Four great singer-songwriters drop new albums during the pandemic
It’s been a hard year for music lovers. Those of us who thrive on live music feel like we’re dying of starvation. Our musical legends seem to be dying at a furious pace, and the soundtracks of our lives seem to be fading out. But there have been a few glimmers of goodness during this mess. One of the best things to happen this fall is four of East Tennessee’s premier singer-songwriters releasing new albums. If you’re not familiar with them, now is the time to check them out.
Mic Harrison and The High Score – “Bright Spot”
Considering that Mic Harrison and The High Score are one of the most beloved and most entertaining live acts to ever come out of Knoxville, the lack of live shows from the band in 2020 has been particularly painful. (The group’s last performance was with Con Hunley at Waynestock X in February.) However, there will be a release show at the Bijou Theatre on Nov. 6 for the band’s new album, “Bright Spot.” The limited-seating performance will be simulcast online and will occur just three days after the most contentious presidential election in at least a century.
“I’ll either be a genius or an idiot,” says Harrison with a hearty laugh.
Harrison came to Knoxville to join The V-Roys when John Paul Keith left the band (then called The Viceroys). As co-lead singer-songwriter with Scott Miller, Harrison created some of the most beloved music to come from the Scruffy City. When the group split, Harrison spent time on rhythm guitar for Superdrag and, later, combined talents with Knoxville band The High Score to create a local tour de force. The High Score already had an excellent resident songwriter in Robbie Trosper, and in the past few years another of the town’s best singer-songwriters and guitarists, Kevin Abernathy, joined the act, turning it into a bit of a local supergroup.
“This is my dream band,” says Harrison. “If everybody just keeps doing what they’re doing, it’s just gonna get better and better. Everybody in the band is really good at what they do. This is not a money thing. I’d just like to do more of this while I’m still alive.”
The new album, which has been in the works for two years, was completed during the summer.
While the band never has released an album that didn’t sparkle, this is the first one that actually displays the energy that the act delivers onstage. Despite the length of time it took to make, it sounds spontaneous and fresh. The extra time in creation shows up in the layers and textures throughout. The 13 tracks, including four numbers written by Trosper and two by Abernathy, are some of the most immediately catchy of the group’s career.
The album crams the best of all its elements together: Harrison’s lovably human lyrics and amiable attitude; Trosper’s punk sensibility; Abernathy’s hot guitar chops and thoughtful songs; and in the form of bassist Vance Hillard and drummer/producer Don Coffey, one of the tightest and punchiest rhythm sections of any rock act in the game.
It is frustrating, says Harrison, to not be able to schedule shows to present the new music for live audiences. Typically, he says, he already would have the next year planned out with concerts and short tours. Instead, he’s been revisiting the music that makes him feel good and want to keep writing.
“I’m just gonna keep my head down and do what I do,” he says. “I think people need art, period. Especially right now.”
Kevin Abernathy – “The Whammy Bar Diaries”
Speaking of Kevin Abernathy, it’s high time the complete “Whammy Bar Diaries” was released. With songs from the project being released every month or so on Abernathy’s website over the past year, the entire work finally became available on Oct. 16. Complete with a fun written memoir (online) that corresponds with each song, it’s the autobiographical story of a kid, smitten with arena rock and the guitar gymnastics of the 1970s and ‘80s, who moves to California to follow his dream.
Reviving the guitar hero, long hair and spandex vibes of the era, it’s brash, a little funny and thoroughly lovable. At times, as on the songs “Monumental Days,” “Kicked Out” and “Get Outta Town,” the music is loud and arena-worthy. Some of the punch is due to drummer Uwe Leuth, who also was a part of the same band that the album chronicles and who still knows how to play like he’s a 20-year-old with something to prove.
A few of the songs even were written during the ‘80s, polished up with new lyrics and reworked for “Diaries.” The standout song, though, adheres more to Abernathy’s most recent style. “Las Cruces Sunset,” a gentle and sad portrait of that first bus trip to the West, was the first song released for the project, well before COVID-19 tore through the country. The pandemic, however, made the one-song-at-a-time release schedule make even more sense for Abernathy.
“People had more time to listen,” he says.
Abernathy also says he had planned to have a big CD release show and party, but the event was waylaid by the novel coronavirus.
“I’m just happy to have the songs out there where people can enjoy them,” he says. “I’m glad to be through with it and crossing the finish line.”
And with an album of his own and one with Harrison and The High Score finished, Abernathy already is working on a new solo EP. At least the pandemic has been good for his songwriting.
“There’s been a lot of free time, and the days have been going by slower,” he says. “I like that.”
Still, Abernathy is chomping at the bit to get back onstage. “And I’ll damn sure be ready to rock when the time comes,” he says of that future date.
