Erin Viancourt w/ Karen Choi
About the artist: Full-hearted, free-spirited, and irresistibly genuine, Erin Viancourt’s take on country music is both timeless and entirely attuned to the chaos of modern life. On her debut album Won’t Die This Way, the Cleveland-bred singer/songwriter/ guitarist brings her lived-in storytelling to a gritty but gorgeously detailed batch of songs, encompassing everything from Americana to Western swing to classic outlaw country. Rooted in the warm and radiant vocal presence she’s shown onstage in touring arenas with Cody Jinks (who recently made Viancourt the first signing to his Late August Records), Won’t Die This Way ultimately reveals her rare capacity to soothe the soul and leave the listener newly empowered to live each day to the absolute fullest.
American Aquarium w/ Justin Bloss
About the artist: For nearly two decades, American Aquarium have pushed toward that rare form of rock-and-roll that’s revelatory in every sense. “For us the sweet spot is when you’ve got a rock band that makes you scream along to every word, and it’s not until you’re coming down at three a.m. that you realize those words are saying something real about your life,” says frontman BJ Barham. “That’s what made us fall in love with music in the first place, and that’s the goal in everything we do.” On their new album The Fear of Standing Still, the North Carolina-bred band embody that dynamic with more intensity than ever before, endlessly matching their gritty breed of country-rock with Barham’s bravest and most incisive songwriting to date. As he reflects on matters both personal and sociocultural—e.g., the complexity of Southern identity, the intersection of generational trauma and the dismantling of reproductive rights—American Aquarium instill every moment of The Fear of Standing Still with equal parts unbridled spirit and illuminating empathy.
Taylor Hunnicutt w/ Tim Lloyd of Western States
About the artist: Taylor Hunnicutt makes old-school southern music for the modern world. She’s a proud daughter of Alabama, writing songs that nod to the state’s tradition of country storytelling, rock ‘n’ roll rebellion, and guitar-driven grit. Sharpened by a touring schedule that’s kept her on the road for roughly 200 days a year, she makes her full-length debut with Alabama Sound — an album that unfolds like a love letter to the American South, written by a road warrior who’s spent most of the decade far away from home. “It’s a little country, a little singer/songwriter, a little Americana, and a lot of soulful southern rock,” says Hunnicutt, an opera-trained vocalist who began writing songs after dropping out of music school, landing a waitressing job at a blues juke joint, and sitting in with the bands that came through town. She’s no longer the guest artist, though — she’s the main act, and Alabama Sound showcases her high-energy, hellraising brand of southern stomp, country-rock twang, and amplified attitude.
Silverada w/ Jason Scott & The High Heat
About the artist Evolution. It’s what keeps the best bands afloat — song after song, show after show, record after record. Mike Harmeier formed Mike and the Moonpies in his early 20s, a workingman’s country band, honing their craft with five-hour sets on Austin’s dancehall circuit before expanding across America. By the early 2020s, they’d become global ambassadors of Texas music, from Abbey Road Studios to the Grand Ole Opry. The growth led to introspection. As their music changed, why not their name too? Silverada marks this evolution. “Back in the day, all we wanted to do was play the Broken Spoke,” says Harmeier, reminiscing about the Austin honky-tonk where Silverada found its roots. The album, their ninth, showcases their accumulated strengths — sharp songwriting, pedal steel melodies, and a versatile rhythm section — while breaking old rules. “Radio Wave” and “Eagle Rare” demonstrate their sonic exploration. Harmeier penned Silverada in his backyard studio, drawing inspiration from diverse sources. Recorded at Yellow Dog Studios, the album balances progression with roots, honoring their past while looking ahead. “We spent the first part of our career figuring out who we are,” says Harmeier. “Now we want to evolve not only the sound of the band but the dynamic of the live show too. Silverada sets the stage for the next leg of the journey.”
