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Intentionally Simpler: An Interview with Tracy Bonham
For music fans of a certain age, hearing the name Tracy Bonham likely conjures up “Mother Mother,” an alt-rock MTV hit from the mid-90s that found Bonham in a full-throated wail backed by a wall of shredding guitars. But that was then. And this is now. Over the two decades since, the singer/songwriter has chased…
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Suffer No Fools: An Interview with Sarah Bettens
As both a solo artist and the front woman for K\’s Choice, Belgian rocker Sarah Bettens has long been a staple in the LGBTQ music community, even before she officially came out more than a dozen years ago. Around that same time, Bettens put K\’s Choice on hold and settled into a domestic life with…
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Shawn Colvin: Uncovered
Anyone who has followed Shawn Colvin\’s career for any length of time knows that she is very fond of covering songs. She can\’t help it. She got her start as a cover artist in a bar band. As good of a copy cat as she is, however, Colvin learned long ago that she had to…
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Squared Roots: Brandi Carlile x Elton John
The classically trained Sir Elton John wasn\’t always just so. In his early days, Reginald Dwight was so hooked on the American sounds of Elvis Presley, Ray Charles, Jim Reeves, Bill Haley, and Jerry Lee Lewis that the band he formed in 1962 was called Bluesology. Then, in 1967, John met lyricist Bernie Taupin and…
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Five Questions: Langhorne Slim
After six critically acclaimed releases over the course of 10 years, the unbridled Americana force that is Langhorne Slim recently issued his seventh project, The Spirit Moves. Slim got sober two years ago and became a meditator in order to harness his energy in a whole new way. The resulting songs speak for themselves, reflecting…
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Texas Forever: Hayes Carll Proves What Songs Are For
In a town so over-run with great singer/songwriters, it\’s sometimes easy to forget that Nashville\’s not the only place they come from. Massachusetts, California, New York, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Oklahoma, and Oregon all do their part, too. Heck, even Iowa chips in, now and then. And, of course, there\’s always Texas which, on Friday…
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Undercover Angel: An Interview with Shawn Colvin
Perhaps inspired by “Tiny Dancer,” Shawn Colvin originally wanted to be the seamstress for the band … not the leader of it. But she eventually got out front and sang a bunch of cover tunes until she found her own voice as a songwriter. Several decades later — and amidst six albums of originals —…
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Brandi Carlile Makes Her Own History at Ryman Auditorium
Most artists who play at Nashville\’s Ryman Auditorium comment about how historic the room is and what an honor it is to step on that stage. Maybe all of them mean it, but probably none of them to the extent that Brandi Carlile meant it on Saturday night. She seemed supremely touched and genuinely humbled…
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Soul to Soul: Mavis Staples and Joan Osborne Take the Show on the Road
Anyone who caught Mavis Staples shimmying out in the middle of the big musical number on Stephen Colbert’s recent Late Show debut knows that the 76-year-old gospel/soul singer’s still got it. In just the past five years she has released two albums — You Are Not Alone, which won a Grammy in 2011, and One…
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Patty Griffin: Servant of Love
As artists move through the world, they see and feel things that less-sensitive people don\’t. Then, they retreat to their creative spaces and translate those experiences into music, paintings, and words, as best they can. Patty Griffin has long had her eyes and heart trained on the stories unfolding around her in the lives of…