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The Deep Hollow // Weary Traveler (October 26th)

If there is one thing we can learn from Shawshank Redemption, it is this: we have to either get busy living or get busy dying. Americana trio The Deep Hollow are firmly planted in the former. Through their sophomore record, Weary Traveler, Micah Walk, Liz Eckert and Dave Littrell dig into this sorrowful life of getting older, longing for a stable home and the sometimes unbearable weight of the open road. Sonically, the band fits somewhere between the pulse of Patty Griffin and John Prine and the adventure of Jason Isbell, The Lone Bellow and Brandi Carlile.

With the assist from producer Gary Gordon (Montgomery Gentry, David Davis & the Warrior River Boys), the band shoots for a much grander sound than their 2016 self-titled debut. “I wasn’t totally sold on having a fuller sound. I was a little nervous going in,” Walk admits. “I was prepared to do it the way we did the last one. I’m really happy with the way it turned out, but it is a little different than our debut.”

Plump cello, violins, and muddy guitar intensify the stories, which are cut from both their personal lives and through the eyes of strangers. “Freedom Street,” which features Gordon tapping on a suitcase for some mellow palpitations, is another one of great misery among the bunch, depicting the reality of homelessness and glossed over with considerably charged political and religious overtones.

The trio play off each other quite effectively, often trading songwriting credits, too, and with each honest-to-goodness, off-the-cuff life lesson they share, they bare witness to life’s most critical points. “Real Life” imparts sage advice from an older generation and sets the tone for a sojourn smack dab into the eye of the storm. Much later, “Misplaced Love” further questions the nature of their reality as framed in religion, leaving the listener with even more questions than when the story first started.

The cruelty of life comes to a head on “Anna’s Gone,” a somber, string-laden ballad about a green-eyed girl named Anna who commits suicide. “Now, I stay up way too late thinking about what went wrong / And what I could have said to make her see she belonged / And that she wasn’t better off dead,” Littrell mourns. It’s a performance that pierces the soul and one you’re not likely able to scrub from your memory.

“How to Make a Living” slides into a similar refrain of heart-torn pain, as the band grapples with the monotony of small town life.  “I’ve been working at the lumber yard / But I ain’t fit to do the work that real men are,” sings Walk, Eckert and Littrell sweeping in to aid with hard-boiled, tight-knit three-part harmony. “I just stand behind a counter all day long / Trying to figure out where it all went wrong.”

The Deep Hollow came together as you might expect. Staples of the local music scene of Springfield, Illinois, Walk, and Littrell has an especially long list of previous credits and musical explorations, from collaborating in other Americana bands to touring extensively in a prog-rock band. Notably, Walk worked on a project with Jamie Candiloro, whose biggest collaborators include Ryan Adams, Willie Nelson, and The Eagles, among others. Eckert comes from a predominantly community theatre background, and she did try out for American Idol once and made it all the way to Hollywood. While her star wasn’t catapulted into the stratosphere then, her talents would come of great use around town, leading her to serve as a fill-in for a cover band, a side project of Walk’s. The two would strike an instant chemistry, and the duo formed in 2013.

Sometime later, when Littrell was itching to try out some new tunes he wrote, he turned to the duo ahead of an upcoming show. With no rehearsal, the trio hit the stage and something truly stupendous happened. A smooth blend of three-part harmonies poured out and set the foundation for an already impressive catalog of work together. “That was when we knew what we wanted next,” remembers Walk.

It was the song “Devil” that proved to be groundbreaking for them. They submitted it to American Songwriter’s 30th Anniversary Song Contest and ended up winning. “Not to sound jaded or disheartened or anything, but when you apply for a lot of contests for a few years and you maybe make it through a round or something, you almost assume nothing is going to come of it. We were excited to just be a finalist. When we won, it was like holy cow.”

They went on to play the City Winery to celebrate, performing alongside Jim Lauderdale, Jason Isbell, and John Oates. Then they hunkered down and made their debut record which included the award-winning track. They toured, they grew as songwriters, they developed their relationship as a band and wrote more music.

All that led them here.