Chuck Briseno
This show offers free admission to veterans and active duty military upon presentation of proper ID at the door.About the artist:Chuck briseno is an independent artist and songwriter hailing from the small south texas town of george west, hometown of world champion cowboy phil lyne and the national “Storytelling capitol of texas”. The love for music, songwriting and storytelling has always been deeply rooted in chuck’s life. His grandfather “tata” had a guitar in the house, and he would record himself singing love songs in spanish about his grandma ofelia. This true love of music would define and shape him into the writer and performer he is today. Soon after graduating high school, he joined the military and was deployed to afghanistan in 2007 for 15 months with the 173rd airborne brigade. He served as a paratrooper and team leader while simultaneously applying to west point. In 2012 he graduated and served as a tank commander and combat engineer until 2018. Beginning in 2019, chuck shaped his career as a road warrior, logging over 150,000 miles and 600 shows to date. Along with releasing his debut album “you should be mine” and multiple singles to include “find her with me,” and “she’s my home,” he has built a reputation of hard work and dedication to not only his music but most importantly to his fans. Along with headlining his own shows across the country, chuck has been the supporting act for many artists including the turnpike troubadours, pat green, granger smith, muscadine bloodline, wade bowen, stoney larue, josh ward, jackson taylor, and uncle kracker. In the last 3 years he has recorded at the legendary sun studio as well as east avalon recorders in muscle shoals, al. With new music on the verge of release in 2024, you will find chuck on more festivals and bigger venues throughout the country.
Rob Leines w/ Honky Tonk Airlines
About the artist: “It’s hard for me to sit still,” admits Rob Leines, the country-rock frontman and blue-collar road warrior who regularly spends more than 200 nights a year onstage, bashing out a mix of Telecaster twang, guitar-driven grit, and southern storytelling. Long before he paid tribute to the touring lifestyle with albums like 2021’s Blood Sweat and Beers, Leines crisscrossed the country as a child. The son of a military man, he was born in Georgia and spent time in both Utah and California before returning to the motherland, where he graduated high school and began working as a whitewater raft guide. Leines loved the South — its waterways, mountains, and and although he’d eventually move back to California, those southern roots would always play a role in his music. Following his 2018 debut, Bad Seed, and the 2020 concert album Live in Richmond at the National (recorded during a rowdy night in Virginia, opening for Whiskey Myers), Blood Sweat and Beers finds Leines occupying the intersection between outlaw country and southern rock. It’s a record that mixes tattooed twang, hardscrabble honky tonk, Appalachian rock & roll, and roadhouse roots music into the same pot, filled with songs that spotlight the highs, lows, victories, vices, and vixens that come with a life spent on the move. “Won’t find me on the radio, no late-night TV show / You’ll find us in a smokey bar somewhere on the go,” he sings in “Rock & Roll Honky Tonk Life,” a celebration of the roll-up-your-sleeves work ethic that’s steered his entire career. A longtime welder who spent years working in the oil and gas industries along the Pacific Coast, followed by a traveling gig repairing components of turbine engines at power plants across the world, Leines understands the value of long days and hard work. Blood Sweat and Beers is the product of that same perseverance, written and recorded after his long climb from the dive bars of California – where Leines played some of his earliest shows, giving up his metalworking gig in order to pull triple-duty as the frontman, lead guitarist, and booking agent of his own power trio – to cross-country gigs, national acclaim, opening slots for country legends like Dwight Yoakam. “A lot of these songs are about blue-collar pride,” he says. “They’re about the workingman’s experience. I’m trying paint a picture of what it’s like on the road, and what it’s like in the South. My roots are still very much tied to the area, and you can hear that in the sound.” Co-produced by Leines and Eric Rennaker, Blood Sweat and Beers doubles down on the raw, rowdy stomp of Leines’ live show. For years, he’s described his sound as “if Skynyrd and Cash had a baby,” although Blood Sweat and Beer explores the wider orbit of country-rock, too. “Patty Lynn” is a murder ballad fit for campfires and front-porch pickin’ parties, “Hold On” is an acoustic love song, and “Good Time” spotlights Leines at his funkiest, trading the amplified twang of Bad Seed for something soulful and greasy. At the center of Blood Sweat and Beers, though, are songs that rip, riff, and roar, from “Bailing Hay” — a four-on-the-floor rabble-rouser that’s equal parts ZZ Top and Waylon Jennings— tO
Brit Taylor
