We haven’t heard a lot from Alecia Nugent since she moved back home to Louisiana after several years in Nashville in the early aughts. There she recorded several successful bluegrass albums for Rounder Records, in cooperation with producer and co-writer Carl Jackson, and toured across the US in support.
But ultimately, the call of motherhood and her young daughters brought her back to where she had grown up, and Hickory Grove, LA was where she wanted to raise her girls.
Now, however, Alecia has time and energy for music once again with a country album, The Old Side Of Town, produced by Keith Stegall, set for release soon. Even on a country release, she couldn’t leave the grass behind, as she explains about this first track, officially released tomorrow.
“The bluegrass single is actually a bonus track on the new album. I decided to release this song in two versions, bluegrass and country, in hopes that it would reach listeners of both genres, and because it is a tribute to my dad, it seemed only right to have a bluegrass version of HIS song. I lost my dad in 2013 and he was my biggest mentor, and my musical inspiration. I came back to record again after all these years to pay tribute to him, and I hope the whole world will get to know him through this song. Because you see, they don’t make ‘em like my daddy anymore.”
They Don’t Make ‘Em Like My Daddy Anymore will be available tomorrow (7/31) on Spotify, and to radio programmers at AirPlay Direct.
We often receive notes from from readers about their favorite artists who seem to have dropped off the face of the earth. Of course they are still clinging to the crust of our rapidly moving sphere; they just aren’t so visible in the music industry as perhaps they once were.
One such is Alecia Nugent, who was a prominent touring and recording artist for Rounder Records in the 2000s. She occupied a place between contemporary bluegrass and acoustic country, embracing both styles over the course of three popular recordings for Rounder Records.
Her career was an anomaly of sorts, in that she didn’t play an instrument, and hadn’t had a reputation as a songwriter. It was just her out front singing, with nothing to hold on to but a microphone. Naked, so to speak, in the world of bluegrass.
But ever since she was a young girl, it was something that audiences could readily forgive once they heard her sing. Pure and powerful, Alecia has a wide range and a lovely voice. She brings passion and sincerity to every song she sings, and after the release of her debut album in 2004, the rest of the bluegrass world learned what she had to offer – something that listeners in northern Louisiana had known for some time.
As a young girl, her dad and his cousins performed regionally as Southland Bluegrass Band, and they consumed little Alecia’s imagination right from the start. Growing up with music in her life, accompanying her dad, Jimmy, to band shows, she was eager to sing with them on stage, and was given the opportunity to do so on occasion even before she joined the band as a regular member as an early teen.
Nugent continued singing with the band as she grew up, married, and had children. But it was a strenuous divorce that actually got her into music as more than an avocation. Though she continued to work day jobs after the 2001 split with her husband, she made a move to Nashville not long after and began to catch the attention of folks in the biz. Bluegrass fans and promoters along the Gulf Coast were well aware of Alecia’s talent, but not so much in Music City.
With the financial assistance of one such promoter, a debut, self-titled project was recorded with Carl Jackson at the helm, released in 2004. Critical and radio response was very positive, leading to a second CD, A Little Girl… A Big Four Lane in ’06, again with Jackson producing, and a third, Hillbilly Goddess in ’09 produced by Jerry Salley.
Throughout this period, Alecia worked an aggressive performance schedule and dealt with all the issues of keeping a band together on top of maintaining joint custody of her three girls between homes in Louisiana and Tennessee.
But family called her back to the Pelican State when her father was diagnosed with cancer in 2009. At the time she was working on what would have been a fourth album for Rounder, and she left it unfinished to help care for her dad. In a recent conversation, Alecia said that she had initially planned on finishing and releasing that project, but life got in the way.
“When I moved back here I had no intentions of leaving the music business. I figured I could do it from down here. But it’s not like being in North Carolina or Kentucky. Louisiana is really remote in the bluegrass world.
We lost my dad in July of 2013.
I do hope to be able to get out there and complete this 4th record – but now is not the time. My youngest daughter is about to start her senior year in high school. The oldest is 23, and she has a daughter, so I am now a grandmother. My 19 year old is still at home with me as well.
I do want to return to it at some point, but right now, my life is full with two teenagers at home. That’s too many challenges to head out on the road. I have be mom right now.”