Weary Traveler, recorded in Inside Out Studios in Sparta, Illinois, is not only a grainy snapshot of life but their ever-transforming live performance style, too. “I think that was just the way we were evolving live. We just decided to record the album that way,” says Walk. That feeling of being truly, unquestionably alive keeps the album afloat even in the darkest of times.

Heartache is often their primary muse, but they don’t get completely lost in it. There are several moments of clarity, including with such love songs as “Now I See,” “Wide Open Road” and “Hangin’ On.” They are well-earned payoffs for all of life’s doom and gloom, allowing the band to fully display the vastness of life itself. Quite simply, The Deep Hollow’s second album shines with catastrophe and hope, suffering and relief, desolation and contentment.

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“Music and art can be the vehicle through which we can have a conversation.” – B-Sides & Badlands

“Classic Midwestern Americana vibes with traditional folk energy. Think stripped-down guitar-playing, three-part harmonies, and award-winning songwriting.” – Cowboys & Indians Magazine

“Vocal magic” – Goodnight Hestia

“Sonically, the band fits somewhere between the pulse of Patty Griffin and John Prine and the adventure of Jason Isbell, The Lone Bellow and Brandi Carlile.” – Imperfect Fifth

“Hauntingly beautiful.” – Rock the Pigeon

Publicist: Rachel Hurley

“Rachel has to be one of the hardest working people in the business. When an artist signs on with a publicist, there are really no guarantees. The best thing you can do is hire someone with Rachel’s focus and work ethic. I don’t know how many campaigns she was working on simultaneously, but the quality of her service honestly made us feel like we were her only client during our campaign. She provided extremely prompt communication when we had a question or concern and most importantly, she provided results. ” Micah Walk

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Mad Crush // Mad Crush (November 16)

You could say Mad Crush know a thing or two about music. Only years of experience can explain the wry wit and complimentary musicianship of the songs on the band’s forthcoming, self-titled debut album. One part June Carter sassing Johnny Cash along with two dashes of Itzhak Perlman on a midnight hayride, Mad Crush’s songs contain theatrical, back-and-forth performances between their singing protagonists Joanna Sattin and John Elderkin. Complete with humor and heartbreak, their songs are in fact bright little dramas about fussing, fighting, and occasionally making up—universal truths sprinkled with brand-new magic dust.

Hailing from Chapel Hill, N.C., Mad Crush brings together five talented players whose previous credits are widely varied. Drummer Chuck Garrison started as indie-legend Superchunk’s drummer, and he has toured the world with them and also with his later bands Pipe and Zen Frisbee. He has played in support of such luminaries as Sonic Youth, Screaming Trees, and Mudhoney, among others. Violinist Laura Thomas has worked with a bevy of heavyweights, from Ray Charles, Jay Z, and Judy Collins to acclaimed R.E.M. producer Mitch Easter, Itzhak Perlman, and Hilary Hahn. Singer John Elderkin’s songwriting has been praised by SPIN, Billboard, Jon Pareles of The New York Times, R.E.M. producer Don Dixon, and Cashbox. He has recorded with such VIPs as Stuart Lehrman (The Roaches, Paul Simon), Brian Paulson (Wilco, Son Volt, Superchunk) and Chris Stamey (Whiskeytown, Big Star). Ingenious electric guitarist Mark Whelan is a stalwart of the local music scene, having played in The Popes and The Veldt, among many other bands. And newcomer Joanna Sattin brings the hot, remarkable vocal delivery that gives the band its “certain something.”

Mad Crush, the album, operates under the guise of indie-folk, oiled to perfection with lyrics inspired by Elderkin’s desire “to get to the heart of what matters—how we deal with getting what we want in life, and also how we deal with losing it.” In this way, songs that first appear to be about romance are also roadmaps to much grander stories. For example, in the smooth-talking opener “Time for a Love Song,” Elderkin’s braggadocious leading man declares his infatuation for Sattin’s cynical woman, in much the same spirit of Tony Award winning playwright and lyricist Joe DiPietro’s popular 1996 musical, I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change. In lieu of shaded caricatures of modern love, Elderkin plants his characters in real, relatable situations and repeatedly employs humor as a way to expose his own insecurities.

