drinking song, and “Wildflower,” a waltz written for his wife, Iris Rose. In the fog of his fairy-tale success, though, lies the reality of ups and downs in an unforgiving music business. It’s a story that’s less glitter and more guts, and at the core of it all stands the things that matter most to him: the artist’s family and his songs.

He’s been called laid back by some, but that term doesn’t quite nail down Brody’s demeanor. Calm and thoughtful more accurately describe who the man really is. His record producer Matt Rovey probably says it best, describing the young singer as “an old soul.” That kind of organic self-confidence is very evident in his songs. He seems to understand himself and what makes others tick. His lyrics are gimmick-free, written from an honest and mature place. The same depth of character can be heard in his voice, which has a direct line to emotions, delivered with a wood-grain richness of tone reminiscent of Brad Paisley. But unlike many of his contemporaries, Brody shows vulnerability, poignancy, dynamics and range. Many of his lines end with a whispery release of breath that is somehow comforting. One can analyze on and on, but really, when it comes down to it, Brody is just being himself.

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