Alecia is working as the Advertising Sales Manager at her hometown newspaper in Alexandria, LA, The Town Talk, and was delighted to hear that several Bluegrass Today readers had written in to ask about her.
“Bluegrass fans have to be the most loyal people on earth. I’m not the kind to post a lot on Facebook, but I still get messages on there from fans saying that they would love to see and hear me again. I always make a point to respond to them.”
Speaking of the possibility of completing that fourth album, Alecia says that she isn’t even sure of her status with Rounder Records.
“I haven’t talked to them in the longest time, so I don’t know if I’m still considered a Rounder artist or not. I’d certainly rather finish this album with them. They have been very good to me.”
So at least for the time being, she is doing her singing at home, something she says her daughters also enjoy, though they profess no interest in singing on stage.
“They all love to sing, but not publicly. I tell them that if they would ever just get up on stage one time, they would love it.”
Let’s all hope that the time is right soon, and we get to hear some new music from Alecia Nugent.
Tim Stafford and Alecia Nugent have announced their engagement to be married. Could this be the next great bluegrass power couple?
Tim tells us that he and Alecia had known each other for years, but became close when they worked together on her show at the Celtic Connections Festival in Scotland this past January. They fell hard and fast, and plan to be married in about a year.
They won’t quite be a bi-coastal couple, but do plan to maintain a home somewhere near Nashville, and one in Pineville, Louisiana. Nothing but a few more mile on the highway, eh?
Jim VanCleve, fiddler with Mountain Heart, has had quite a busy 2010 so far. As related in our recent communications, it appears that there is no rest in sight. But Jim wouldn’t have it any other way.
In addition to recording demos for the next Mountain Heart album in January, and touring with the band, he’s made a trip to Scotland with Alecia Nugent. She asked him to join her group for a show at Celtic Connections Festival which takes place in Glasgow, Scotland every year.
“It’s a HUGE event with well over 100 acts, who appear at various venues throughout the city over the course of three weeks. The sheer magnitude of such an undertaking is mind boggling!! The intent of the festival, is to celebrate the extremely rich Celtic musical heritage while opening the ears and hearts of Glaswegians to various musical forms from across the globe. It is indeed an epic event, and it is a great thing that they include Bluegrass and Americana music among the many featured styles they feature each year!
The band Alecia had assembled was an extremely fun bunch of guys (and gals) who most bluegrassers are well aware of: Tim Stafford and Rob Ickes (both from the band Blue Highway, who were also appearing at the festival) on guitar and resonator guitar, respectively, Ashby Frank, the young mando monster who was most recently with Special Consensus, Chris Wade, a young banjo player from Ohio, Sonya Rutledge, who played bass for quite some time with Sweethearts of the Rodeo, and myself.
The shows were extremely well received. Blue Highway and Alecia Nugent both got wonderful standing ovations, and glowing reviews all the way around, so I’d say they enjoyed bluegrass across the big pond quite a lot! We obviously had a great time hanging with our Blue Highway buddies, but also made a lot of new friends- who were a hoot!
Rob Ickes, Ashby Frank, and myself found ourselves in a bona fide Celtic jam/dance session in our hotel lobby late one night with these new friends. It was quite a time, and I must say, they really know how to do it up right over there! So, us bluegrassers come by it honest! I really hope to be able to return to the festival soon, as it was certainly a treat!”
Jim also has a fiddle workshop coming up in Stockesdale, NC next weekend. They are billing the two 3 hours sessions as “Jam With Jimmy” – a morning class for beginning/intermediate players, and an afternoon class for advanced fiddlers. The fee is $65 and each student is asked to bring their fiddle and expect to play some for Jim.
Later that evening, from 7:00-10:00 p.m., Jim will host an open jam for area pickers. The fee for the evening jam is $20, and includes snacks. You can find more details about the fiddle workshops on the Stonefield Cellars web site, where they will be held. Pre-registration is required.
Thomas Wywrot is about to release a self-produced solo project, Every Time I Walk This Road. The album has a modern, in-your-face bluegrass sound with Wywrot’s banjo and guitar prominent in the mix.
