Revisiting an episode from 2013 featuring Billy Bragg, The Flatlanders, Amy Speace, Joe Pug, and Suzzy Roche and Lucy Wainwright Roche. Support for this podcast is provided by Digital Relativity. https://digitalrelativity.com/
Tag: Suzzy Roche
Mountain Stage's Favorite Performances of 2016
2016 was a big year for NPR Music and West Virginia Public Broadcasting‘s Mountain Stage. We celebrated 33 years of live performance radio, commemorated the 25th anniversary of R.E.M.’s legendary set, and listened to the voices of two new guest hosts.
And across seven venues in four states, we recorded over 120 live sets that showcased the best and brightest musicians in the world today. Along the way, we video streamed eight of our shows through VuHaus and made some new #gotowv friends along the way (with posters and glass records in tow!). Of course, none of this would have happened without your support.
Before we embark on another musical year around the sun, Larry Groce and the Mountain Stage crew have picked out 33 performances that deserve another listen and another round of applause. From A to Z, these are our favorite Mountain Stage performances of 2016. (Hint: click the Episode # for their Mountain Stage podcast episode, where available.)
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Aoife O’Donovan – In the Magic Hour (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on October 30, 2016 – Episode #883)
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Billy Bragg & Joe Henry – Gentle On My Mind (Byham Theater in Pittsburgh, PA on September 25, 2016 with WYEP & Pittsburgh Cultural Trust – Episode #879)
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Bottle Rockets – Dog (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on March 20, 2016 – Episode #866)
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Brett Dennen – Cassidy (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on May 8, 2016 – Episode #870)
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Cheryl Wheeler – Estate Sale (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on July 24, 2016 – Episode #874)
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Chris Smither – Leave the Light On (Byham Theater in Pittsburgh, PA on September 25, 2016 with WYEP & Pittsburgh Cultural Trust – Episode #879)
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Darrell Scott – Desperados Waiting for a Train (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on May 22, 2016 – Episode #871)
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Foy Vance – Ziggy Looked Me In The Eye (Clay Center in Charleston, WV on October 16, 2016 – Episode #881)
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Hayes Carll – Sake of the Song (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on May 22, 2016 – Episode #871)
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Indigo Girls – Shame on You (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on September 18, 2016 – Episode #878)
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Iron & Wine – We Two are Moon (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on December 4, 2016 – Episode #885)
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Jerry Douglas presents The Earls of Leicester – Down the Road (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on July 24, 2016 – Episode #874)
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John Paul White – Once and Future Queen (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on November 20, 2016 – Episode #884)
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Judy Collins with Ari Hest – I Choose Love (West Virginia University in Morgantown, WV on April 17, 2016 – Episode #868)
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Lake Street Dive – Call Off Your Dogs (Clay Center in Charleston, WV on June 5, 2016 – Episode #872)
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Lucius – I Can’t Help Falling in Love with You (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on June 26, 2016 – Episode #873)
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Margaret Glaspy – Emotions and Math (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on June 26, 2016 – Episode #873)
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Mike Cooley – Made Up English Oceans (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on March 20, 2016 – Episode #866)
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Ona – Sleep, Rinse, Repeat (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on February 21, 2016 – Episode #864)
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Overcoats – Smaller Than My Mother (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on February 21, 2016 – Episode #864)
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Rhiannon Giddens – At the Purchaser’s Option (Davis & Elkins College in Elkins, WV on August 13, 2016 – Episode #876)
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Robbie Fulks – Aunt Peg’s Old Man (University of Kentucky in Lexington, KY on April 3, 2016, with WUKY – Episode #867)
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Robert Ellis – California (Byham Theater in Pittsburgh, PA on September 25, 2016 with WYEP & Pittsburgh Cultural Trust – Episode #879)
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Sarah Jarosz – House of Mercy (University of Kentucky in Lexington, KY on April 3, 2016 with WUKY – Episode #867)
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Steve Poltz – Folksinger (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on May 1, 2016 – Episode #869)
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Suzzy Roche and Lucy Wainwright Roche – Bleeker Street (Clay Center in Charleston, WV on June 5, 2016 – Episode #872)
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The Wood Brothers – Never and Always (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on May 1, 2016 – Episode #869)
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Tift Merritt – Heartache is an Uphill Climb (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on December 4, 2016 – Episode #885)
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Todd Burge – Time to Waste Time (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on December 4, 2016 – Episode #885)
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Todd Snider – Stuck on the Corner (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on October 23, 2016 – Episode #882)
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Wilco – Space Oddity (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on February 14, 2016 – Episode #863)
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William Matheny – Living Half to Death (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on June 26, 2016 – Episode #873)
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Wynonna & the Big Noise – These Are The Things That I Lean On (Culture Center Theater in Charleston, WV on September 18, 2016 – Episode #878)
Mountain Stage THIS SUNDAY: What You Need To Know
Do you have a ticket for THIS SUNDAY’s live Mountain Stage in Charleston with Lake Street Dive, Seratones, Royal Wood, Lucy Wainwright Roche & Suzzy Roche and My Bubba? If you do, you’re in for a treat. If you don’t, you better hurry. As of this writing less than 60 tickets remain, available at The Clay Center Box Office, 304.561.3570, or HERE.
