FUTURE CLASSICAL PIONEER LAURA ESCUDÉ RELEASES HER MOST PERSONAL WORK TO DATE “EMBRACE YOUR SHADOW” SINGLE + ANNOUNCES HER NEW EP ENOUGHNESS

FUTURE CLASSICAL PIONEER LAURA ESCUDÉ RELEASES HER MOST PERSONAL WORK TO DATE 

“EMBRACE YOUR SHADOW” SINGLE

 + ANNOUNCES HER NEW EP

ENOUGHNESS

“In order to really understand the complexities and genuine music crafting that she is doing, you’ll have to

immerse yourself into her work.” - Noisey

“You are a badass, and you certainly have our attention.” - Hypebae

“We’re hearing, immersing and have fallen prey to the siren sound of this producer who already lends her

programming chops for Kanye West, Jay-Z and many other top dogs.” -VIBE

“As one of the pioneers in live show programming -- especially the use of Ableton Live software, now widely regarded as the industry standard -- Escudé has helped reshape how the concert industry uses electronic music and digital playback across virtually every genre of music.” - Billboard

LISTEN TO “EMBRACE YOUR SHADOW” : HERE

Los Angeles-based artist, innovator, entrepreneur and live show designer Laura Escudé has released her new single, and most personal work to date “Embrace Your Shadow,” co-written with Lila Rose and announces her new EP Enoughness, due out May 11. Synthesizing her skills as a classically trained violinist and technical prowess, and avant-garde electronic producer, Escudé infuses neo-classical & sleek futuristic style with raw emotion elicited with her musical machines. 

Technology is a second language for Escudé, who became the world’s first Ableton Certified Trainer in 2008. In 2012, she founded Electronic Creatives, using her skills to hire and train programmers and playback engineers for artists including Logic, Ariana Grande, The Weeknd, Big Sean, Charli XCX, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Electronic Creatives has hosted several playback engineering training programs over the years, with the latest being MASTERTRACK Worldwide. Escudé brought massive productions to life for the biggest and most influential artists in the world including Kanye West, Jay Z, Bon Iver, Missy Elliot, Herbie Hancock, and television megabrand American Idol. These creative applications of technology made Escudé one of the world’s most in-demand live show designers and saw her touring extensively with these shows, collaborating with artists to create fresh, thrilling experiences for audiences worldwide.

“There’s more to a concert than an artist playing music: there are transitions, remixes of songs, and video and lighting production that has to be synced with the music. Ever wondered how this comes together so seamlessly? Laura Escudé—founder and CEO of live show design company Electronic Creatives and musical artist—is one of the most renowned people in this field responsible for creating live shows.”  - Forbes

In 2016, Escudé experienced awakening after tour burnout landed her in the hospital. She was exhausted, stressed, and at one of the lowest points in her life, and unsure how to get better. Escudé was forced to take a break from work and focus on her health. This physical, mental, emotional and spiritual process involved letting go of unproductive habits and thought patterns, facing her fears and giving up aspects of her life that didn’t serve her. Escudé was soon not just better, but for the first time in her life truly thriving, which became apparent in her work. Escudé shed the moniker of Alluxe, under which she had been releasing music for years and decided to put out music under her own name. This breakthrough inspired her to help others, particularly live performers to optimize their own health and well-being. In 2017, she launched The Transmute™ Retreat, a week-long workshop incorporating yoga, meditation, nature, live performance workshops, and community performances. In 2019, she launched The Transmute™ Accelerator online course to help artists accelerate their live performances using technology, and in 2021 launched The Transmute™ Academy, a community dedicated to Ableton Live + Music Tech Courses & Events to help artists continue their growth in music and business, in addition to The Transmute™ Academy Masterclasses with special guest presenters 2x month. The Transmute™ Accelerator is a year-long program, with launch events featuring top industry experts, such as Suzanne Ciani, The Album Leaf, and Sudan Archives.

 Personal growth is an ongoing process, and this past year of forced isolation was the catalyst for some heavy healing and self-work that Laura had been putting off for years. The stillness of 2020 pushed Laura into the start of the recovery process from a 20-year eating disorder, which she wrote about HERE on Medium. This healing journey is the inspiration behind “Embrace Your Shadow,” and the Enoughness EP as a whole.  It’s about learning to love yourself, especially the messy parts. “For me, music is the most inclusive space. It gives me full permission to create, be and express myself,” says Escudé. “I find when I am deep in musical reflection I feel the most free and expansive. When I honor the sounds that naturally come through me, I am healed. It is my intention for this track, and the full EP, to be a journey and space to cultivate knowing, healing, and for transformation.” 

KEEP UP WITH LAURA:

Website | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Soundcloud

AFM & SAG-AFTRA FUND MAKES A RECORD-BREAKING DISTRIBUTION OF $70M

 AFM & SAG-AFTRA FUND MAKES A RECORD-BREAKING

 DISTRIBUTION OF $70M

The AFM & SAG-AFTRA Intellectual Property Rights Distribution Fund (“The Fund”) is a 501c(6) not-for-profit organization whose purpose is to collect and distribute royalties to non-featured performers on sound recordings for songs played on satellite radio, non-interactive streaming and other digital formats domestically and internationally. As digital platforms have grown, so have the Fund’s royalty collections and payout demands. While it is increasingly challenging to identify, locate, and pay the right people, The Fund has continued to expand, and has collected and distributed millions of dollars in royalties on behalf of non-featured performers. Last year, $60M was distributed, and on April 30th this year, The Fund made a record-breaking distribution of over $70M, for a total of over half a billion dollars distributed since its inception.

Though the music industry is slowly recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic, its repercussions will be experienced for years to come. As artists are searching for alternative streams of revenue in the face of economic uncertainty, The Fund offers both union and non-union session musicians and vocalists a sense of relief. “As a recording artist, I’ve been very fortunate to work with Elton John, Mary J. Blige, Joe Cocker, and many others. I also sing on movies, television shows, and commercials, so when I started receiving royalties from an organization with this long, funny name, I was happily surprised,” says Fund participant and vocalist Kudisan Kai. “If you’ve worked as a vocalist or a musician, the AFM & SAG-AFTRA Fund may have some funds for you,” explains Grammy Award-winning artist Alvin Chea of a cappella group Take 6. “I know I’ve worked on a lot of big projects with artists like Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, and Elton John, along with some smaller projects—they find them all. They’ve blessed me and given me many pleasant surprises in my mailbox.” 

“Given the enormous impact the pandemic has had on the ability to earn a living on both instrumentalists and vocalists, we are thrilled to be able to assist non-featured performers by collecting and distributing royalty income they might not know they’re entitled to receive,” says Sidney Kibodeaux White, Chief Operating Officer of The Fund. Unlike other rights collectives, there is no membership or registration requirement in order to qualify—as long as a musician participates as a non-featured performer on a covered sound recording, that musician  is considered a “participant” for distribution purposes.

“Every year, we’ve been able to collect more revenue on behalf of our participants,” White continues. “This year, The Fund set a record with more than $70M in distributed royalties. We want to encourage would-be participants to visit the website for more information.” 

CONNECT WITH THE AFM & SAG-AFTRA FUND:  

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || TWITTER || YOUTUBE

ANNIE KEATING RELEASES SINGLE “KINDRED SPIRIT” VIA AMERICANA HIGHWAYS

ANNIE KEATING RELEASES SINGLE “KINDRED SPIRIT”

VIA AMERICANA HIGHWAYS

NEW LP BRISTOL COUNTY TIDES OUT ON JUNE 4TH

A cross between Willie Nelson and John Prine and you don't get any better than that - The Village Voice

Country-rock, with a renegade bite - LA Weekly

Honest, refreshing -  New York Post

Keating navigates the Americana environs inhabited by Emmylou Harris, Patty Griffin and Lucinda Williams, and proves she’s every bit their equal -  No Depression

It is accomplished and inspired. It feels universal and deeply personal at the same time. It is an evocative story of love, loss and finding what matters most in uncertain times  - The Spirit Of Progressive Rock

Keating writes and sings like a woman who knows deep down that heartache is the price of hope, and she makes us believe that all of it is worth the cost - Bluestown Music

An album of depth and sincerity, passionate, fearless, and one that flows superbly. Annie Keating’s Bristol County Tides is a marvelous, enjoyable piece of artistry - Liverpool Sound and Vision   

 Photo: Ehud Lazin 

STREAM “KINDRED SPIRIT”

SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD 

Brooklyn-based artist Annie Keating has unveiled her brand new single “Kindred Spirit” from her forthcoming album Bristol County Tides, set for release on June 4th. “This is a heavy hitting, genuine love song, the sultry husky kind that gives you renewed hope after you’ve resolved there’s none,” says Americana Highways. “Annie Keating has gritty husky vocals that lend instant credibility to anything she sings. Her songwriting is deep and heavy hitting, and the production and arrangement is bright, without anyone stepping on anyone else’s toes.”

“Rarely in life, one comes across a kindred spirit – a person with whom one finds a deep and instant connection with echoes of both the past and present,” Keating explains of the song’s inspiration. “During the pandemic, I left the city and relocated to coastal Massachusetts. There, I was lucky to meet such a person, who showed us kindness and connection in a time of isolation. He taught me and my kids about the tides, I got a boat and he showed us up the river, while my dog learned to swim and my boy learned to fish. We found joy in times of pandemic hardship and uncertainty through the power of human connection. This song is about that connection.”  

Lucinda Williams. John Prine. Bob Dylan. Allison Krauss. Willie Nelson. Johnny Cash. Bonnie Raitt. Emmylou Harris. Patty Griffin. This is a short list of the musicians Keating has been compared to over the last 15 years. She writes and sings like a woman who knows deep down that heartache is the price of hope, and she can make us believe—in that way that only the best artists can—that all of it is worth the cost. She's shared the bill with the likes of John Hiatt and Bon Iver, toured internationally many times in a dozen countries, and now, launches this 15-song tour de force—an epic pandemic story of awakening and inspiration that shows this veteran artist at the peak of her powers. On this, her eighth full length album, Keating delivers songwriting in its most honest, vulnerable, beautiful form.