A Canadian by birth, he grew up in Dryden, Ontario and came to the States to attend East Tennesse State University on a bluegrass scholarship. Since graduating, Thomas has worked in and around bluegrass in Nashville for the past few years. He played banjo with Alecia Nugent – featured on several tracks on her terrific CD, Hillbilly Goddess – and has performed with The Isaacs this past year.
Joining him on Every Time I Walk This Road are Jim VanCleve on fiddle, Randy Kohrs on resonator guitar, Jason Chapman and Alan Bartram on bass, and Jeremy Chapman and Ashby Frank on mandolin. His CD won’t be available officially until January 5, 2010, but Thomas agreed to share a few words and some audio samples here on Bluegrass Today in advance of the street date.
“These are all songs I’ve thought about recording over the past five years or more, and I collected most of them and wrote a few of them while I was in college at ETSU.
I wrote three of the songs on the CD. Kayla Dear, which started as a bit of an inside joke, and still is, but it ended up making a good love gone wrong song. F.T.L. is a slow guitar instrumental, and Meat Eater is an uptempo banjo instrumental that was named by Jamey Booher, winner of a MySpace contest I held in order to name the tune.”
Kayla Dear – Listen Now [http://www.thomaswywrot.com/Site/Purchase_A_CD_files/Kayla%20Dear.mp3]
Meat Eater – Listen Now [http://www.thomaswywrot.com/Site/Purchase_A_CD_files/Meat%20Eater.mp3]
Most of the lead vocals on the CD come from Daniel Salyer, who also contributed two new songs, Lonesome Tonight and Running Through My Mind. Two others, 95 Years and Now Here Comes The Rain were written by Carter Moore.
“I met both of these guys while attending school at ETSU and they are both great songwriters.
Rounding out the CD are some of my favorite songs. Carolina In The Pines is a Michael Martin Murphy song I first heard by Gibson, Martin, and I, a band based out of Thunder Bay, Ontario. I was about 10 when I first heard them play it, and it has stuck in my mind the whole time, so I based my arrangement on theirs.
Till I See You Again is a Kevin Welch tune I first heard played by Chris Silver about 7 years ago. I was very fortunate to have Alecia Nugent come in and sing the Tenor on this song, and it really turned out great.
I think my favorite song on the CD would have to be Lily Green. It was written by Ben Winship and was recorded by Growling Old Men, a duo consisting of Ben and John Lowell. They were both playing together at the time as members of Kane’s River, a killer band from Montana. The original recording just had mandola and guitar on it, so it was cool to put it together as a bluegrass tune and it just took on a life of it’s own. Alan Bartram handled the lead vocals and my girlfriend Laura Keel sang high baritone. I even got Jesse Stockman of the Isaacs to layer some baritone fiddles on one part to really build it up.
Lilly Green – Listen Now [http://www.thomaswywrot.com/Site/Purchase_A_CD_files/Lily%20Green.mp3]
Last but not least is the song Handsome Molly, which is a great traditional tune that I rearranged to give it a bit of a modern sound to it. Jeremy Chapman plays a killer mandolin intro and outro and Randy Kohrs’ dobro break is perfect.”
Handsome Molly – Listen Now [http://www.thomaswywrot.com/Site/Purchase_A_CD_files/Handsome%20Molly.mp3]
Every Time I Walk This Road will be released 1/5/10 on CD, and should be available in iTunes and at Amazon.com shortly thereafter. Pre-orders are being accepted now on Wyrot’s web site.
The first video from Alecia Nugent’sHillbilly Goddess CD has appeared online.
The video is for the song, Don’t Tell Me, written by Buddy and Julie Miller, and shot and edited by Glenn Sweitzer.
It’s a lovely song and a very attractive video, but I can’t help but wonder why they didn’t create a video for the hilarious and heartwarming title track.
Alecia Nugent has announced the winner in her online Hillbilly Goddess contest where fans were invited to submit essays promoting the cause of their own better halves as the one, true Hillbilly Goddess.
The contest was born of the lyrics to the title track to Alecia’s latest CD, a clever and quite funny song she wrote with Sonya Kelly and Carl Jackson, describing a Hillbilly Goddess as the opposite of a high fashion, pop culture diva.
