Scott Miller & Bobby Bare Jr.
Event on 2012-09-14 00:00:00
Scott Miller
http://thescottmiller.com/
Scott Miller blends folk and rock like there ain’t no words for. The power of storytelling with the power of a compressed electric guitar comes through this Virginian not heard since the likes of Wayne Newton (fellow Virginian) or The Statler Brothers (also of the Commonwealth.) Not even since Thomas Jefferson (Virginian) and Woodrow Wilson (another Virginian) formed their rock trio with drummer Stewart Copeland (northern Virginian) “League of Nations.”
Unlike most of the faux-simplified-effete’-elite-Americana/ Alt-Country world, Miller was actually raised on a working farm. His parents were a WWII generation couple that carried on the Spartan lifestyle of their Scots-Irish forefathers. Miller has described the lifestyle as “Amish that drink.”
In 1990, Miller left the family farm and moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, where he started scraping a living in local bars and clubs. Miller then founded a rock band called the V-roys, the first band signed to Jack Emerson’s (R.I.P.) and Steve Earle’s E-Squared label. His songwriting became more mature. His understanding of the music “biz” (“It ain’t called ‘show-friends.”) became more astute, but his guitar playing remained the ham fisted flat-picking of his youth. He calls them “solos.”
Releasing four albums over the next 6 years for the highly respected Sugar Hill Label: THUS ALWAYS TO TYRANTS ( '01), UPSIDE/DOWNSIDE ('03–a #1 Americana Record), CITATION ('05), and the live album RECONSTRUCTION ('07) , Miller and the Commonwealth spent a year as the house band for the WB Network's "Blue Collar TV with Jeff Foxworthy." Miller recounts, “Suddenly the band and I didn’t have to load up and travel every night, we could walk across from the theatre where the television show was taped into a 5 star hotel bar, and make great money doing it. I hated it, of course.”
And now, like most artists with a brain these days,Miller has founded his own record label (F.A.Y. Recordings) and is releasing a brand new record for '09 titled FOR CRYING OUT LOUD. This new batch of songs are already causing quite a stir among fans and critics. And critics of fans. And fans who criticize critics. And fans who criticize other fans. And even the critics who critique the critics of criticizing fans…
Bobby Bare Jr.
It was the last day of January 2008- I was in Seattle and my dad was somewhere in Florida- and my mom sat alone during a thunderstorm on a couch in the house our family bought in 1970 in Hendersonville, TN just outside of Nashville. It is a long white ranch house that sits on a tall hill directly above Old Hickory Lake, surrounded by tall 100 year-old Beech trees. Well the storm outside that night pushed one of those old hollow trees further than it could bend and the broken tree split the house in half, beneath that tree was the roof, 2x4s, insulation, and my frightened mother screaming while trying to figure out if she was dead or alive, crippled or broken. The tree had broken two vertebra in her neck and she was the only one who could call 911- so from her rainy den she did – and within a year she and the house recovered. She is lucky to be alive and being a good, loving, Nashville songwriting son that I am, I got a good song out of her tragedy- as well as a title to my next record.
It has been almost four years since my last release. Since 2006’s The Longest Meow I have brought my 2nd child into the world (Beckham Bare) – experienced divorce – lost my house (divorce)- almost lost my mom – almost lost my son (listen to “The Sky Is The Ground”) – produced my largest musical project (Twistable, Turnable Man: A Musical Tribute to the Songs Shel Silverstein) – got my house back – got a new girlfriend – and got a new baby on the way! I have also finished my 6th full-length CD, A Storm – A Tree – My Mother’s Head, 13 songs that took me four years to write and record.
Last winter with my good friend/engineer/co-writer/producer David Vandervelde, and four of my favorite friends/musicians, we began to organize, edit, write, and arrange my latest pile of riffs, chords, and poems into something that could resemble my next record. By the end of February of this year we felt good enough about the songs to take them into this huge log cabin in Nashville and see about recording them all in two days. After much rehearsal almost all of what you hear on A Storm – A Tree – My Mother’s Head was recorded Feb. 28th and March 1st. I figured after doing my last record in one day – that if I spent two days on this record it’s gonna sound twice as good- right? – maybe. I don’t know- I only know that I included Opie Taylor – Liz Taylor – Darth Vader- murder – cheese burgers-lies – cheating – Jesus – guns – lipstick (not red lipstick though)- Elvis (2 times) – drunks – muscles – fish – Chattanooga – naked swimming at night – wet goats – flaming arrows – blood – bicycles – metal stitches – Jesus Lizard t-shirts – angry bugs – Kosher Oreos – The Dixie Chicks – Necrophilia – and my Mother’s head (you can even hear her screaming on the song).
9pm. advance / day of show.
Advance tickets available online and at our local outlets.
Fully seated show.
at Grey Eagle Tavern
185 Clingman Avenue
Asheville, United States
Scott Miller & Bobby Bare Jr. is a post from: Intervention Therapy