Bristol County Tides, produced by Teddy Kumpel, is Keating's most accomplished, inspired, and ambitious work to date. The inspiration for all songs was born there, amidst the rising and falling tides in an idyllic farm to coast New England town, where deep connections were forged amidst times of isolation. Taking us on a journey from Brooklyn to the coast, the river to the sea, an artist awakened delivers 15 beautiful, tender songs that capture a heart slowly lit up on the inside, and feel as true as the tides themselves. Keating is a gifted storyteller who can evoke a joyful summer afternoon one moment, and break your heart open the next. 

Bristol County Tides is available for pre-order at iTunes, Amazon Music, and at Annie Keating's website. 

BRISTOL COUNTY TIDES TRACK LIST 

THIRD STREET

KINDRED SPIRIT

MARIGOLD

NOBODY KNOWS

BLUE MOON TIDE

HALF MAST

HIGH TIDE

KINDNESS

HANK’S SALOON

SONG FOR A FRIEND

DORIS

BITTERSWEET

LUCKY 13

SHADES OF BLUE

GOODBYE 

CONNECT WITH ANNIE KEATING:  

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || TWITTER || BANDCAMP || YOUTUBE || SPOTIFY

OUT TODAY: BEN COSGROVE’S NEW LP THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS

OUT TODAY:  

BEN COSGROVE’S NEW LP  

THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS 

An impressionistic ode to the life that grows between the urban cracks…Cosgrove works solely in abstracts, using minimalism and deeper concepts to paint portraits with a soft, muted palette - WBUR 

The expansiveness and thrill…is illustrative of Cosgrove’s musical vision. The push and pull of dynamics, the utilization of the whole range of the piano and the dense, sweeping pianism makes ‘Templates For Limitless Fields of Grass’ well… limitless - Sound Of Boston 

THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS 

SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD 

Today, Boston-based Ghost of Paul Revere keyboardist and instrumental folk composer Ben Cosgrove releases The Trouble With Wilderness, his new LP produced by indie-folk maestro Dan Cardinal (Josh Ritter, Darlingside, Lula Wiles, The Ballroom Thieves). The Trouble With Wilderness is a lush, textured, and expansive set of 12 new songs that consider the role of nature and wildness in the built environment.  

“Not long ago, I came to the uncomfortable realization that I was spending an awful lot of my time on stage introducing songs by telling stories about the kinds of places that tend to show up on scenic postcards and not in people’s everyday lives,” explains Cosgrove. “I’ve been writing and performing music about landscape for years, but it turns out that—largely by accident—a lot of that music has been about national parks, oceans, mountains, wilderness areas, wildlife preserves, and other landscapes whose beauty and identity are hard to separate from the implicit and erroneous idea that human beings have nothing to do with them.”  

“I think the practice of formally or informally dividing the world up into a bunch of conventionally beautiful ‘natural’ parts and another bunch of utilitarian, unpretty, ‘unnatural’ ones is one of our society’s more misguided and lastingly harmful tendencies,” he continues. “I realized I was ignoring an important obligation to remind my audiences that the built environment can be as insane, impressive, humbling, affecting, and worthy of attention as any theoretically untrammeled wilderness — and also that in a very real, Anthropocenean sense, pretty much everything on the planet is a part of the built environment at this point, so we’d better start learning to appreciate it.” 

With this in mind, Cosgrove created a set of songs about the wildness found in ordinary places, and focused on situations and environments whose human and nonhuman elements are more weirdly and complicatedly interrelated. The Trouble With Wilderness is about those kinds of things: weeds in the sidewalk, power line corridors, gardens, interstates, lawns, river crossings, urban growth boundaries, and other instances where it’s hard to determine what is natural and what is not.   

“Our relationship with the rest of the world could only deepen if we were to expand our list of places worth celebrating, to broaden our understanding of what nature is and where we might find it,” Cosgrove relays. “I hope these songs can make the ordinary things around you start to pop with new color and clarity. It’s been a good reminder for myself, too, to keep paying attention to the details of the world around me, whether I’m in a park or a parking lot. For better or worse—and I think pretty clearly for better—there’s wildness to be found everywhere: even in the most constructed and artificial environments, there is always something beautiful, chaotic, and anarchic at work, doing its part to rattle the edges, to crack the sides, to burst forth and bloom.” 

The Trouble With Wilderness is an uncommonly beautiful set of songs and a massive step forward in Cosgrove’s idiosyncratic and increasingly mature body of work. Like the vernacular landscapes he looked to in composing it, the music on The Trouble With Wilderness sits on the narrow balancing point between order and wildness and manages to lean simultaneously into both.  

THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS TRACK LIST  

THE MACHINE IN THE GARDEN 

ANORAK 

OVERPASS 

ARTERIAL #1 

THIS RUSH OF BEAUTY AND THIS SENSE OF ORDER 

OKLAHOMA WIND SPEED MEASUREMENT CLUB 

CAIRN 

WILDER 

ARTERIAL #4 

HADLEY 

MELTWATER 

TEMPLATES FOR LIMITLESS FIELDS OF GRASS 

CONNECT WITH BEN COSGROVE:   

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || TWITTER || BANDCAMP || YOUTUBE || SPOTIFY   

IMOGEN CLARK “FIRST CLASS MAN” SINGLE FEAT. COLIN HAY MIKE BLOOM PRODUCED BASTARDS EP DUE 5/21/21

IMOGEN CLARK
“FIRST CLASS MAN” SINGLE FEAT. COLIN HAY

MIKE BLOOM PRODUCED BASTARDS EP DUE 5/21/21

Photo Credit: Jess Genevieve

“FIRST CLASS MAN” || WATCH | LISTEN

PRAISE FOR IMOGEN CLARK… 

“… the song hits all the right pop heights as Clark soars above the instrumental on the anthemic chorus… ascends to dizzying pop rock brilliance.” – Under The Radar

“… poignant narrative and stellar musicianship.” – Beat Magazine
 “she commanded the stage with matchless acuity” – Sydney Morning Herald (4.5 stars)

Beloved Australian singer-songwriter, Imogen Clark, continues to deliver the goods, today releasing her stunning new single ‘First Class Man’ recorded with music great, Colin Hay.

The third single to be lifted from her forthcoming BASTARDS EP – due for release on Friday 21 May – ‘First Class Man’ is an emotive tribute to Imogen’s musical collaborator and mentor, the late Glen Hannah.

Glen, who passed suddenly in 2019 was a revered guitarist, award-winning producer and universally beloved member of the Australian music community.

“When I was 14 and just getting started as a musician, I met an incredible guitarist named Glen Hannah. Glen became an instant mentor to me and was a key part of some of the biggest, most important musical milestones of my life, including the first time I played with a band and the first big crowd I ever played in front of.

Glen came on the road with me a lot towards the end of his life and used to musically direct my band; he was a constant presence on the other end of a phone call when I needed advice from someone with experience and wisdom who I knew only had my best interests at heart.

In 2019, Glen lost his battle with depression, a battle I had no idea he was waging through the years we knew each other. It really goes to show that you never know what people are going through under the surface, and Glen was a classic example of the phrase “still waters run deep”. He was one of the most humble, talented, kind and generous people I knew, and not a day goes by that I don’t think about Glen and wish I could have done something to help.

When I sat down in LA earlier this year to write with one of my songwriting heroes Colin Hay, I knew he would be able to help me get these feelings out into a song which was proving too hard to write on my own. The song is for Glen and everyone who misses him, and I hope it reminds everyone to always check up on your friends and family if you think there’s a chance they might be hurting, because you’ll always regret it if you don’t.”

ABOUT IMOGEN CLARK

Imogen Clark is an Australian singer-songwriter, hailing from the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, whose music ranges from arena-ready rock anthems to raw confessional indie pop.

Since 2016, the 25 year-old has released two studio albums and one EP – 2020’s The Making Of Me – and featured on a number of compilation albums.

Cutting her teeth playing in local pubs in the Blue Mountains during her teen years before taking the stage with artists like Shania Twain, Ian Moss and Willie Watson, Imogen has worked relentlessly over the past decade building up her musical chops. She has worked with Mark Lizotte (Diesel), Kasey Chambers and Jim Lauderdale and cites Benmont Tench (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers) and Pete Thomas (Elvis Costello and the Attractions) amongst her collaborators.

Released in August of last year, Imogen Clark’s The Making Of Me EP garnered widespread acclaim both in Australia and North America. Praised for its raw honesty by fans and critics, the six-track offering showcased Imogen’s powerful vocal and reflective lyrics.

Recorded in LA with producer Mike Bloom (Julian Casablancas, Jenny Lewis) at the helm, The Making Of Me features a star-studded line-up with players from some of the world’s greatest rock bands – from Benmont Tench (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers) on keyboard, to Pete Thomas (Elvis Costello and the Attractions) on drums. Local artists Alex Lahey, Clare Bowen, Emma Swift, Anita Lester and more can be found across EP singles ‘Found Me’, ‘My Own Worst Enemy’, ‘The Making Of Me’, and ‘Paper Boat’.

IMOGEN CLARK ‘FIRST CLASS MAN’ | WATCH | LISTEN

Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Spotify | Apple Music | Bandcamp 

JULIANA HATFIELD RELEASES SECOND SINGLE “GORGON” TODAY ALBUM BLOOD OUT 5/14/21 ON AMERICAN LAUNDROMAT RECORDS CELEBRATES WITH LIVE STREAM PERFORMANCE ON MAY 8th

JULIANA HATFIELD RELEASES SECOND SINGLE “GORGON” TODAY

ALBUM BLOOD OUT 5/14/21 ON AMERICAN LAUNDROMAT RECORDS

CELEBRATES WITH LIVE STREAM PERFORMANCE ON MAY 8th

PHOTO CREDIT: DAVID DOOBININ

STREAM “GORGON” || SPOTIFY

 Juliana Hatfield releases her second single “Gorgon,” today on American Laundromat Records. The song is featured on her 19th solo studio album Blood, “an irresistible catharsis laced with endless earworms” (- WBUR ) due 5/14/21. Juliana will celebrate the new album with a live stream performance from Q Division Studios on Saturday, May 8th at 4 pm ET.