About the artist: With the critically acclaimed release of her sophomore album, Kentucky Blue, singer-songwriter Brit Taylor is striding positively into her future. The Kentucky native — with her captivating lyrics and arresting vocals — is stepping boldly ahead with one foot firmly grounded in her Appalachian roots and the other plowing through new ground. It is rewarding, but it hasn’t been easy. Kentucky Blue, produced by Grammy winners Sturgill Simpson and David Ferguson and released in 2023, is a happy, upbeat record that is feisty, funky and pure country and reflective of her life today. Its success — debuting No. 4 on Billboard’s Bluegrass Albums and climbing to No. 18 on Americana Music’s album chart — follows the success of Brit’s 2021 debut album Real Me and its complement, Real Me Deluxe, which chronicled her self-reflective journey from the depths of despair to honest self-awareness. The highly acclaimed Real Me opened as the highest-ranking debut album on the AMA/CDX Radio Chart at No. 37 and garnered positive reviews from American Songwriter, Rolling Stone, NPR’s World Cafe and others. The 2022 AMERICANAFEST featured her at an official artist showcase, and she headlined The Burl’s 2022 official after-party for Kentucky Rising, an all-star concert in to raise money for East Kentucky flood victims. Taylor’s list of recent live performances includes opening for Dwight Yoakam, Ian Noe, Alabama and Robert Earl Keen and touring in support of both Kelsey Waldon and Blackberry Smoke. PBS featured her on “The Caverns Sessions,” a musical series from deep within a subterranean amphitheater in Tennessee’s Cumberland Mountains. She has released new music with Dee White, Mike and the Moonshines and others. She will tour in support of Brent Cobb this spring. Born where the famed Country Music Highway 23 slices through Kentucky, life was good for the young singer who spent her childhood years on the Kentucky Opry. Because she was singing before she could read or write, songwriting came later. It took the end of a teenage puppy love to lure her to put pen to paper and words to her emotions. Her first lyrics were born, and her love for songwriting was unleashed. High school graduation was followed by a move to Nashville, a college degree, a music deal, marriage, and a mini-farm. And then it all went bad. A husband gone AWOL, a band that dissolved, a beloved dog that died, a music deal gone sour and a bank that wanted her home made for a winter of despair. After a brief wallow in self-pity, Brit went to work, determined to be true to herself and to make music her way. Tired and broken hearted by the “new Nashville,” she walked away from her song writing deal. Declaring she’d rather “clean toilets than write shitty songs any longer,” Brit cleaned houses to pay the bills, successfully turning her side hustle into a bona-fide small business. At the same time, she served as “general contractor” for her self-financed Real Me, pulling together a cast of professionals to co-write and play with her, all while recording on her own newly created record label, Cut A Shine Records. Life is good again. She signed a collaborative deal between Cut A Shine Records and Thirty Tigers and a publishing contract with Reservoir and One Riot. Wasserman Music serves as her booking agent. She has a new love and marriage and two new miniature donkeys and a rescue dog added to her zoo of one cat, two dogs, five goats and a bunch of chickens. Today, Brit is bravely standing out as her own self. It isn’t an easy path to navigate, but Brit learned that the best GPS is her inner self. Always true to herself, Brit Taylor continues to tells stories which manage — whether they are dramatic, humorous or heartfelt — to be downright honest. It is who she is.
Alex Williams w/ Hunter Peebles
About the artist: Waylon Jennings said it best back in ‘78, realizing the line between his life and art had all but vanished. “Don’t you think this Outlaw bit’s done got out of hand?” the legend sang – and it’s a feeling Alex Williams knows all too well. Portrayed in 2017 as the heir to the Outlaw Country throne, the Lightning Rod Records artist played his part to perfection, living out the words to gritty hits like “Little Too Stoned” and the rest of a Nashville-produced album debut, Better Than Myself. But after five years of waging war against himself, it’s time to put the guns down. “It’s all I knew at that point. When I made the first record, I didn’t have a band, I didn’t have a lot of writing experience, and overall a very surface level sense of what I wanted to do,”Williams says of his early days, and the tunnel vision which eventually led to his new LP, Waging Peace. Matching a cold look in the mirror with a newly liberated sonic style, the set marks a brand newchapter for an artist once pushed into a creative corner. A small-town Midwestern kid who’s now amassed more than 5 Million global streams, and toured throughout North America and beyond, those words reveal a man who’s lived and learned, finding a way to put his truth in song. And how he ended up here is a story of its own. Raised in Pendleton, Indiana, Williams grew up assuming he’d follow his father into criminal justice – but was laying down the law onstage by high school. It was actually his dad who encouraged his early songwriting, Williams says, and fusing hard hitting heavy metal with guitar-driven rock with a deep-beyond-his-years baritone, he was soon gigging between Indiana and Texas, where a cousin had a bar. Soon the old soul was enrolled in Nashville’s prestigious Belmont University, but he quickly left for an education on the road – connecting with Outlaw heroes like Waylon and Willie, Billy Joe Shaver and more along the way.
