The Jack White-owned Third Man Records is facing some financial difficulties. This is the news coming out of the company’s Nashville headquarters in the SoBro neighborhood just south of downtown where they operate a record store, venue, as well as house label offices.
A traditional like few others will transpire once again this summer when Willie Nelson celebrates the 4th of July by gathering together friends and family for his annual 4th of July Picnic. For the fourth year in a row, the event will be held at the Circuit of the Americas speedway just south of Austin, TX, and will include many long-standing invitees.
Saving Country Music’s reigning Album of the Year winner Tyler Childers will be hitting the road hard and heavy in the first part of 2018 behind his award-winning record Purgatory, including some stops on some big stages, marquee performances at major festivals, and many other dates coast to coast in between.
On Tuesday, January 16th, The Americana Music Association launched its brand new charting system with the help of technology company CDX. The new system will more easily and more accurately report the activity on Americana’s radio stations and shows across the Americana reporting network.
The problem with Margo Price’s ‘All American Made’ is the same as her first record, ‘Midwest Farmer’s Daughter.’ Though the songwriting is strong in segments, the recordings themselves are lifeless, the playing and mixing is unimaginative, at times Margo’s otherwise strong voice is exposed and naked-feeling in the mix.
As the CMA Awards were transpiring Wednesday (11-8) night inside the Bridgestone Arena, Sturgill Simpson decided to take his guitar, his Grammy for Album of the Year from 2016, and do a busking set in front of the arena as local journalist Adam Gold broadcast the whole thing via Facebook Live.
The Turnpike Troubadours have just crashed the mainstream party at the top of the Billboard Country Albums chart with the release of their latest record, ‘A Long Way From Your Heart.’ Signed to Thirty Tigers, and with little help from radio beyond regional play, they continue to show what quality music and grassroots efforts can result in.
On the heels of releasing a surprise EP called Weakness in July, Margo Price has announced the name and details for her official sophomore album “All American Made.” It was recorded in Memphis at Sam Phillips Recording (his studio after Sun) with her touring band. Listen to a new song, and check out new tour dates.
The 16th Annual Americana Music Awards will transpire on Wednesday, September 13th at the Mother Church of Country Music, The Ryman Auditorium, beginning at 6:30 p.m. Central as part of the week-long AmericanaFest in Nashville, and they have just announced the performers for the presentation, and how folks can tune in.
The only greater disservice an artist or a label can do to the music they’ve worked so hard on and put so much love into than releasing it on an EP, is to release it on a four-song EP. You want to bury music and relegate it to the also-ran of your discography and have Wikipedia page editors and everyday fans give you quizzical looks? Release an EP.
“Hedley’s initiation into the Third Man family solidifies not only the end of Bro Country’s stranglehold on the country music industry, but also Third Man’s place as the greatest country label on the planet,” says the Jack White-owned label after signing Nashville fixture Josh Hedley to the label.
The Americana Music Association announced the nominees for their 2017 awards on Tuesday afternoon (5-9) via a live press conference from the Country Music Hall of Fame’s Ford Theater. Along with announcing the nominees, the presentation included performances from multiple Americana artists.
A traditional like few others will transpire once again this summer when Willie Nelson celebrates the 4th of July by gathering together friends and family for his annual 4th of July Picnic. For the third year in a row, the event will be held at the Circuit of the Americas speedway just south of Austin, TX, and will include many long-standing invitees.
The 2017 Outlaw Music Festival will actually be a series of events, or a tour if you will, consisting of six total stops throughout July hitting up New Orleans, Dallas, Detroit, Milwaukee, Syracuse, NY, and Rogers, AR. Willie Nelson and his Family Band, Bob Dylan, Sheryl Crow, The Avett Brothers, and Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real play most events.
We’ve known for a while that Chris Stapleton’s much-anticipated sophomore album and the follow-up to his landmark debut Traveller will be released on May 5th, but despite the looming deadline, details on the new release have been quite limited. But all of that is about to change.
The biggest takeaway from SXSW 2017 will be that for the first time since the very inception of the idea over 30 years ago, the annual music gathering experienced a palpable draw down in attendance and industry participation to a degree that it fundamentally changed many of the dynamics and rigors one must endure to attend.
Margo Price was surprised Tuesday (3-7) night when she was beckoned to the headquarters of her record label Third Man Records, and walked in the doors to find a throng of friends, band members, and other supporters there to congratulate her on winning the 2017 American Music Prize.
It don’t matter who’s on country radio, Chris Stapleton is still the current king of country music when it comes to recognition and album sales. A solid 16 months since he shocked the world at the 2015 CMA Awards, and he is still the perennial chart topper on the country albums charts with Traveller most every week, and there is no signs of it slowing down soon.
Zac Brown promised last September that the band would be bringing the music back to its roots, and he certainly delivers on that promise with Zac Brown Band’s latest single called “My Old Man.” But how we got here and why such a return to the roots is even possible or necessary is important context.
They’ve decided to divide opening duties among a total of 26 separate openers across the 65 total tour dates, as opposed to taking the usual stance with openers, which is to drag the same two or three lightweight mainstream up-and-comers around with them for six months. Even more surprising are the names selected to open.
Much of the attention of ‘Noisey: Nashville’ is expended when Zach Goldbaum embeds with country rapper Mikel Knight’s street team, which Saving Country Music has covered extensively in the past. Independent country artist Margo Price is also involved, and tells the story behind her song “Hands of Time.”
Covering female country artists has all of a sudden become a perilous enterprise. Even when you’re putting out efforts to highlight female artists, simply referring to them by their gender can be a no no, along with a host of other seemingly spanking new, and frankly unintuitive rules that will put you in the doghouse with a host of socially-conscious media members
When Saving Country Music started in 2009, the biggest artist in country music was Taylor Swift. Now, it’s arguably Chris Stapleton. Independent artists are finding support like never before, allowing them to be able to completely sidestep the pitfalls of the mainstream industry and still have sustainable, and in many cases, very successful careers.
One of the reasons we feel so surprised at Americana’s success and so many have been so slow to recognize it is because it has been a slow and steady process. Because of Americana’s model of sustainability, the revolution has been plodding, yet purposeful. And now it’s success is palpable, and measurable by industry-standard metrics.