The winning entry came from W. Brent Woodal, and is titled My Hillbilly Goddess – My Wife Marie. Here’s just a taste:
On our first date we went to the edge of the woods near her home and picked polk salad. Then we went back to her place where she cooked it for supper. She knew exactly how much fatback to throw in for seasoning; I was hooked from the first bite. I hadn’t tasted polk salad that good since my grandmother died. After sopping up the last of the pot likker with the cornbread she had made I asked her to marry me. She told me that I was moving way too fast so I waited until our fourth date to ask her again. That time she said, “Yes.” Because of fond childhood memories she has of listening to the Louisiana Hayride, we got married at the Municipal Auditorium in Shreveport, Louisiana. After the preacher pronounced us man and wife I removed her John Deere cap before kissing her. We then went with family and friends to a local Waffle House where our reception was held.
How can you top that!
Brent wins a copy of Alecia’s CD plus a basketload of T shirts and other fun stuff from John Deere and Smith & Wesson. Something tells me they will be put to good use.
This week’s edition of Track-By-Track with Kyle Cantrell will feature Alecia Nugent and her superb new CD, Hillbilly Goddess. She will discuss each track with Kyle as they play through the entire album.
The show can be heard on Sirius-XM, and debuts this morning (6/24) at 11:00 a.m. (EDT). Rebroadcasts are scheduled for Thursday (6/25) at 9:00 p.m. and the following Wednesday (7/1) at 11:00 a.m.
Look for the show on Bluegrass Junction, Sirius 65 and XM 14.
The Mountain Stage web page at the NPR Music site has links to a number of recently re-aired programs that should be of interest to readers of Bluegrass Today.
These are encore presentations of earlier shows, but the music is still plenty fresh and powerful all around. The Crooked Still and Rhonda Vincent bits are especially fine.
You can access the audio for these segments online:
The new CD from Alecia Nugent, Hillbilly Goddess, officially hit yesterday (5/12) on Rounder Records.
To mark its release, they have put together a contest with prizes that echo the theme of the title track, with the winner receiving logo merchandise (hats, t-shirts, key chains, glassware) from Rounder, John Deer, Smith & Wesson and Alecia herself.
The song is a clever, witty number written by Nugent along with Sonya Kelly and project producer Carl Jackson – a tongue-in-cheek, self-deprecating look at what it means to earn the HG honorific.
It’s a fun romp (with JD Crowe on banjo) which seems destined to be a radio favorite. Let’s hope Rounder has a music video planned for this track.
To enter the contest, just listen to the whole track on Alecia’s site and let them know why your significant other is the ultimate Hillbilly Goddess.
There is a great deal to admire about this album. It is a great example of how much can go right with a new recording when a group of extremely talented people are involved at multiple levels. Jackson has produced two previous albums for Nugent, both stellar works, and this one is no different. The audio fidelity is brilliant and the backing musicians superb.
Every song is a gem and Alecia sings with authority, passion and grace. The production and arrangements (as per other Carl Jackson-related releases) owe much to the way modern country music is recorded. For instance, there are two acoustic guitar tracks on almost every song (Tim Stafford and Andy Falco) and subtle percussion is also found throughout.
For all that, however, the sound is acoustic and when not distinctly bluegrass, is always informed by the traditions that Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs and The Osbornes left us, with touches of “real country” music. Adam Steffey is on mandolin, Andy Leftwich on fiddle, Thomas Wyrot on banjo, Rob Ickes on resonator guitar, Kevin Grant on bass and Todd Creasman on drums.
A couple of other tracks that really stood out were The Last Greyhound and The Nugent Family Band. The first, by Tim Stafford and Craig Market, is a tender ballad about a child leaving home.
The Last Greyhound – Listen now: [http://media.libsyn.com/media/thegrasscast/last_greyhound.mp3]
I won’t spoil the rest of the story, but let’s just say that it turns out much better than Stafford’s similar tale in Midwestern Town. Thanks guys!
The Nugent Family Band is a biographical take on Alecia’s having grown up playing music with her family. She wrote it with Tom T. and Dixie Hall, and it is simply a charming song.
The Nugent Family Band – Listen now: [http://media.libsyn.com/media/thegrasscast/nugent_family_band.mp3]
There isn’t a dud on this disc. Congratulations to all involved.