With “Northern Lights,” Sattin takes the lead for the set’s most emotional moment. Her first time recording vocals for a full band, her performance here is a marvelous demonstration of true talent. “Joanna just owns it. The song would not work without her,” says Elderkin. Violinist Thomas agrees. “She came in and knocked it out of the park. And within days, she became an expert in the studio,” she says.

“Stay in Bed” is a canoodling romp around the cherished moments when the power of love pulls the pair through all doubt. “You give me a reason to stay up past 10, now and then,” coos Elderkin. The balancing act he executes with Sattin is downright charming, and the gentle push and pull between the two throughout the album cuts right to the heart of what Mad Crush does best. Conversely, “My Pre-Existing Conditions” is almost an Avenue Q b-side, spliced with comedy and misery. “Frankly, I used the ongoing healthcare debate as inspiration. I ran with that and made up this list of pre-existing conditions that are a jumble of character flaws,” he explains. “A lot of what I’m listing is true of myself, and, some of it, I made up because it fits the theme of rejection. So, some are silly and others are meant to be freaking heartbreaking. The payoff comes at the end, when I beg to be accepted despite all these flaws, the way we all want to be.”

That theatrical element to Elderkin’s songwriting and performance grew out of his previous project, a high-powered rock opera that was an unofficial sequel to David Bowie’s 1972 album, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. With that band, ¡Moonbeams No Mas!, he went for larger-than-life, majestic storytelling. “I have an MFA in fiction writing, and I was ready to write something big,” he says. “That double album felt like writing a novel, and I worked on it line-by-line in that way. I think the story holds up the same way a musical works.”

When Elderkin returned to the Triangle area of North Carolina a few years ago, he was ready to satisfy a different ambition—trying a new dramatic style and approach with a new band. “I am incredibly lucky to be working with top-flight musicians, and frankly, our sound is a result of everyone doing their own thing in service of each song. You can hear each personality emerge as the music unfolds,” he explains. “That means we all have a say in the stories we are telling, so there’s a richness and freshness you can’t plan for in advance. It’s exciting.”

Without a bass player, Mad Crush’s new album is pinned somewhere between the earth and the stars. Guitars, violin, and percussion predominantly make up the arrangements and create an almost floating sonic effect. “We consciously made it our project to write these songs in a way that they work without a bass,” says Thomas. “That’s another reason we sound a bit different.”

With such a tremendous lineup of talent, Mad Crush is a saucy, heartwarming, and tragically poetic watercolor of lust, hope, and uncertainty.

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“If you put out an album, make sure I get it.”

– Jon Pareles of The New York Times

“Wonderful!”

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Nick Dittmeier & the Sawdusters // All Damn Day

Southern Indiana musician Nick Dittmeier finds a needed reprieve from the looming presence of loss in his life with his new record All Damn Day (due October 26th). Fronting Nick Dittmeier & the Sawdusters, the singer-songwriter lingers on the omniscient Grim Reaper in a way that’s hopeful and uplifting as it is forlorn, harkening to the works of such literary giants as John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, Roald Dahl and Mark Twain.

“I look at this record as a continuation of a lot of storytelling by these writers. Their themes touch on a lot of forgotten people, working class people and characters that have impossible situations in front of them,” says Dittmeier, who also draws heavily upon the work of Frank Bill, Dave Eggers, Kurt Vonnegut and Daniel Woodrall. His perceptiveness in his craft is refreshing and has so far earned him stage slots with the likes of Cody Jinks, John Prine, Turnpike Troubadours, Justin Townes Earle, The Mavericks and several others.

Suffice it to say, he needed this cathartic musical release to come to terms with a handful of challenging life events. “I went through a lot of deaths when I was starting to record this album,” he says. “So, a lot of the songs touch on people dying, something I normally wouldn’t have done.” His mother-in-law succumbed to an aggressive form of cancer, and he honors her life and homestead on the exceptional “Two Faded Carnations,” written during a lonesome drive from Salem to Scottsburg, Indiana, nestled deep within Scott County. The stretch of blacktop carves its way through ten miles of soy and corn fields, as so much of the Heartland does. The breathtaking beauty of the drive served to reinvigorate Dittmeier and his songwriting.