Since this show is a little different than our “home shows” at the Culture Center, here are a few tips for this Sunday.
–Where Do I Enter? First of all, there is plenty of parking nearby, including the Clay Center’s reasonably priced event parking on Washington Street. Use the main entrance to the Clay Center. The box office will open at 5p.m. for will-call tickets, and the grand lobby will open at 6p.m. We’ll have merchandise and, yes, a bartender on site. A lot of on-stage presentations ask attendees to enter through the Walker Theater (off Brooks Street) but not this time. We want lots of elbow room while you’re picking out your merchandise.
–What’s this “On-Stage Seating” all about? We hope our guest-artists aren’t creeped out by our frequent use of the word “intimate” in describing this show. Take a look at the photo above. Your seats are literally ON-STAGE at the Clay Center. It’s still general admission, so arrive early to be first to enter when seating begins at 6:30pm. The Clay Center’s lovely team of volunteer ushers will be on hand to help guide you and answer questions, including help with handicap accessible seating.
–What else is different? Not much. The show will still go about 2.5 hours, will still feature five guests, and there will be no intermission (refreshment sales end after the show starts). Our singer Julie Adams is out of town, so Larry Groce and his wife Sandra will be doing a tune from LG’s new record “Live Forever.” Those of you in attendance will also get the first chance to purchase tickets to our unannounced July 24 show in Charleston.
Summer is here, and Mountain Stage is excited for all the great music happening in Charleston and beyond. Check out our Live Show Schedule, sign-up for our e-mail newsletter so you can be first to know about new shows, and be sure to join us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram for behind-the-scenes glimpses and updates on show-day.
Rabbits, Religiosity and the Return of Yeasayer
After a four year break, seminal alt rock band Yeasayer is back with a dazzling new release titled Amen & Goodbye. We sat down with Yeasayer’s Anand Wilder to talk about the record, the farm that it was recorded on and how things have changed since the band came together almost ten years ago.
Yeasayer’s fourth full-length Amen & Goodbye is out now on Mute. You can follow the band on Twitter and Facebook. To hear more of their music, tune in to ‘A Change of Tune,’ airing Saturdays at 10pm EST on West Virginia Public Broadcasting.
Interview Highlights
On recording Amen & Goodbye:
We were upstate [New York], recording at this place called Outlier Inn. It was on this beautiful farm, like a fiber farm, with Angora bunnies and all these goats and sheep. I didn’t [take an Angora bunny home], but I did buy my wife an Angora bunny hat, which is just the warmest hat [laughing]. These bunnies get huge. As they get too much hair, they start eating their own hair and choke on it. So you have to shave them. So we would take a break and watch the owner of the bunnies just shave them [laughing]. They’re just big puff balls.
It was a nice break to get out of the studio. You know, when you’re in seclusion up in the semi-wilderness, it’s just nice to be like, “Ok, let’s take a break. Let’s go to the waterfall and go swimming!” Or, “Let’s go pet some bunnies!” It just feels like a safe place instead of being in the city and saying, “Let’s go outside and get more coffee at the coffee shop.”
On lessons learned from his recent solo release Break Line, an indie rock opera set in Appalachia:
Well I learned that just being “Anand Wilder from Yeasayer” does not mean you can put out a record and expect it to sell well [laughing]. I think we’ve probably already sold more copies of Yeasayer than I sold of Break Line. But it was a strange project, and I didn’t do much promotion for it except, you know, your show [“A Change of Tune”]. I think when we’ll go out on tour as Yeasayer, we’ll probably bring some of the vinyl and CD’s and have them out on the merch table, so maybe they can have a second wind.
On Amen & Goodbye’s pronunciation:
You know, I always say A-men & Goodbye. When people say Ah-men, it’s always seems much more reverent to me. Whereas A-men & Goodbye just sounds like a sign-off. “Alright, see you later! Amen and goodbye.”