Inspired by the Greek mythical creatures, Juliana sings of a non-compliant, discontented woman who escapes from the chains of love on “Gorgon”: “I never said I was an angel / I never said I ever cared / I never promised anyone anything / no enchanted fairytales / you must have interpreted it wrong / because I don’t sing love songs”

Playing all the instruments on the track, “it was fun building it up from scratch and then letting it all hang loose in the long free-pop/jazz outro,” Juliana explains. “Recording at home, there’s no one stopping me from indulging in every wacky musical whim that pops into my head.”

It was preceded in January by the gritty and abrasive, yet groovy and melodic first single “Mouthful of Blood” to the delight of critics.

"[‘Mouthful of Blood’] super-catchy, lightly melancholic power-pop tune that reminds me of Hatfield’s influence on bands like Best Coast and Colleen Green.” - Stereogum

 “…a jangly number that recalls her Blake Babies days which also features some Beatlesque orchestration.” – Brooklyn Vegan

"[‘Mouthful of Blood’]’s catchy and melodic, even as it tackles a serious topic.” - Spin

“…a churning guitar riff.” – Rolling Stone

“Over an ebullient, guitar-driven arrangement, Hatfield’s new single “Mouthful of Blood” examines the complicated nature of exercising your freedom of expression without fear of repercussion.” – Albumism

“The forever great and perpetually unfuckwithable Juliana Hatfield has been spoiling us with new music over the past few years…. Underneath the [‘Mouthful of Blood’]’s bubbly demeanour is Hatfield’s usually whipsmart lyricisms, and here, her mouth is bleeding from having to bite her tongue so damn much.” – Vanyaland

Blood is available for pre-order now on American Laundromat Records. 

LIVE STREAM CONCERT FROM Q DIVISION STUDIOS

WATCH HERE

May 8th / BLOOD RELEASE SHOW @ 4 pm ET

 JULIANA HATFIELD

BLOOD out 5/14/21

Track Listing

1.     The Shame Of Love

2.     Gorgon

3.     Nightmary

4.     Had A Dream

5.     Splinter

6.     Suck It Up

7.     Chunks

8.     Mouthful of Blood

9.     Dead Weight

10.  Torture

Website | Instagram | YouTube | Spotify | Twitter | Facebook

ETHAN GOLD REFLECTS ON ALLURE OF “PRETTY GIRLS” NEW SINGLE OUT 4/16/21

ETHAN GOLD REFLECTS ON ALLURE OF “PRETTY GIRLS”

NEW SINGLE OUT 4/16/21

NEW ALBUM EARTH CITY 1: THE LONGING OUT ON 6/11/21

Photo Credit: Lori Lusk

“PRETTY GIRLS” || STREAM/SHARE 

LOS ANGELES, CA – Los Angeles-based artist/producer/composer Ethan Gold releases the fourth single from his upcoming album Earth City 1: The Longing, the indie folk/pop tune “Pretty Girls” today.

Warning of the allure and trappings of perceived beauty, Ethan muses: “Pretty girls always get the attention / No matter what they do, they make the men go blind / Pretty girls keep the boys in detention / Their love is never true, but no one seems to mind / You’re like the sun, I’m overcome by a fever…”

The song follows a pair of singles “Alexandria & Me” and “In New York,” a yin/yang much like the cities they represent. The A-side “Alexandria & Me” is a 90s-inspired guitar driven ode to the City of Angels, while the aptly titled “In New York” is a Sinatra/Waits-ish piano ballad about the Big Apple.

“New York City likely has been the subject of more tributes than any other city on Earth. Ethan Gold adds his voice to the chorus with “In New York.” The gentle piano ballad is carried by gravelly vocals from Gold, extolling the highs, lows, and endless possibilities of the titular city.” – Under The Radar       

“…a colorful montage that brings Gold’s heartfelt words to the big and small screen.”-  Glide Magazine

All these songs are included on Earth City 1: The Longing (out June 11, 2021), the first in a trilogy of albums about the alienation of our hyper-connected modern world.

The idea for the trilogy came to Ethan after a life changing experience. While working on a film score in New York, Ethan suffered a head injury in a freak accident. Following the accident, Ethan lost his ability to speak and do complex tasks like sound engineering – all of which he had to relearn. Last year, he spoke about the experience with GQ Magazine (South Africa) for an article about the power of meditation and mindfulness that has guided him through his recovery and to today.

ABOUT ETHAN GOLD: Ethan Gold first stepped into public consciousness when he produced and arranged Elvis Perkins’ blog-hyped stunner Ash Wednesday. While moonlighting as bass player and resident musician in his brother Ari’s celebrity-driven folk party band the Honey Brothers, and also scoring his twin’s debut film Adventures of Power, Ethan continued honing his intensely sensitive music, eventually self-releasing his debut art rock album Songs From A Toxic Apartment to underground acclaim (“Emotions delivered with an unfiltered, glaring legibility”- Pitchfork) (Essential new releases -The Sunday Times UK). Other recent film scores produced during the recovery from his head injury include The Song of Sway Lake featuring John Grant and the Staves singing Gold’s music and 2019s Don’t Let Go.

Single “Pretty Girls” OUT NOW

Single “Alexandria & Me” OUT NOW

Single “In New York” OUT NOW

Single “Our Love is Beautiful” OUT NOW

Earth City 1: The Longing COMING 6/11/21

KEEP UP WITH ETHAN GOLD

Website || Instagram || Facebook || Twitter || Spotify || YouTube

OUT TODAY: RYANHOOD’S NEW LP UNDER THE LEAVES

OUT TODAY: 

RYANHOOD’S NEW LP UNDER THE LEAVES 

A musically mesmerizing bluegrass/folk rock collection of songs - Arizona Daily Star 

Intricate and challenging, Ryan’s acoustic guitarwork creates a steady and solid foundation for Cameron’s lyrics to shine - American Songwriter 

Continuing their path as Tucson-based trailblazers, their upcoming LP, Under The Leaves, sees Ryanhood exploring news means of innovating their sound - PopMatters 

Acoustic fusion aces Ryanhood offer an all-natural shot in the arm with Under the Leaves...Mixing bluegrass speed, jam-ready melodies, and pop-rocking forward momentum, two guys with guitars challenge decades of easy-listening ‘rules.' - Nashville Lifestyles 

"An introspective search for meaningful change in a tumultuous world...This is a well-crafted album - Glide Magazine 

The pair continue to innovate on their folk pop brand, bringing a refreshing energy and sweetness into new music that resonates in with that special warmth reserved for acoustic instruments - Atwood Magazine 

Ryanhood …urges us to get back to our truest selves - Underground Music Collective 

This Tucson, AZ duo really knows how to get your feet tapping while delivering a genuine message about internal reflection - The Indy Review 

LISTEN: UNDER THE LEAVES  

Today, award-winning, Tucson, Arizona-based acoustic duo Ryanhood, comprised of Ryan David Green and Cameron Hood, has released their latest LP Under The Leaves. This new album sees lead guitarist Green stepping into the role of sole producer, weaving a tapestry of lush strings and rich harmonies. Like their shows, Under The Leaves is driven by strong acoustic guitar performances and is at turns energetic, hopeful, and quietly moving—a musical invitation to breathe, and to soak in a river of melodies and harmonic hooks. Hood, the band’s primary lyricist, has waded into those musical rivers with dream-like verses about seeds and forests, breath and wind, and the cycles and seasons that frame our lives. Throughout the album’s songs, a question is asked: How do we create meaningful and lasting change in a world filled with division and turmoil? The offer on Under the Leaves is to slow down and face the one thing we have the power to change: ourselves. As the duo sings on the album’s second track “The Fight,” “the only revolution is the one within.” 

 WATCH: “THE FIGHT” 

Drawing inspiration from thought leaders and philosophers like Martin Luther King, Jr., Father Richard Rohr, French historian René Girard, and Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek, the pair distill their observations into a poignant portrait of the human condition. It’s philosophy and poetry against a backdrop of intricate string work delivered with conviction and pure energy. From the very first strums of hopeful album opener and title track “Under The Leaves” to the tender, butterfly-inducing love recalled in “Wide Awake In A Dream,” to the plaintive resolve of self-reckoning in closer “Morning Breaking,” the band encourages us to slow down, look around, and spread our love and compassion to those around us.  

 Named ‘Best Group/Duo’ in the 2014 International Acoustic Music Awards, Ryanhood got their first break more than a decade ago as street-performers at Boston’s Quincy Market. They’ve since gone on to perform more than a thousand shows in 45 U.S. states over the past decade, and have shared stages with Jason Mraz, Matt Nathanson, Train, and many more.  

Under The Leaves is available digitally, as well as on vinyl and CD. The band has also written a companion book, featuring essays and stories behind the songs, expanded artwork, and photography that is also available for purchase. Click HERE to order. 

UPCOMING SHOW DATES: 

4/16 - Under The Leaves, Under The Stars - Tucson, AZ  

4/17 - Under The Leaves, Under The Stars - Tucson, AZ 

5/30 - MeadowGrass Music Festival - Colorado Springs, CO 

CONNECT WITH RYANHOOD:   

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || TWITTER || BANDCAMP || YOUTUBE || SPOTIFY   

BEN COSGROVE RELEASES NEW SINGLE “THIS RUSH OF BEAUTY AND THIS SENSE OF ORDER”

BEN COSGROVE’S NEW SINGLE  “THIS RUSH OF BEAUTY AND THIS SENSE OF ORDER”  OUT NOW

  NEW LP THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS  OUT ON APRIL 23RD  

An impressionistic ode to the life that grows between the urban cracks…Cosgrove works solely in abstracts, using minimalism and deeper concepts to paint portraits with a soft, muted palette - WBUR  

The expansiveness and thrill…is illustrative of Cosgrove’s musical vision. The push and pull of dynamics, the utilization of the whole range of the piano and the dense, sweeping pianism makes ‘Templates For Limitless Fields of Grass’ well… limitless - Sound Of Boston 

LISTEN: “THIS RUSH OF BEAUTY AND THIS SENSE OF ORDER” 

SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD

Boston-based Ghost of Paul Revere keyboardist and instrumental folk composer Ben Cosgrove has released “This Rush Of Beauty and This Sense Of Order,” the newest single from his forthcoming LP The Trouble With Wilderness, produced by indie-folk maestro Dan Cardinal (Josh Ritter, Darlingside, Lula Wiles, Session Americana, The Ballroom Thieves) and set for release on April 23rd. “This Rush Of Beauty and This Sense Of Order,” was inspired by a poem by author E.B. White of Charlotte’s Web fame about gardening and gardeners: "Not sun, not soil alone can bring to border / This rush of beauty and this sense of order.” The poem speaks to the ways in which people have attempted—with varying degrees of success—to apply some degree of spatiotemporal organization to the natural world. 