Dittmeier often looks to his roots and turns tragic circumstances into poetic replenishment. “We were young and wild / Rolling with the times / We put a gun upside your head so we could be partners in crime,” he sings, the flowering and savory-sweet production a deceiving tilt against the underlying misfortune. “Roulette caught up with us / Robbery that went wrong / Well, I might misheard my brother / Most likely our luck ran gone…”

On the same day his mother-in-law was told she would no longer treated for cancer, his great grandmother passed away, and his beloved dog died inexplicably in its sleep. Channeling the pain of these events, Dittmeier pours his all into the album’s 10 songs as he finds the strength to move ahead, mature and endure. This approach hammers like nails into freshly-cut lumber and lends itself well to his roots-rock style of songwriting.

Tucked away in a rural Indiana farmhouse alongside Indianapolis-based producers Jason McCulley (Josh Kaufman, Milbranch String Theory) and Ryan Koch (The New Etiquette, J. Elliott, Kate Lamont), Dittmeier was able to focus his energy while writing and recording these tunes with minimal distraction. Surrounded by nothing but sunny cornfields, he broke “down the flow of sentences and certain kinds of prose,” he says. “There are some unconventional song forms within the record.”

All Damn Day was shaped over the course of nine months and gushes with bigger, brighter sounds and aspirations for radio play. That’s not to say Dittmeier abandons his previous work’s touches; his lyrics remain firmly planted in employing such literary devices as imagery, metaphors/similes and tone to coax the listener into his little corner of the world. “Walking on Water” ricochets from the past to the present, as he recounts a hometown man who once fell into the Ohio River in the dead of winter. “Water commerce is still very present. My hometown has had the same barge company for almost 200 years. In my early 20s, I briefly worked as a longshoreman. While on the barge, there’s a three-foot walking space of ice. This worker fell in the river…and he lived.”

Truth be told, Dittmeier thrives on keeping the legacy of his family intact on the banks of the Ohio in a town called Jeffersonville, Indiana, where five generations have settled to raise families and make a living. He straddles the line between classic and contemporary, a leveling-up that only makes sense for a full-time working musician itching for what’s next.

As with most artists, Dittmeier played in various bands over the years but embarked on a solo endeavor four or five years ago, along with two EPs, 2013’s Extra Better and 2014’s Light of Day. Pulling in numerous players, the “& the Sawdusters” was tacked on for the band’s debut full-length, 2016’s Midwest Heart / Southern Blues. A bit of lineup reconfiguring then took place, furthering the frontman’s commitment to developing the kind of sound, feel and authenticity the band needed.

With All Damn Day, Dittmeier embraces the role of a storyteller with this collection of ten deeply introspective character sketches. He takes on each mantle so convincingly, it is often difficult to separate Dittmeier the person and Dittmeier the artist. But that’s the allotment most singer-songwriters of his caliber bear. From “Head to Rest” to “I Can’t Go Home” to “City of God,” a meditation on the 1937 flood of the Ohio River, the album has a remarkable presence that commands multiple listens.

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“An enjoyable southern country rock romp, offering a varied selection of lively toe-tapping songs and melodic, reflective pieces.” – Americana UK

“Heartland rock riffage meets classic country storytelling.” – Wide Open Country

“Hopeful and uplifting as it is forlorn.” – Imperfect Fifth

“One artist that has consistently been releasing good music.” – Never Nervous

“Nick Dittmeier & the Sawdusters create instant old fashioned bluesy classics” – Americana Highways

Publicist: Rachel Hurley

“Rachel was great for our release. Not only did we receive more press for our album than the previous one, but she also helped us manage the flow of press coming in. We were in Europe when the campaign started and touring the states after that, so things can be forgotten or maximum exposure mismanaged. She continually gave a list of the press to talk about and how it related to our campaign. We then could push on social media and guide social media promotion. She was also available any time I had questions about the campaign and I felt like I got honest input when I asked for it.” – Nick Dittmeier