Cole Quest Archives - Bluegrass Today

Self [En]Titled – Cole Quest and the City Pickers

A hallowed heritage can be hard to live up to. Expectation is often intimidating, but when your granddad was someone who happened to be one of the most iconic folksingers of all time, the bar is set so high, it’s all but impossible to even think you can come close.

For Cole Quest, being the grandson of the great Woody Guthrie could easily be both a blessing and a curse. His birthright certainly provides him with a gateway to recognition, but the level of expectation is also unrealistic, and comparisons to his famous forebear gives him plenty to overcome, especially at the outset.

Consequently, Quest and his band, the City Pickers — Quest (reso-guitar), Christian Apuzzo (guitar), Mike Mulhollan (banjo), Matheus Verardino (harmonica), and Larry Cook (bass) — are wise not to even attempt to emulate anyone other than those with whom they share a similar sound and sensibility. Their six song EP, Self [En]Titled mostly hews to the bluegrass basics, while employing a personal perspective and a shared sense of spontaneity. No, he doesn’t neglect his genealogy entirely; a take on the fanciful Way Over Yonder in the Minor Key, a song originally written by Woody and later completed by Billy Bragg, adds an old-time element that’s obviously keyed to a natural niche. So too, there’s an irreverent attitude found in songs such as Ostrich Therapy and Bitcoin Gambler, each a timely commentary on the crazy contradictions that add to the madness of today’s modern malaise.

Mostly though, the ensemble sticks to more familiar-sounding fare. The instrumental medley, 7-11/Foggy Mountain Rock, owes its approach to Flatt & Scruggs, Jim & Jesse and other influential players and pickers. If I Still Had You makes a similar statement. On the other hand, the heartbreaking My Sweet Little Girl taps into universal feelings, but focuses on the heartbreaks of loss that still lingers.

That then, is the true relationship Quest is able to maintain, that is, the ability to connect with listeners in a wholly human way. It’s the thing that Woody always wanted.

The Bitcoin Gambler from Cole Quest and The City Pickers

New York City grassers Cole Quest and The City Pickers have released a clever animated music video for the second single from their upcoming EP, Self [En]Titled.

Cole has an interesting lineage for a singer and songwriter. He is the grandson of folk legend Woody Guthrie, and shows a touch of his patriarch in the lyrics to this new single. Playing reso-guitar and singing harmony, his City Pickers include Christian Apuzzo on guitar and lead vocal, Matheus Verardino on harmonica, Mike Mulhollan on banjo, and Larry Cook on bass.

The song is Bitcoin Gambler, which Quest wrote about the cryptocurrency craze, which he says draws from his own experiences trying to cash in, along with some Trump references that may feel a bit stale at this point.

“As a software engineer by day, a folk musician by night, and someone who lost money in the Bitcoin crash of 2018, I felt I had a unique connection to this modern-day dilemma. First came the melody line written on guitar, and the rest of the song wrote itself in a matter of minutes. As the band laid down the tracks, I fell in love with the ending of the recording. You can hear how each musician found their own, wonderfully unique, voicing to this melody. As I was writing the song, I found myself reflecting on things that are important. Surely, losing a few dollars wasn’t worth focusing on in contrast to the problems created by an ill-equipped fool in the white house.”

The video was created by animator Megan O’Neill, which perfectly captures the feel of Quest’s grassed up talking blues.

Self [En]Titled is due on April 16 from Omnivore Recordings.

Cole Quest & The City Pickers remember Woody Guthrie

We have commented before about the paradox of New York City’s well-earned reputation as the entertainment capital of the world, despite its paucity of bluegrass music. It shows that beauty and attraction is in the eye of the beholder. Or to relate the wisdom of a 1960s era philosopher, “Keep Manhattan just gimme that countryside.”

But The Big Apple does produce some quality bluegrass, though it is understandably influenced by the city that encompasses it.

Today’s example comes from Cole Quest and The City Pickers, and a first single from their upcoming, 6-song EP. They live on the more progressive side of the bluegras spectrum, led by reso-guitarist Quest, supported by Christian Apuzzo on guitar, Mike Mulhollan on banjo, Larry Cook on bass, and Matheus Verardino on harmonica.

For the single, they have chosen an interesting hybrid composition, Way Over Yonder in the Minor Key, written by Cole’s grandfather, Woody Guthrie, as a poem and later set to music by English songwriter, Billy Bragg, and recorded in 1996 by Wilco. The City Pickers turn it into a mid-tempo grasser, which you can hear in this clever animated lyric video released yesterday.

The band’s EP, Self-Entitled, is set for an April 6 release on Omnivore Records. Pre-orders can be placed now online.