“Gardens present interesting situations where all these organisms that want to explode, multiply, and take over are all ratcheted into straight and reasonable rows and columns and painstakingly maintained at certain sizes and shapes,” explains Cosgrove. “In this song, to reflect that tension between order and disorder, I tried to build a sense of joy, chaos, and expression out of a bunch of rigid, blocky chords and stilted gestures. It's tied pretty closely to the idea the whole album is about, which is basically that there’s wildness to be found everywhere: even in the most constructed and artificial environments, there is always something beautiful, chaotic, and anarchic at work, doing its part to rattle the edges, to crack the sides, to burst forth and bloom. “This Rush Of Beauty and This Sense Of Order” follows the release of album tracks “Overpass,” “Templates For Limitless Fields Of Grass” and “The Machine In The Garden.”

“OVERPASS”

SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD 

“TEMPLATES FOR LIMITLESS FIELDS OF GRASS”

 SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD

“THE MACHINE IN THE GARDEN”

 SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD

The Trouble With Wilderness is a lush, textured, and expansive set of 12 new songs that consider the role of nature and wildness in the built environment. Cosgrove has spent a lot of his career in collaborations and artist residencies with national parks, performing solo across the lower 48, and all of his solo compositions have been centered around those kinds of areas - until now. With the new LP, he encourages us to recognize beauty in the smallest blades of grass breaking through pavement, and in structures that have been overtaken by the wildness of nature. You can hear this when you listen to the album's tracks, as he distills his observations and brings them to acoustic, percussive life on his keyboard. 

The Trouble With Wilderness is an uncommonly beautiful set of songs and a massive step forward in Cosgrove’s idiosyncratic and increasingly mature body of work. Like the vernacular landscapes he looked to in composing it, the music on The Trouble With Wilderness sits on the narrow balancing point between order and wildness and manages to lean simultaneously into both.

CONNECT WITH BEN COSGROVE:  

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || TWITTER || BANDCAMP || YOUTUBE || SPOTIFY  

ZAYDE WOLF RELEASES HIS MONSTER SINGLE “HOLY WATER” FROM THE FORTHCOMING ALBUM NEON BLOOD TYPE OUT MAY 7TH

ZAYDE WOLF RELEASES HIS MONSTER SINGLE 

“HOLY WATER” FROM THE FORTHCOMING

ALBUM  NEON BLOOD TYPE 

OUT MAY 7TH

“ZAYDE WØLF has slowly but surely started to take over the world.” - Alternative Addiction

“With this electric and in your face musical creation he inspires us to speak up and follow your dreams. He embraces his own fire to give life to this soundscape as it unites melodies and lyrics to craft something that is sure to trigger something in all of us. -  Wolf in a Suit 

“Zayde’s driving and melodic vocals that are simple yet they work perfectly with the song as the instrumentation and music itself is not overly complicated….. “ Hard Beat Magazine

“Perhaps the perfect description of ZAYDE is simply the dark rock child of Imagine Dragons and The Black Keys.” - Ones to Watch

“Here whispery intensity blossoms into a melodic and sonic tour de force as the song is triumphantly orchestrated.” - Parade Magazine (on “New Blood - Reimagined”)

LISTEN TO “HOLY WATER”: HERE

Nashville’s Alt. Rock chart topper Zayde Wølf, the musical persona of  Grammy nominated producer and songwriter Dustin Burnett has released a beast of a single “Holy Water,” one his most powerful songs to date, a bold statement being that his music has yielded over 400 Million streams and has served as the motivational soundtrack for millions of fans, who have found the strength and inspiration to overcome life’s toughest challenges in Wølf’s music. I get all these emails,” Burnett told Billboard, “with all these stories about how the music has moved people in some way. I wanted to continue to make music for people to be inspired by." 

“Holy Water” follows the formula of some of the most memorable songs ever written, being that it manifested quickly, unexpectedly and was a last-minute addition to the album. It was one of those accidental songs that emerged once Burnett released his creative boundaries as he felt the album was finished. "I didn't try to write ‘Holy Water’ on purpose, it was already in there, a raw and personal moment, just waiting for me to release it,” says Burnett.  "Sometimes when you remove all of your boundaries on your creativity, something new, surprising, and even fantastic emerges. I think ‘Holy Water ‘was that for me."

“Holy Water,” which is featured on Spotify's All New Rock and New Noise playlists  follows up the anti-hero inspired song “Madness,” that  Indie Obsessive said was filled with  “thunderous percussion, backing vocal shouts, and crescendos that contribute to the pandemic-like motivational effect that ‘Madness’ builds in listeners,” and was immediately swooped up for us all throughout the NCAA March Madness tournament by CBS and Turner  Sports. “Back At It” Zayde Wølf’s  first taste of the new music this year, was a powerful entry that Apiate called “ an energetic pop/rock track that carries the musician’s signature electronic-infused style. Zayde’s lyrics are reminiscent and uplifting and he delivers the song with infectious exuberance,” setting the tone for what 2021 had in store for Zayde Wølf fans, his third full length album Neon Blood Type. This album follows the 2018 release of Modern Alchemy, Zayde Wølf’s sophomore full-length album, which charted in over 25 countries on the iTunes charts and debuted in the top ten on the iTunes Alternative chart in the U.S. within hours of its release. 

“ Neon Blood Type signifies everything that is unique within people and within Burnett. “ 

- American Songwriter 

Unintimidated by his past successes, Dustin Burnett (aka Zayde Wølf) has always been solely focused on making music that helps listeners to push through and overcome life’s challenges.  This motivational mentality of transcending the past, and not allowing it to define who you will be, are not just concepts Burnett has embraced, but it’s how he has lived his life. Raised in Metropolis, a small town in Illinois best known for its fictional favorite son, Clark Kent, the level of success Burnett has achieved, both personally and professionally, is beyond anything he ever imagined or that was expected of him growing up. The Zayde Wølf project which started by accident five years ago has grown into an empire that includes 245K YouTube subscribers, 90 million video views, over 1.4 Million monthly listeners on Spotify, with 400 million streams across all streaming platforms and millions of followers, all outside of the mainstream music business (i.e no label, no publishers etc.).  This is on top of the hundreds of films, TV shows, trailers, commercials, and video games that have featured his music. The list includes Shameless, Skyscraper movie, Love-Simon movie, the Jack Reacher 2, The Maze Runner 3, Pride Prejudice & Zombies, spots for UFC, MLB, NFL, Dodge, Jeep, WWE, Xbox, NBA, and more. In addition to syncs, Wølf has creatively expanded his reach by cultivating partnerships with brands such as Dude Perfect, one of the top YouTube sports channels with over 54 Million subscribers and 12 Billion views. Other creative partnerships include collaborations with Fortnite champion DrLupo, and extreme downhill racers Rémy Métailler and Matt Walker. Last year Burnett partnered with the NHL and  NBC sports for the Stanley Cup Finals where they used the Zayde Wølf track  “Home” in a spot featuring Burnett performing the song  HERE, and most recently was the featured celebrity guest on the Gamer Hour where Burnett and Host Chris Puckett talked about their love for video games and went head to head live playing  Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War.

KEEP UP WITH ZAYDE WØLF:

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || TWITTER || INSTAGRAM || YOUTUBE || SOUNDCLOUD 

SARAH CICERO RELEASES HER STUNNING DEBUT EP COLD IMMACULATE OPPOSITE

SARAH CICERO RELEASES  HER STUNNING DEBUT EP

COLD IMMACULATE OPPOSITE

Full of heart and yearning, pain and passion, ‘Cold Immaculate Opposite’ resonates with stunning emotion as Brooklyn’s Sarah Cicero spills her soul in song. - ATWOOD MAGAZINE

“....this EP [will] likely be an emotional look in the mirror for many female listeners who are experiencing the tumultuous years of their 20s.” - IMPRESSED MUSIC

“Beyond eloquently telling a 6′ monstrosity to buzz off, Sarah’s music embodies that sad-and-lonely twenty-something energy… But does it with phat bass tone, melodic hooks, and most importantly, sincerity. “ - BUFFALBLOG

LISTEN TO COLD IMMACULATE OPPOSITE : HERE

“.... featuring a number of collaborators in the Brooklyn DIY scene, that embraces all of the uncertainty and nebulousness that is being a twenty-something and is an exercise in both personal healing and community building in action.” - SHE MAKES MUSIC

Brooklyn’s Sarah Cicero has released her breathtaking debut EP Cold Immaculate Opposite out today on all digital services. The EP tackles the uncertainty of being a twenty-something and those in between years, stepping out of childhood, yet not yet completely knowing how to navigate adulthood.  This EP was a collaborative effort between Cicero, her producer Sahil Ansari, and a number of peers from the richly creative Brooklyn DIY scene who worked to help bring the songs to life, all while in isolation. The collaborative effort put into the music during a year of solitude is further proof of how important community is especially, during times of transition.  

“In a year when human connections have been hard to come by, the connectivity experienced when listening to music has helped to keep many of us afloat in the sea of quarantine chaos. For singer-songwriter Sarah Cicero, that creative kinship has come from sharing her own experiences through her music, some of which are far too difficult to process outside of song.”

 - Open the Trunk

The five songs that make up this incredible body of work document the evolution of a young woman’s journey into self-awareness. The songs are as magically complex as Cicero. They tackle themes of loss on the lead-off song “Atticus,” feeling small and unseen on “Indifferent,” to desperation and hitting what feels like rock bottom on “Proud,” then turning to the wistful “At Arms Length” tells the story of that first real love.   Under the Radar Magazine said that  “‘At Arm’s Length’ is possibly her most poignant track yet. Cicero beautifully captures the feeling of your first “real love,” delivering confessional lyrics over a symphonic rush of instrumentation."  The EP is rounded out by Cicero’s version of an empowerment anthem, with “Letter to the Editor,”  directed towards men who think and act like being “tall” is a personality trait. 