***CANCELLED*** Breland with Ryan Charles
About the artist:Boundary-shattering breakout star, BRELAND is pushing the possibilities of Country music on a global scale. Since the arrival of his PLATINUM-certified debut single “My Truck,” the New Jersey-bred singer/songwriter/producer has amassed over 1.1 BILLION career streams, brought his crowd-thrilling live show to an international headline tour, and gained acclaim from many of the world’s leading music publications (with Rolling Stone hailing him as “a symbol of Country music’s ongoing evolution” and Billboard calling him a “keen, visionary solo artist”). On his critically acclaimed 2022 debut album CROSS COUNTRY, the Bad Realm Records/Atlantic Records/Warner Music Nashville artist introduced a high-energy sound that blurs the barriers between Country, Pop, Hip-Hop, Soul, and Southern Gospel, offering up smash hits like the GOLD-certified “Praise The Lord (feat. Thomas Rhett).” A blockbuster year for BRELAND, 2023 included such triumphs as teaming up with superstar Keith Urban to open the 16th annual Academy of Country Music Honors by performing their GOLD-certified collaboration “Throw It Back” and — immediately following the performance — receiving the ACM Lift Every Voice Award, recognizing his role in “elevating underrepresented voices throughout the Country music genre, transcending demographics and geography.” Released in September, CROSS COUNTRY: THE EXTRA MILE delivered a star-packed bonus version of his full-length debut, with the expanded album’s six fresh tracks including a brand-new feature with Brittney Spencer as well as longtime live favorite “Cowboy Don’t.” With his high-profile TV appearances to date including Good Morning America, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Voice, and TODAY, he also spent much of 2023 on the road as support for the legendary Shania Twain’s QUEEN OF ME TOUR in the U.S. and U.K. (with stops at iconic venues like Madison Square Garden), in addition to taking his THE EXTRA MILE TOUR across the U.K., Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. A truly magnetic live performer, BRELAND has also graced the stage at major festivals like Stagecoach and C2C: Country to Country Festival, fulfilling his mission of uniting audience members from all walks of life with his wildly joyful music.
Wonder Women of Country : Mellissa Carper + Kelly Willis + Brennen Leigh
When Kelly Willis, Melissa Carper and Brennen Leigh – three accomplished singer-songwriters who have forged their own unique lanes in country music – joined forces as a power trio, there was no more appropriate moniker than Wonder Women of Country. At the end of 2021, after serendipitously sharing bills separately several times, Willis approached Leigh and Carper about teaming up and playing some shows together. Wanting more than your standard songwriter-in-the-round arrangement, the three learned each other’s songs to create a more integrated, band approach. Those first few shows together were so much fun and so well-received that they decided to continue. Wonder Women of Country have discovered that, together, their own individual superpowers come alive. (One of their superpowers is being able to find hidden treasures in any thrift or vintage store.) With Leigh playing lead guitar and mandolin, Carper on upright bass, and Willis playing rhythm guitar, they support each other’s distinctive original material with beautiful three-part harmonies. “At every show, folks were asking if we had records together,” says Willis. “After months and months of that, we finally found a chance to go make one.” Their forthcoming, six-song EP, Wonder Women of Country: Willis, Carper, Leigh, was recorded at Bismeaux on the Hill in Austin, TX in December of 2023. It features two songs by each artist, including a couple of Carper/Leigh co-writes, and one reimagined John Prine tune. Each track captures the magic these three create night after night on the road. Wonder Women of Country are the super heroes we’ve all been waiting for.
