Rocks Hearts’ Wanderlust video, shot at World of Bluegrass

Rock Hearts on the red carpet for the IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards (9/29/22) – photo by Sammy Passamano

615 Hideaway Records has released a new music video for Rock Hearts, a performance video for their song Wanderlust, which will be included on their upcoming project with the label.

Taking advantage of everyone being together last week in Raleigh for the World of Bluegrass convention, label head Sammy Passamano brought his video equipment along and shot the band in several spots in the convention center. Anyone who spent time there during IBMA week will recognize these settings, or may even have encountered the band during the shoot.

Rock Hearts is Joe Deetz on banjo, Alex McLeod on guitar and lead vocal, Billy Thibodeau on mandolin, Austin Scelzo on fiddle, and Rick Brodsky on bass.

The song is one McLeod wrote some time ago, with an eye towards the way he grew up in a military family, moving every few years and becoming anxious staying in one place. For Alex, he solved this issue by finding the love of his life, settling down, and starting a family.

Wanderlust started out as a slow, bluesy number that he repurposed just as the band was preparing to record this spring. In the studio, Michael Cleveland twin fiddled with Scelzo.

Passamano tells us that this shoot was a seat-of-the-pants affair, but that it worked out quite well. Before launching his label, Sammy had been focused on video production, even while working with his family’s label, Rural Rhythm Records.

“This was the definition of a ‘Run & Gun Shoot,’ and I was looking at what natural light we had to work with in the convention center. Overall, I would say that we plan on doing more video like this next year as it was so much fun. My flight on Friday was at 5:00 p.m., and I wanted to get to the airport early just to be safe. We started around noon and by 2:00 p.m. we had enough footage to work with.”

Check it out…

Wanderlust is available as a single now from popular download and streaming services online. Radio programmers can get the track at AirPlay Direct.

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About the Author

John Lawless

John had served as primary author and editor for The Bluegrass Blog from its launch in 2006 until being folded into Bluegrass Today in September of 2011. He continues in that capacity here, managing a strong team of columnists and correspondents.