“Cicero’s songs, so full of complex emotion, are each a beacon of sonic light and charming effervescence. Her energy is nothing but authentic, and it is with this resonant sense of sincerity that such stunning songs like “At Arm’s Length” and “Letter to the Editor” hit home with Cicero’s audience.” - ATWOOD MAGAZINE

 As for the future, Cicero continues to write on a regular basis and looks forward to what in-person collaborations will yield. 

KEEP UP WITH SARAH CICERO:

 INSTAGRAM || YOUTUBE || SOUNDCLOUD || BANDCAMP

AUSTRALIAN GUITARIST/SONGWRITER HAMISH ANDERSON RELEASES “MORNING LIGHT” TODAY

 AUSTRALIAN GUITARIST/SONGWRITER HAMISH ANDERSON 

RELEASES “MORNING LIGHT” TODAY 

Photo Credit: Ted Eytan

Today, Australian “singer, songwriter and guitar hero” (-Billboard) Hamish Anderson releases “Morning Light”, a 70s style song dripping with rock-n-roll swagger, building from a driving guitar & drum beat to boldly distorted T. Rex meets Rolling Stones tones. It is his first new music since 2019s Out of My Head (winner of Independent Music Award for “Best Blues Album”). 

Following a tour opening for Gary Clark, Jr in his native Australia, Hamish was set to return to the States for a solo U.S. headlining tour in 2020 when COVID created a global lock down.  Finding himself a world away from his scheduled shows and isolated at home in Australia, Hamish didn’t miss a beat. He immediately began performing live stream concerts and video sessions partnering with brands like Guitar World’s “Lesson/Playthrough“,  Martin Guitars “Jam In Place”, amongst others and an invitation to perform on John Lee Hooker Facebook page. He was also featured in the August 2020 issue of Guitar Player. 

Hamish wrote “Morning Light” prior to 2020; but while the world was evolving, this song not only resonated with his audience, but also became an acoustic mantra during all his live stream shows. He shared: “Morning Light” came to me when I was on my first European tour in 2018. I remember I was lying in the back of the van with the sun shining on me when the lyrics and melody just popped into my head.  I had been thinking about all sorts of hard times that everyone has to endure -- and how much of it actually turns out okay. I wanted to capture that feeling of hope that a new day can bring by reminding myself that things will get better - and that these everyday moments really do shine through, if you pay attention.” 

This marks the first collaboration with co-producer David Davis (Miguel, The War on Drugs, Lauren Ruth Ward). “Morning Light" was remotely produced while Hamish was in lockdown in Melbourne, Australia and the band – bassist Lauren Stockner; drummer Matt Musty (Grace Potter, Train); plus soulful backing vocals by Jessica Childress (Aloe Blacc, Allen Stone) - and producer David Davis were in Los Angeles, CA.   

With "Morning Light" Hamish Anderson comes into his own as not only a co-producer; but also tapping into the zeitgeist of the new framework for us all. That everyday moments matter most of all - and it will all be better in the light of the new day. 

To support the single, Hamish will be performing Main Stage at Blues on Broad Beach Festival in Queensland, AUSTRALIA in May with additional shows (both live stream and live in person) to follow. 

KEEP UP WITH HAMISH ANDERSON 

Website || YouTube || Twitter || Facebook || Instagram || Music 

HYPEREXTENSION ANNOUNCES THE LAUNCH OF ITS PUBLISHING DIVISION IN PARTNERSHIP WITH WARNER CHAPPELL MUSIC

HYPEREXTENSION ANNOUNCES THE LAUNCH OF ITS 

 PUBLISHING DIVISION IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

WARNER CHAPPELL MUSIC

Los Angeles-based sync licensing company HyperExtension is excited to announce the launch of its publishing division through a worldwide partnership with Warner Chappell Music, the global publishing arm of Warner Music Group. As part of the deal, Warner Chappell will oversee administration for the new HyperExtension publishing division in addition to offering support for HyperExtension songwriters through its Creative Services department. 

For nearly the past decade, HyperExtension has built a reputation for providing exemplary music from around the world to all platforms of visual media, including film and television, advertising, trailers, and more. The first signings to the new HyperExtension publishing division include Erik Mattiasson (Melpo Mene), Christopher Barnes (Gem Club), and Henry MacLean and Dylan Grossman (Maryanne Bold).  

HyperExtension founder and CEO Rachel Komar started the company with a holistic approach to artist development and sync licensing, with exceptionally artist-friendly deals. The company’s roster is intentionally small and hyper-curated, enabling the team to give each artist the attention they deserve. “I started working in music half of my life ago, finding undeniable musical talent, helping build their careers, and watching them grow,” says Komar. “I am thrilled to have found such a wonderful partner in Warner Chappell. This partnership has opened us up to new opportunities on a global scale, for our growing roster of exceptionally talented writers, all the while respecting and supporting our artists-first ethos.” 

Warner Chappell Music EVP and Global Synchronization Leader, Rich Robinson, added: “We’re always looking to partner with companies that share our approach to getting songwriters heard and supporting them at all stages of their careers. Rachel and the HyperExtension team have curated a talented roster of writers and artists, and we’re excited to join forces to find new opportunities for these incredible songs.”

KEEP UP WITH HYPEREXTENSION

PUBLISHING PLAYLIST || WEBSITE || INSTAGRAM || FACEBOOK || TWITTER

ABOUT HYPEREXTENSION

HyperExtension is a connection between music and visual media. The Los Angeles-based company’s carefully curated roster includes artists from around the world in the genres of rock, pop, ambient, electro, soul, and more. The company’s passion lies in artist development, creatively exposing their roster’s work to new avenues, and developing new revenue streams for their clients.

ABOUT WARNER CHAPPELL

Warner Chappell Music, the global music publishing company of Warner Music Group, is home to a wide array of legendary songwriters and a rich catalog of contemporary hits and influential standards. With offices in more than 20 countries, Warner Chappell provides deep expertise across a range of creative services and the most innovative opportunities for songwriters and copyright holders. Warner Chappell, which has a history dating back more than 200 years, currently publishes and administers music from A-Lin, Angèle, Apache 207, Ava Max, Aya Nakamura, Bruno Mars, Capital Bra, Celeste, Chris Jeday, CJ, Cole Porter, Dan + Shay, Dave, Duran Duran, El Guincho, Fraser T. Smith, Gamble and Huff, Gene Autry Music Group catalog, George Gershwin, George Michael, Grateful Dead, Jasmine Sokko, Jesse & Joy, Justin Tranter, Kacey Musgraves, Katy Perry, Kevin Yi, Kool & the Gang, Led Zeppelin, Lin Xi, Lizzo, Madonna, MNEK, Oscar Holter, Pablo Alborán, Pop Smoke, Quincy Jones, Rauw Alejandro, RAYE, Stormzy, Summer Walker, Ta-You Lo, Thomas Rhett, and Tones and I, among many others.

Follow Warner Chappell Music on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

RYANHOOD PREMIERES NEW SINGLE “UNDER THE LEAVES” VIA POPMATTERS

RYANHOOD PREMIERES NEW SINGLE 

“UNDER THE LEAVES” VIA POPMATTERS   

NEW LP UNDER THE LEAVES OUT ON APRIL 16TH  

Intricate and challenging, Ryan’s acoustic guitarwork creates a steady and solid foundation for Cameron’s lyrics to shine - American Songwriter  

Acoustic fusion aces Ryanhood offer an all-natural shot in the arm with Under the Leaves...Mixing bluegrass speed, jam-ready melodies, and pop-rocking forward momentum, two guys with guitars challenge decades of easy-listening ‘rules.' - Nashville Lifestyles 

The pair continue to innovate on their folk pop brand, bringing a refreshing energy and sweetness into new music that resonates in with that special warmth reserved for acoustic instruments. - Atwood Magazine 

This Tucson, AZ duo really knows how to get your feet tapping while delivering a genuine message about internal reflection - The Indy Review 

Photo: Ehab Tamimi

LISTEN: “UNDER THE LEAVES”   

Award-winning, Tucson, Arizona-based acoustic duo Ryanhood, comprised of Ryan David Green and Cameron Hood, has released “Under The Leaves,” the title track from their forthcoming album, set for release on April 16th. "Continuing their path as Tucson-based trailblazers, their upcoming LP, Under The Leaves, sees Ryanhood exploring news means of innovating their sound,” remarked PopMatters. “Besides acting as composer, vocalist, guitarist, and mandolinist, Green’s also slipped into the project as its sole producer. Throughout, he impresses with the vibrance through which he conveys their collection of strings and harmonies. Taking the vocal lead on the duo’s ritual new single, Hood is a confident navigator. He’s deceptively at-ease as he heartily commands its unusual instrumentation; the track is a swirl of strings and multisided percussion in 5/4 time. Hi lyrical inspiration, meanwhile, explores fresh territory just as well.” 

Lyrically, the song was inspired by the Wendell Berry poem, “Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front,” where he writes: “Ask the questions that have no answers / Invest in the millennium / Plant sequoias / Say that your main crop is the forest that you did not plant, that you will not live to harvest. . . .”In the face of everything fast and new, Berry is talking about cultivating deep, slow roots—something seemingly missing from our modern lives,” explains Hood. “Additionally, Quaker Thomas R. Moore writes, ‘We are bowed down with burdens, crushed under committees, strained, breathless, and hurried, panting through a never-ending program of appointments. . . . [we] postpone till next week that deeper life . . . for this week is much too full.’ And as tempting as it is to call that the curse of the modern life, knowing that he wrote those words in 1941 reveals that our busyness is not something that this wifi, hi-def culture is doing to us, it’s something we’re bringing with us into the culture.” “Under The Leaves” follows the release of previous singles “Wide Awake In A Dream,” “Appy Returns,” and “The Fight.” 