Brandon Fulson – “Roaring Twenty”
Be it politics or the pandemic, something put Brandon Fulson on a creative roll in 2020. Previously, some of Fulson’s political commentary came out with the group The Bitter Resisters. Fulson feels like a Knoxvillian; he lived in the city for several years, plays here regularly and records at Arbor Studios, but he’s based in Middlesboro, Kentucky, the town in which he grew up.
Fulson is the only one of the singer-songwriters featured in this article whose new album is focused on the travails of the current year.
Instead of picking through all the songs he had accumulated and choosing his favorites from the bunch, producer John Baker suggested that Fulson record his most recent songs, making it more like a document of the moment. Fulson decided that 2020 definitely was the right year in which to entertain such an idea.
“Right before the whole thing hit, I was kind of burnt out,” says Fulson of his pre-COVID life. “I was writing and recording, but I wasn’t listening to music. I was listening to podcasts. But when the pandemic hit and [live music] was all gone, I was like, ‘Hey, I wasn’t ready to let this go!’ It got my creative side going.”
The resulting 11-song “Roaring Twenty” feels immediate and topical. From the opener, “Hoarding Toilet Paper,” it’s easy to relate to Fulson’s humor and often-jaundiced turns of phrase.
In “Born on Third” Fulson skewers an alt-right poser with aplomb: “To hear his tale, you’d think he’s John Henry. He’s a keyboard warrior, but to your face he’s real friendly. Parades a bazooka while he’s eatin’ at the Wendy’s. His wives, they’ll tell you the reason for his envy.”
Fulson references current musical greats, including Jason Isbell (the song “Jason” features a fickle fan finally appreciating Isbell becoming a happy, sober person) and Sturgill Simpson (“I’ll Take the Crown” references a Simpson song which in turn was a nod to the absurdist play/character Pere Ubu aka King Turd). And the somber “John Prine Moon” pays tribute to one of the greatest songwriters of the modern era who was lost to COVID-19 in the early days of the pandemic.
Outside of the new release, Fulson made a YouTube video in which he defended Tyler Childers’ album “Long Violent History” and his fellow Kentucky artist’s commentary supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. Fulson’s video already has been viewed more than 41,000 times. In fact, Fulson’s defense of Childers seems to have drawn a number of people to Fulson’s own brand of Appalachian twang-filled music.
“Roaring Twenty” does include some less-topical numbers, as well, such as the sweet but hard-edged “Kentucky Blue Eyes.” This portrait of an indomitable woman is one of the best songs of Fulson’s career.
“Roaring Twenty” is an album that addresses a year that we’d otherwise like to forget. But these songs deserve to live long after 2020 is over.
(Full disclosure: I created the artwork for this album.)
Jake Winstrom – “Circles”
Although Jake Winstrom now lives in Brooklyn, New York, we’re not letting him go completely. He returns to town to record his albums with producer (and former V-Roys founder and Suns of Phere member) Jeff Bills. “Circles” is Winstrom’s latest release, and his second solo album since the beloved Knoxville group The Tenderhooks disbanded is a beauty.
Kicking off with the bouncy “Come to Texas She Said,” the entire album is brighter and more upbeat than its predecessor, “Scared Away the Song.” However, when it’s time for a weeper, Winstrom delivers in spades with “I Walk in Circles.” With cello played by Andy Bryenton, the song possesses one of the saddest yet prettiest choruses I’ve heard in years.
For some, Winstrom’s distinctive high-pitched voice may take a few tracks to warm up to, but then it becomes addictive. “Circles” is a great-sounding album, musically and technically, as well. The arrangements are tasteful and gorgeous. No “wall of sound,” the instruments, mostly played by the cream of Knoxville’s music community, are distinct and on point.
“We were really lucky because we were in the homestretch,” says Winstrom. “We were mixing remotely with John Harvey and Mary Podio [of Top Hat Studios in Knoxville]. They’d email me the mix, and I’d just say, ‘Turn this up. Turn this down.’”
Winstrom says that with musicians unable to come into the studio, Knoxville guitar ace and Arbor Studios head John Baker “swooped in as the 11th-hour hero,” adding instrumental bits to songs.
It’s good, says Winstrom, that most of the album was finished before the pandemic hit because it hasn’t been good for his muse.
“In times of unease, I’d rather be watching a movie or playing a game rather than writing. Now I’ve got all the time in the world, but I get a lot of inspiration from bouncing off people and overhearing things on subways and other places. … I think next year we’ll start seeing the real pandemic-inspired stuff.”
The tough year that 2020 has been is not over quite yet. And considering that things may not be back to normal, pandemic-wise, until at least the summer of 2021, music fans will continue to feel the effects of in-person concert famine. However, having new releases from artists as talented as these may sustain us for at least a little while.