On the band’s goal for Amen & Goodbye:
There’s so much of a process wrapped up in it for me, so I think about the journey these songs have gone on. We were dropped by our record label in 2013. And then we had to say, “Ok, what are we going to do now? Are we going to make another album? Are we going to do it ourselves? Are we going to look for another record label?” So that’s part of the title. We had this long process, and now let’s not be precious about it. Let’s just put it out. We got to get this out into the world! But we were also reflecting on all this societal talk about religion and xenophobia, and I think that was playing into the record. It was sort of our own religious manifesto, and we tried to tie the album together. So it’s loosely a concept album, where we have reoccurring themes and motifs that keep coming back. We were working with the album as this kind of antiquated form, where people listen to songs on YouTube. We’re saying, “Let’s make an album that connects lyrical themes and musical motifs.” And a lot of the songs are very personal to me; I feel like I’ve said things I’ve wanted to say about a friend that I lost and having a baby and then more broader themes of religiosity.
On Amen & Goodbye’s religious themes:
I think it’s because it’s something I find so frustrating in contemporary life. We’re still constantly dealing with these ideas that seem to be very antiquated and medieval. I think a lot of the time, religious freedom can be just another excuse to enforce patriarchy. And so we wanted to deal with it. Yeah, we could make the next one about Christopher Columbus [laughing]. There’s a lot of issues you can raise with that. But somehow, religion is something that’s a little bit more easy to deal with in a song. If you’re talking about Christopher Columbus, that really would seem like a musical [laughing].
On Amen & Goodbye’s album artwork:
Chris [Keating, Yeasayer’s frontman] got in touch with David Altmejd; he’s been a fan of his art for a really long time. We had the idea that we wanted to use all these different characters from our previous songs like “Madder Red,” and I think there was a song on Odd Blood called “Grizelda,” which was based on this criminal called Griselda Blanco. So we had this list of all these different characters from past songs we were working on and songs that didn’t even make the final cut of Amen & Goodbye. And we sent all these characters to David Altmejd, and then he came up with characters of his own from news items. Like I think Donald Trump’s head is in there, sort of like a riot to get rid of him as the leader of our country. So he put together this type of tableau, and we didn’t know if we were going to be putting it together digitally. But he really wanted to do one-shot for the gatefold. And we gave him a lot of references from Sgt. Pepper to Prince’s Around the World in a Day and other albums that had a lot of different characters, and he came up with his own thing.
[The members of Yeasayer]’re in there, and they’re sort of early versions of ourselves. There’s a Bob Fosse dancer in the top left corner. Moloch, the god of child sacrifice [laughing]. Bamol! Bamol is the name of the character from the “Madder Red” video. We had this song that didn’t make the cut called “Loan Shark Brothers,” and [Altmejd] interpreted that as the funny kind of two-dimensional cartoon of the guys carrying the suitcase with money in it. So we would give him a little bit of inspiration and his mind would run wild, and everything he came up with was fantastic.
We always joke about “Yayslayer” [the poster found in the Amen & Goodbye‘s background]. David asking us about the worst press photo we ever did, the one where we’re throwing a Campbell’s soup jar in the air. It’s this horrible photo that followed us in our early days. And that was his idea, to say, “I’m going to take the worst press photo and make it a crappy poster for you in the background.”
On collaborating with Suzzy Roche and Lael Neale for Amen & Goodbye:
I saw Suzzy in a play called “Early Shaker Musicals.” The Wooster Group in Manhattan put on this play, and it was basically Suzy Roche, Elizabeth LeCompte (who is also the head of The Wooster Group and its founder) and Frances McDormand. And they were reenacting this record [originally done by Sisters of the Shaker Community from Sabbathday Lake, Maine]. Someone on the side of the stage was playing this record, and they were hearing it in their ears and you could kind of hear it. And they were just speaking along with the record and singing these Shaker spirituals from the record. And I saw the name Suzzy Roche in the program, and I thought, “Is that the same Suzzy Roche from The Roches?” And I knew someone who was in The Wooster Group, so I asked if I could get her email, and he gave it to me. And I just wrote to her and said, “Hey, would you want to sing on the next Yeasayer record?” And I don’t know if she had ever heard of us, but I sent her the demos to the songs, and she said, “Oh, these are great.” And she came by, and she just did one day in the studio. She was really cool, really fun to hang out with, just a consummate professional.