LISTEN: “WIDE AWAKE IN A DREAM” 

LISTEN: “APPY RETURNS” 

LISTEN // WATCH: “THE FIGHT” 

Named ‘Best Group/Duo’ in the 2014 International Acoustic Music Awards, Ryanhood got their first break more than a decade ago as street-performers at Boston’s Quincy Market. They’ve since gone on to perform more than a thousand shows in 45 U.S. states over the past decade, and have shared stages with Jason Mraz, Matt Nathanson, Train, and many more.  

Their latest album, Under the Leaves, sees the lead guitarist Green stepping into the role of sole producer, weaving a tapestry of lush strings and rich harmonies. The album, like their shows, is driven by strong acoustic guitar performances and is at turns energetic, hopeful, and quietly moving—a musical invitation to breathe, and to soak in a river of melodies and harmonic hooks.  

Hood, the band’s primary lyricist, has waded into those musical rivers with dream-like verses about seeds and forests, breath and wind, and the cycles and seasons that frame our lives. Throughout the album’s songs, a question is asked: How do we create meaningful and lasting change in a world filled with division and turmoil? The offer on Under the Leaves is to slow down and face the one thing we have the power to change - ourselves - as the duo sings on the album’s second track, “the only revolution is the one within.”  

Under The Leaves will be available digitally, as well as on vinyl and CD. The band has also written a companion book, featuring essays and stories behind the songs, expanded artwork, and photography that is also available for purchase. Click HERE to order. 

UPCOMING SHOW DATES: 

4/11 Tucson Folk Festival 2021 - Tucson, AZ 

4/16 - Under The Leaves, Under The Stars - Tucson, AZ  

4/17 - Under The Leaves, Under The Stars - Tucson, AZ 

5/30 - MeadowGrass Music Festival - Colorado Springs, CO 

CONNECT WITH RYANHOOD:   

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || TWITTER || BANDCAMP || YOUTUBE || SPOTIFY   

AWARD-WINNING MUSIC DOCUMENTARY PARALLEL LOVE: THE STORY OF A BAND CALLED LUXURY ARRIVES AT STREAMING PLATFORMS MAY 18th

AWARD-WINNING MUSIC DOCUMENTARY

PARALLEL LOVE: THE STORY OF A BAND CALLED LUXURY

ARRIVES AT STREAMING PLATFORMS MAY 18th 

“…an eye-opener” - NPR

PARALLEL LOVE TRAILER || WATCH  

The award-winning documentary Parallel Love: The Story of a Band Called Luxury will be available on digital platforms including iTunes and Amazon beginning May 18th, 2021 via Random Media.

Directed by Matt Hinton (PBS documentary “Awake My Soul: The Story of The Sacred Harp”), the film follows the path of Luxury, a band from small-town Georgia, who, on the cusp of success, suffer a devastating touring wreck with long-term consequences. In the intervening years, they continue to make records and three members of the band become Eastern Orthodox priests. Through interviews and archival footage, Parallel Love tells the gripping and poignant story of Luxury and documents the making of a new record, Trophies, now as priests.

The film first delighted audiences in the summer of 2019 with a theatrical release via Abramorama earning accolades in the media (NPR Weekend Edition Saturday feature; “Vibrant. Full of surprises.” -Film Threat; “I couldn’t take my eyes off it. A brilliant tribute.” -Paste Magazine) and film festivals including “Best in Fest” for the Covellite International Film Festival and “Audience Award” of the Gasparilla Film Festival.

ABOUT MATT HINTON:  Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, Matt Hinton grew up loving movies but believed that rock n roll was the more realistic career path. While playing in various bands, he studied Religion and Philosophy at Georgia State University, followed by graduate school at Emory University where he studied Theology. While teaching Religion at Morehouse and Spelman Colleges in Atlanta, he produced, directed (with his wife, Erica Hinton) and edited “Awake, My Soul: The Story of the Sacred Harp (2008),” his first feature documentary that aired on PBS. “Parallel Love: The Story of a Band Called Luxury” is his second full length documentary film.

ABOUT LUXURY: Chris Foley (bass), Lee Bozeman (vocals), Jamey Bozeman (guitar) and Glenn Black (drums) formed Luxury in the early 90s as a post-punk band influenced by The Smiths and Fugazi. Matt Hinton joined the band in 1999 finalizing their current line-up. After signing to Tooth & Nail for their debut release Amazing and Thank You (1995), Luxury was poised to move to the next level when fate intervened, and a touring wreck changed their fortunes as well as their ambitions. Luxury convalesced and regrouped to put out two additional albums The Latest & The Greatest (1996) and Luxury (1999) before (temporarily) calling it quits. The focus shifted from stardom to family, while Chris, Lee and Jamey also pursued their own path to Orthodox priesthood. Six years later, the band reconvened for their fourth effort Health And Sport (2005). Following a decade long break, the band reconvened to work on material for 2019s Trophies, their latest full length offering. Earlier this year, Luxury released the EP One-Sided on vinyl. Luxury is currently in the studio working on a new album due in late 2021.

ABOUT RANDOM MEDIA: Random Media is a content company that acquires and distributes films on a worldwide basis through movie theatres, digital platforms, cable, satellite, and television networks and through conventional brick and mortar retailers. Random Media is known for its commitment to building strong, supportive relationships with its filmmakers. The companies’ library includes over 200 films, including the acclaimed films: Hoaxed,  Killswitch: The Battle for the Internet,  Fare,  House by the Lake and  Yamasong: March of the Hollows. 

KEEP UP WITH PARALLEL LOVE THE DOCUMENTARY

Website || Facebook || Twitter || Spotify

DAVID COOK ANNOUNCES FULL BAND SHOWS TO SUPPORT THE LOOKING GLASS EP RELEASE IN APRIL AND U.S. TOUR DATES IN SEPTEMBER

DAVID COOK ANNOUNCES FULL BAND SHOWS TO SUPPORT

THE LOOKING GLASS EP RELEASE IN APRIL

AND U.S. TOUR DATES IN SEPTEMBER

Photo Credit: Jake Harsh Photography

 SINGLE “FIRE” OUT TODAY || LISTEN 

NASHVILLE, TENN. – Musician/actor David Cook announces first performances with a full band in over a year to support his highly anticipated EP The Looking Glass (out April 16, 2021). Broadcast on concert live streaming platform Mandolin from Ocean Way Studios in Nashville, he will perform three shows: Sunday, April 18th, The Looking Glass EP release show; Sunday, May 2nd, a fundraiser to benefit The National Brain Tumor Society; and Sunday, May 16th, an extended set highlighting his newer offerings and additional songs from his catalog. All shows to begin at 7 pm CT and tickets are available at the BOX OFFICE.

David is also happy to announce the U.S. leg of his 2021 tour beginning September 11th in Cincinnati and continuing to the Northeast before wrapping in Columbus, OH on September 25th. It will be followed by his previously announced co-headline tour with Kris Allend billed as “Dave & Kris Go to Europe Acoustic Tour” scheduled for October 2021.

The Looking Glass EP is a six-song set recorded in Nashville with producer Andy Skib. Earlier this week, David premiered the third single “Fire” on Parade Magazine: “[‘Fire’] combines a driving rhythm with a jubilant sense of want that is palpable.”

In 2020, David released two singles from the EP. The first, “Reds Turn Blue,” a nod to the manic highs (reds) and lows (blues) of anxiety, something David has struggled to overcome since his season seven win on American Idol. As David told People.com, “This song became a therapeutic process for me, as a way to personify my anxiety and make it something other than me — which in an odd way has helped me navigate my relationship with it.” To capture that struggle, David worked with artist Justin A. Nixon to create a visual that was, “sci-fi and sinister” but left open-ended to represent “that constant battle between anxiety and myself.”

And the second, “Strange World,” is “my homage to this year,” said David. “Staring out of windows at the world outside, feeling disconnected from it, and trying to find those moments that would normally exist outside, inside.” 

The Looking Glass EP will be released on April 16, 2021 with live stream and tour dates to follow.

LIVE STREAM CONCERTS VIA MANDOLIN

PURCHASE TICKETS HERE

APRIL 18 / EP RELEASE SHOW @ 7 pm CT

MAY 2 / FUNDRAISER FOR THE NATIONAL BRAIN TUMOR SOCIETY @ 7 pm CT

MAY 16 / EXTENDED SET OF FROM HIS CATALOG @ 7 pm CT

U.S. TOUR DATES

SEPT 11 / CINCINNATI, OH @ Ludlow Garage

SEPT 12 / CANTON, OH @ The Auricle Outdoors

SEPT 15 / NORTHAMPTON, MA @ Iron Horse

SEPT 16 / DERRY, NH @ Tupelo Hall

SEPT 17 / CAMBRIDGE, MA @ Sonia

SEPT 18 / NORFOLK, CT @ Infinity Hall

SEPT 20 / NEW YORK, NY @ City Winery

SEPT 21 / PHILADELPHIA, PA @ City Winery

SEPT 23 / ANNAPOLIS, MD @ Ram’s Head

SEPT 24 / PITTSBURGH, PA @ Thunderbird

SEPT 25 / COLUMBUS, OH @ Rumba Cafe

THE LOOKING GLASS EP || PRE-SAVE

RELEASE DATE:  APRIL 16, 2021

“REDS TURN BLUE” OUT NOW SPOTIFY || YOUTUBE

 “STRANGE WORLD” OUT NOW SPOTIFY || YOUTUBE

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BEN COSGROVE’S NEW SINGLE “OVERPASS” OUT TODAY NEW LP THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS OUT ON APRIL 23RD

BEN COSGROVE’S NEW SINGLE

“OVERPASS” OUT TODAY

NEW LP THE TROUBLE WITH WILDERNESS

 OUT ON APRIL 23RD 

An impressionistic ode to the life that grows between the urban cracks…Cosgrove works solely in abstracts, using minimalism and deeper concepts to paint portraits with a soft, muted palette - WBUR 

The expansiveness and thrill…is illustrative of Cosgrove’s musical vision. The push and pull of dynamics, the utilization of the whole range of the piano and the dense, sweeping pianism makes ‘Templates For Limitless Fields of Grass’ well… limitless - Sound Of Boston

LISTEN TO “OVERPASS” via SOUNDCLOUD // SPOTIFY

 Pianist/composer Ben Cosgrove has released “Overpass,” the newest single from his forthcoming LP The Trouble With Wilderness, set for release on April 23rd. Each track on the album is about finding beauty in everyday spaces - not just places "set aside" for their scenic attributes, like natural parks, but in the cracks of sidewalks and rusted building structures and anywhere else our eyes land. "Overpass" was inspired by a big interstate highway that ran between the town where Cosgrove sheltered-in-place last year and the river beside it. Of the song, he says: "I was struck again and again by the absolute jungles of plant life exploding from all its edges, particularly under all the various little bridges that carried the highway over little streams and roads and such. It’s centered on that guitar-like repeated pattern at the beginning, but as the song goes on, its focus broadens to all these hazy, raw, interesting textures at the edges of the melody – much like the plants growing from the concrete, or like watching the landscape change as you drive down a highway.” “Overpass” follows the release of album tracks “Templates For Limitless Fields Of Grass” and “The Machine In The Garden.”

“TEMPLATES FOR LIMITLESS FIELDS OF GRASS”

 SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD

“THE MACHINE IN THE GARDEN”

 SPOTIFY // SOUNDCLOUD

The Trouble With Wilderness is a lush, textured, and expansive set of 12 new songs that consider the role of nature and wildness in the built environment. Cosgrove has spent a lot of his career in collaborations and artist residencies with national parks, performing solo across the lower 48, and all of his solo compositions have been centered around those kinds of areas - until now. With the new LP, he encourages us to recognize beauty in the smallest blades of grass breaking through pavement, and in structures that have been overtaken by the wildness of nature. You can hear this when you listen to the album's tracks, as he distills his observations and brings them to acoustic, percussive life on his keyboard. 

“I found I was spending a lot of time on stage talking about national parks and oceans and wilderness areas, and not enough about the places that people are more likely to encounter in their everyday lives,” explains Cosgrove. The new songs illuminate his unique position as a musician suspended somewhere between genres: “I’m either a singer-songwriter who doesn’t sing, or I’m a composer who behaves like a singer-songwriter,” he has said in more than one interview, and his chatty, disarming stage presence would certainly make him seem more like a folk musician than a classical pianist. In addition to his solo instrumental work, Cosgrove regularly tours, records, and collaborates with artists from across the worlds of folk, rock, and Americana music, and while some moments on the album recall the work of George Winston, Keith Jarrett, Nils Frahm, or Ludovico Einaudi, his extensive experiences performing with bands like Ghost of Paul Revere are evident in more percussive, rhythmic songs like “The Machine in the Garden,” "Overpass," and “This Rush of Beauty and This Sense of Order.” “I think the practice of formally or informally dividing the world up into a bunch of conventionally beautiful ‘natural’ parts and another bunch of utilitarian, unpretty, ‘unnatural’ ones is one of our society’s more misguided and lastingly harmful tendencies,” Cosgrove notes in the album’s liner notes.

The songs on The Trouble With Wilderness, faithful to this concept, are characterized by their textural contrasts and striking juxtapositions: ethereal and asymmetrical clouds blooming above a churning and insistent piano pattern, tapped and plucked noises from all over the inside of a piano snapping wildly over a graceful bassline, or delirious, ecstatic arpeggios that slowly burst free of their constraints. The production by indie-folk maestro Dan Cardinal (Josh Ritter, Darlingside, Lula Wiles, Session Americana, The Ballroom Thieves) both emphasizes the physicality of the instruments involved and elevates the sounds to places that are uncannily gorgeous and sometimes almost surreal. The result is an uncommonly beautiful set of songs and a massive step forward in Cosgrove’s idiosyncratic and increasingly mature body of work. Like the vernacular landscapes he looked to in composing it, the music on The Trouble With Wilderness sits on the narrow balancing point between order and wildness and manages to lean simultaneously into both.

CONNECT WITH BEN COSGROVE:  

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OUT TODAY: MELISSA CARPER’S NEW LP DADDY’S COUNTRY GOLD

OUT TODAY:   

MELISSA CARPER’S NEW LP 

 DADDY’S COUNTRY GOLD 

Not unlike Loretta Lynn, Melissa Carper is giving us scenes and stories and vignettes that kind of play out between home and the honky-tonk  - NPR  

Daddy’s Country Gold showcases Carper’s ability to stretch out a note or a phrase to pull at our hearts, and her artful way of delivering a lyric with the just-right emotional power imbues these songs with a power that stays with us long after the final notes fade. - Folk Alley 

Singer-bassist Melissa Carper sounds like a voice from a bygone era...Evoking the cool, smoky croon of a lounge singer, Carper gives some winking commentary about having a good time. - Rolling Stone Country  

It’s a tricky thing that Carper has done. She clearly revels in recreating the music of her heroes, carefully preserving the sense of romance and immediacy of the old classics. Yet by bringing her own experiences into the canon, she is unearthing a history that includes so many more of us, finally allowed to speak out through memories forgotten due to silence and taboo. - No Depression  

Yearning, stone cold country - Wide Open Country 

Through two previous solo albums and three side bands, Melissa Carper's worked a number of styles to find the fit for her voice, and it finally comes together spectacularly with Daddy's Country Gold. - The Austin Chronicle 

The album is real deal country music, the kind that dabbles freely in blues and jazz and swing, and it funnels every ounce of charm and honeysuckle that Carper lends to her ensemble work and amplifies it exponentially - The Arkansas Times 

Daddy’s County Gold stays light on its feet, and Carper sings with ease...Carper is a first-rate songwriter, as her new music demonstrates. - Nashville Scene 

There's so much to recommend about Daddy's Country Gold, the dazzling new album by out singer/songwriter Melissa Carper, it's hard to know where to begin. - The Bay Area Reporter 

A new batch of songs from Melissa Carper is something to smile and rub your hands together about like waiting for permission to cut into an apple pie. - Saving Country Music 

Right away, you can tell that you’re in for an album that is much different than what you might ordinarily hear. - Glide Magazine 

Melissa Carper has made a perfect album…A daring array of players and special guests accompany Carper across a dozen tracks dressed to the nines in clean, cool jazz-infused hillbilly serenades that linger in the air like fresh-cut hay. - Sound and Soul 

As a dish cooked up with the spice of many talented hands, there rightfully should be a line out the door to sample this new album by Melissa Carper…it’ll meet all your expectations for classic country music with a dose of carefree humor.  -  Americana Highways 

Melissa Carper is a talented singer-songwriter and upright bass player who is worth our intention - Americana-UK 

We’re not only making new memories when listening to Melissa Carper’s latest…but we’re revisiting old ones thanks to the sweet, sentimental sound of…Daddy’s Country Gold - TrunkSpace 

There’s something so absolutely refreshing about straightforward, old-fashioned playing. An homage at points, but very much of Carper’s sound…the right amount of rascally sweetness of a country night out. - Country Queer 

LISTEN: DADDY’S COUNTRY GOLD   

Today, singer/songwriter and upright bassist Melissa Carper has released her critically-acclaimed new LP Daddy’s Country Gold; the album debuted in the Top 50 on the Americana Radio Charts, and that position continues to climb. “She obviously… has such a perfectly executed vintage sound on this album, but she’s very subtly subverting the form,” said Robin Hilton of NPR. “Daddy’s Country Gold—the image that it might bring to mind is that of reaching back to songs and stories and styles handed down, and that is one layer of it for her…but it also is a reference to her own wonderfully butch nickname,” added NPR’s Jewly Hight. “There are elements of stoicism and sentimentality and pining, just like you hear from Loretta Lynn on her album, but I enjoy the fact that you can…hear Melissa Carper do a song like ‘Old Fashioned Gal’ using the language of kind of classic country and pop and jazz and making explicit in whimsical, playful ways that at the person she’s envisioning is a woman.”  

As Folk Alley noted in the album’s premiere, "We don’t have to dig very deep into Melissa Carper’s rich vein of songwriting and sing before we hit gold, for from the opening note on her new album her shimmering and pure vocals and the lush instrumental carpet on which her voice floats glimmer with a vibrant sheen that tells us we’ve struck it rich here.” “On Daddy’s Country Gold, Melissa Carper demonstrates why the Great American Songbook has been so enduring. While Carper’s effortless bass lines and her band’s elegant piano accents recall an era we now call ‘classy,’ it’s Carper’s ingenious songwriting that takes the spotlight,” No Depression said. "Daddy’s Country Gold isn’t simply an easygoing album with a vintage sound; for Carper, it’s an effort to retrieve stories deliberately buried in the past…By using sounds straight from the past, she is queering history.” 

Carper’s refreshingly unique style calls to mind greats like Kitty Wells, Billie Holiday, Loretta Lynn, and Janis Joplin, beautifully conveyed in the grooves of the album’s 12 sparkling gems. She enlisted fellow bassist Dennis Crouch (The Time Jumpers) and producer/engineer Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes, Margo Price) to co-produce the album and bring her dream to life. Recorded live to tape at Tokic’s analog studio wonderland The Bomb Shelter in Nashville, the album features Crouch (bass), Chris Scruggs (guitar, steel guitar), Jeff Taylor (piano, organ, accordion), Matty Meyer (drums, percussion), Billy Contreras (fiddle), with guest appearances from Brennen Leigh, Sierra Ferrell, and legendary pedal steel maestro Lloyd Green.  

WATCH: “I ALMOST FORGOT ABOUT YOU” 

 WATCH: “MAKIN’ MEMORIES” 

Daddy’s Country Gold is just that—twelve glittering Carper originals of the country, western swing, and jazz variety. From the first notes of album opener “Makin’ Memories,” to the whimsical “Would You Like To Get Some Goats,” and the heart-wrenching tenderness of album closer “The Stars Are Aligned,” Carper’s lifetime of work, experience, and wanderlust culminates in a beautiful portrait of heartfelt music, written by a road-lovin’ gal who has lived these songs and spent her life playing music for folks that still love the real thing. 