Laele was a friend of Joey Waronker [Amen & Goodbye producer, known for his work with Atoms for Peace and Beck]. So we weren’t even there when she sang the part. But I think when Joey was doing a preliminary mix for the record, he thought he needed another vocal to thicken up Suzzy’s voice, so Laele’s in there as well on “I Am Chemistry.” She’s great! We saw her perform in L.A. Great voice. Beautiful voice.
On Anand’s personal goals for this record:
I need to stop reading reviews because that just gets me down [laughing]. But I just want to remain culturally relevant and be able to keep making music without having to make too many artistic compromises. That’s the dream I had as a little kid listening to Beck and The Beatles. That’s it. Just living the dream and hope that it keeps going [laughing].
On the future of streaming music:
It seems like when we came out, I remember doing interviews at the very beginning about downloading and why people buy records. But even in the last ten years, it’s changed so much. With each record, there’s a new innovation, you know? I think it was with Odd Blood that people were telling me, “Oh, I heard you on Spotify!” And I remember saying, “What? What is this? What are you talking about? Free music?”
It just sort of… is. It just exists. I mean, I use it. I subscribe to Apple Music because it’s just so convenient as a consumer to say, “Ok, I want to listen to Bob Dylan right now. Ok, I can just look it up and listen to any record.” I think it takes away some of the romance of buying a record and not knowing what you’re going to get and putting it on and listening very intently. But it’s sort of the way of progress. I mean, the whole history of recorded music has been based on technological advances from 78s to 45s, 33s, tapes, CD’s… I always think about when CD’s came out, when I first buying CD’s when I was 5 years old, they had those weird, long packets and cases. And that was just ridiculous, but that’s what I would fetishize as a little kid. I would cut up those cases and keep them in my drawer and look at the album artwork on these CD cases. I don’t know what people are doing now, if it’s all just on their cell phones and it’s so small to hold it and look at the lyrics.
But in terms of the artist’s compensation? I think there is still room for streaming to work. If someone buys the CD, they’re just paying the artist whatever it is, like 3 dollars, at that one point in time. Whereas streaming, if someone listens to my record over and over and over again, I think that plays into the percentage of the profits that are then funneled to the artist. I don’t know if that will be at the equivalent of CD sales or record sales, but it’s something. It’s better than downloading for free.
It is kind of scary. It does seem like content creators are just getting screwed. I don’t know if that plays into why artists have very short careers because they’re not able to make it work. I mean, you have touring. Touring works, but touring is a risky thing if you don’t have health insurance and you’re traveling around in a van in the dead of winter.
On making friends with chickens:
We also had to contend with chickens that were coming into [Outlier Inn’s] vocal booth. If we left the vocal booth open, the chickens would just walk right in. You know, we already did chickens, actually. If you look up Dark is the Night, we did a takeaway show where we sang “Tightrope” acoustic. I was playing the banjo, Ira [Wolf-Tuton, Yeasayer’s bassist] was playing a little keyboard flute and Chris [Keating] played this loop of chicken noises. We’d already done it, so we don’t like to repeat ourselves [laughing].
Mountain Stage After Midnight: Billy Bragg, Joe Pug, Amy Speace
It’s National Pizza Party Day this weekend (seriously), so why not grab a pie, a pal and a Pug (acoustic rocker Joe Pug, to be exact) for Mountain Stage After Midnight.
Broadcast from 1am-5am Saturday and Sunday mornings here on West Virginia Public Broadcasting, Mountain Stage After Midnight takes the best episodes from the show’s 31 year history and shares their memories and songs with our late-night listeners.
Pair your pizza with some archived tunes Saturday May 15 and Sunday May 16 on Mountain Stage After Midnight.
Hear an April 2013 show recorded on the campus of West Virginia University, featuring Billy Bragg, The Flatlanders, Joe Pug (isn’t his new record dreamy?), Amy Speace and Suzzy & Lucy Wainwright Roche.
We also have a February 2009 show that includes Dierks Bentley, Jessica Lea Mayfield (have you heard her recent collab with Seth Avett?), Regan Boggs, Grayson Capps and Andy Driedman & the Other Failures.
Still hungry for more Mountain Stage? If you’re in the Philly area, keep an eye out for Larry and the Mountain Stage crew at WXPN’s Non-Commvention. If you’re not in the Philly area, you can still keep an ear out for Mountain Stage sets on our 24/7 Mountain Stage stream (made possible by your support!). Connect with the show and check out our show shenanigans on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Instagram. Join our monthly email newsletter for up-to-the-minute show announcements and ticket deals. And if Mountain Stage isn’t available in your neck of the woods, contact your public radio station and let them know that you’re hanker’n for Mountain Stage and great live performances.