As a child, Carper, who acquired the nickname “Daddy” years ago from her bandmates for always knowing how to “take care of ‘bidness’,” would lay her head underneath the family record player as she listened to Hank Williams, Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, and other greats from her parents’ collection. After a childhood spent in her family’s country band and a stint in the University of Nebraska’s music department, the wayfaring Carper found herself in the historic town of Eureka Springs, Arkansas, learning to busk with the old country songs she loved as a child. She soon relocated to music hubs like New Orleans, New York City, Austin, and eventually Nashville, founding award-winning bands like power trio The Carper Family, playing festivals and gigs across the globe. Carper also holds a spot in award-winning Arkansas foursome Sad Daddy, and founded roots duo Buffalo Gals with Sad Daddy bandmate and girlfriend Rebecca Patek. 

Daddy’s Country Gold is available digitally, on CD, and vinyl. Click HERE to purchase. Be sure to catch Melissa Carper perform live on Facebook on Monday, March 22nd at 6:00 pm CDT as part of The Boot’s Live & Socially Distant series streamed HERE and HERE. You can also see Melissa Carper perform with Rebecca Patek in their duo The Buffalo Gals on Wednesdays at 6:30pm CDT, streamed live HERE.  

UPCOMING TOUR DATES 

March 19 -  Austin, TX @ Sagebrush - 7pm CDT (outdoors)  

May 21 - Little Rock, AR @ Fassler Hall - 5pm CDT (outdoors)  

May 22 - Eureka Springs, AR @ Gotahold Brewing - 4pm CDT (outdoors) 

June 17 - Nashville, TN @ Station Inn - 8pm CDT (indoors & live stream)  

CONNECT WITH MELISSA CARPER:   

WEBSITE || FACEBOOK || INSTAGRAM || BANDCAMP || YOUTUBE || SPOTIFY   

GIRLS WRITE NASHVILLE ANNOUNCES MARCH 28TH SING THROUGH THE QUARANTINE DRIVE-IN LISTENING PARTY EVENT & KICKS OFF SPRING FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN

GIRLS WRITE NASHVILLE ANNOUNCES  

MARCH 28TH SING THROUGH THE QUARANTINE DRIVE-IN LISTENING PARTY EVENT 

& KICKS OFF SPRING FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN  

CONNECT WITH GIRLS WRITE NASHVILLE: 

Website || Facebook || Instagram || Twitter || Bandcamp || SoundCloud 

Today, Nashville-based, nationally-acclaimed 501c(3) Girls Write Nashville* kicks off their spring fundraising effort, which will continue until March 28th. Donations will go toward future free programming for Title I schools. Supporters will receive an advance copy of the album, merchandise, perks, and access to additional virtual concerts and workshops. Click HERE to donate.  

Girls Write Nashville is also thrilled to share “Toxic Love,” the single from the program’s newest student-written and produced album Sing Through The Quarantine. “Toxic Love” was written and performed by 8th grader and program participant Gentry Wooten. The album is set for release on March 26th and will be celebrated with a Drive-In Listening Party on March 28th at the United Way of Greater Nashville. The album will be broadcast in full from 3pm-4pm CST via WXNA’s Teen Power Radio Hour. Click HERE for more listening party information.  

LISTEN: “TOXIC LOVE”  

Each season, students enrolled in the program work with professional female artist mentors, learn to write and produce original music in a supportive community of peers, and are guided through the vulnerable process of releasing that work into the world. Due to the onset of COVID-19, the program, like countless others, was forced to adapt as Safer-At-Home initiatives began just as the students were preparing to record. Girls Write Nashville pivoted and arranged a remote-recording project and created a full suite of low-cost virtual classes for K-12 students. Students each wrote a “song from quarantine,” then worked, for the first time in program history, on recording their own songs at home, using a cloud-based recording app. Songs were then sent to local female studio musicians to help complete the tracks. The result is an inspiring, entirely remotely-recorded album of youth-written songs about life in 2020 that ranged from rap and spoken word pieces about racial justice to a cheeky trance-pop take on toxic relationships and social distancing, a screamo-metal catharsis about the pandemic, and bittersweet, beautiful embraces of the full emotional range of loneliness and isolation.  

“So much of the value of Girls Write Nashville is in learning leadership skills: becoming artistically resilient, speaking authentically, advocating for your voice, and overcoming self-doubt and fear of rejection,” says program co-founder Jen Starsinic. “Not making a record this year really wasn’t an option to us. It just didn’t seem within our mission or what we try to teach and model for our participants.”    

“Being in this program brought so much excitement to my day,” commented one young participant. “I really looked forward to this safe space where I could be creative and have a good time. I learned more about music and how much effort it really takes. I really appreciate music more now. I have had the opportunity to express my thoughts and feelings in my melodies and verses. Girls Write Nashville is the best program yet! Thank you to all the loving and amazing people involved.” 

Girls Write Nashville and their co-ed wing Loudmouth Community Music currently offer free Girls Write Nashville programs to certain MNPS schools, their Girls Write Nashville All-City Mentorship program open to all students in Davidson County, and low-cost ($20-40/month) co-ed Loudmouth Community Music K-2nd, 3rd-5th grade, and middle and high school classes. All programs are taught by the organization’s trained trauma-informed teachers using original modernized music education curriculum focusing on songwriting and production and guided by the values of equity and empowerment. Interested students should go to www.girlswritenashville.com to complete a basic registration information form and will be contacted by a staff member to coordinate enrollment.    

*ABOUT GIRLS WRITE NASHVILLE:  

Girls Write Nashville is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit whose mission is to empower expression and build a creative music community and mentorship for girls. Started in 2016 as a community arts project on a $2,800 Metro Arts THRIVE grant, it has since grown into a vibrant small nonprofit start-up serving over 200 students and has been featured on NBC’s Today Show, USA Today, The Tennessean, The Nashville Scene, and American Songwriter Magazine, amongst others. It is proud to be one of the only music education organizations nation-wide designed from the ground up to ensure the values of equity and empowerment in its program structure and curriculum. 

By focusing on community-building, authenticity, and the vulnerability of creative risk-taking, Girls Write Nashville participants not only receive a world-class music and songwriting education, but they find their voice: building the confidence, leadership, self-advocacy, and social-emotional skills needed to truly thrive as human beings in any arena.  

The organization is honored for support from partners such as Morris Light & Sound, USA Today Network/Gannett Foundation, Hattie B’s, Predators Foundation, Bart Durham Injury Law, Fanny’s House of Music, Green Iris Records, BMI Foundation, D’addario Foundation, and Alphagraphics.  

RYANHOOD PREMIERES SINGLE "WIDE AWAKE IN A DREAM" VIA ATWOOD MAGAZINE

RYANHOOD PREMIERES SINGLE 

"WIDE AWAKE IN A DREAM" VIA ATWOOD MAGAZINE  

NEW LP UNDER THE LEAVES OUT ON APRIL 16TH 

Intricate and challenging, Ryan’s acoustic guitarwork creates a steady and solid foundation for Cameron’s lyrics to shine - American Songwriter 

This Tucson, AZ duo really knows how to get your feet tapping while delivering a genuine message about internal reflection - The Indy Review 

Photo: Ehab Tamimi

LISTEN: “WIDE AWAKE IN A DREAM”   

Award-winning, Tucson, Arizona-based acoustic duo Ryanhood has released “Wide Awake In A Dream,” a poignant new track from their forthcoming album, Under The Leaves, set for release on April 16th. “It’s getting to be that special time of renewal and rejuvenation – and while the COVID-19 pandemic continues to rage throughout the United State and around the world, we’re beginning to see a faint light at the end of a very long tunnel. It’s time for a breath of fresh air, and today that comes in the form of Ryanhood’s achingly expressive new single,” said Atwood Magazine in their premiere. “A breathtaking folk ballad full of bright acoustics and soaring violin work, ‘Wide Awake In A Dream’ captures love’s dreamy wonder with elegancy and delicate grace.” 

“I was thinking about those big, almost painfully-big feelings at the beginning of a relationship,” lead guitarist Ryan David Green told Atwood Magazine. “Shortly after I graduated from college (Berklee College of Music in Boston), I met the girl who would later become my wife. I taught her weekly guitar lessons, and she would come and help sell our CDs when we street performed at Quincy Market. I had a huge crush on her but didn’t tell her for the longest time. This song is about those times, laying awake at night, filled with those huge feelings, but not yet having revealed them.” “Lyrically, Ryan is painting dreamlike worlds,” bandmate Cameron Hood said, adding, “and I think that’s a good metaphor for what he’s done with the melodies, rhythms, electric guitars, and string sections of this whole album.” 

“Wide Awake In A Dream” follows the release of fiery instrumental jam “Appy Returns” and lead single “The Fight.” “‘The Fight’ and its intellectualism is a strange though perfectly complementary companion to its mainstream indiepop sensibility,” said American Songwriter of the song. “While the rhythm clutches the primal hunger for melodicism, the subject matter challenges you to reach in deep and ponder what it takes to achieve peace, eventually encircling the truth that change can only come from within.” 

LISTEN: “APPY RETURNS”  

LISTEN // WATCH: “THE FIGHT” 

Named ‘Best Group/Duo’ in the 2014 International Acoustic Music Awards, Ryanhood got their first break more than a decade ago as street-performers at Boston’s Quincy Market. They’ve since gone on to perform more than a thousand shows in 45 U.S. states over the past decade, and have shared stages with Jason Mraz, Matt Nathanson, Train, and many more.  

Their latest album, Under the Leaves, sees the lead guitarist Green stepping into the role of sole producer, weaving a tapestry of lush strings and rich harmonies. The album, like their shows, is driven by strong acoustic guitar performances and is at turns energetic, hopeful, and quietly moving—a musical invitation to breathe, and to soak in a river of melodies and harmonic hooks.  

Hood, the band’s primary lyricist, has waded into those musical rivers with dream-like verses about seeds and forests, breath and wind, and the cycles and seasons that frame our lives. Throughout the album’s songs, a question is asked: How do we create meaningful and lasting change in a world filled with division and turmoil? The offer on Under the Leaves is to slow down and face the one thing we have the power to change - ourselves - as the duo sings on the album’s second track, “the only revolution is the one within.”  

Under The Leaves will be available digitally, as well as on vinyl and CD. The band has also written a companion book, featuring essays and stories behind the songs, expanded artwork, and photography that is also available for purchase. Click HERE to order. 

CONNECT WITH RYANHOOD:   

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