Front Country was among the alternative acoustic groups who brought their music to the IBMA World Of Bluegrass convention in 2015, where they were an invited showcase act. Since that time their star has continued to shine, based on the sultry, aggressive, and highly emotive vocal stylings of Melody Walker.
You can hear the bluegrass background in their music, but once they dropped the banjo, other influences from blues and pop music have come to the fore.
They have just released this video for O Heartbreaker, one of the tracks from their latest album, Other Love Songs. It was recorded live as part of the Tomboy Sessions in Santa Cruz, CA earlier this year.
Other Love Songs, the next album from Front Country, isn’t due until April 7, but the band has agreed to let us share the record’s second track as a pre-release premiere here at Bluegrass Today.
Lonesome Town was written and sung by the group’s guitarist, Melody Walker, who says that she was inspired by the scramble she’s seen as small towns try to keep business alive downtown.
“As a West Coast band, we have spent a lot of time in the vast western expanses between California and Colorado. Where actual towns are 300 miles apart, and you might not find so much as a gas station in between. I also grew up in a suburban city with a languishing historic downtown, where shopping moved to big box stores on the outskirts and local small businesses struggle to stay open. This song is a blend of those two experiences, using the desert ghost town as a metaphor for the tribulations of any small town struggling to keep Main Street alive.”
Here’s the track, a blend of their bluegrass roots with the current coastal California Americana sound.
In addition to Melody on guitar, Front Country consists of Adam Roskiewicz on mandolin and banjo, Jacob Groopman on guitar and reso-guitar, Jeremy Darrow on bass, and Leif Karlstrom on fiddle. Both Adam and Jacob assist with vocals, but it’s Walker’s powerhouse voice that drives the band. Fans of modern acoustic music will find much to enjoy in their more experimental approach within the traditional bluegrass quintet.
Pre-orders for Other Love Songs are available now from popular digital download sites, which include an instant download of one track.
Front Country has been teasing their fans this past few weeks, releasing previews each Friday from their upcoming EP, Mixtape. It’s a five track project of cover songs that the band likes to perform, which they cut to satisfy fan requests in between full-length albums.
Like most of their music, this last, Kissin’ Comes Easy, features the blues-drenched vocals of Melody Walker out front, supported by Jacob Groopman on guitar, Adam Roszkiewicz on mandolin, Leif Karlstrom on fiddle, and Jeremy Darrow on bass.
Long time grassers will recall the song as a Good Old Persons track by Kathy Kallick from 1983. Enjoy.
Mixtape will be released for download sale on all popular platforms next Friday, May 13.
Front Country has recently brought Jeremy Darrow on board as the band’s new bassist. He takes the spot vacated by Zach Sharpe who left as the band transitioned to a full-time touring group.
Darrow received his musical training at the College of the Arts in Philadelphia. Bluegrass fans know him from his earlier work with Detour and Dixie Bee-Liners. He currently resides in Nashville.
Front Country shared this statement as they receive him as a new member.
“We’d like to welcome Jeremy Darrow as the new bassist in Front Country! Jeremy joined us on our two national tours this year and we could not be more excited to welcome him into the group as a full time member. He is an amazing bass player, coffee snob, foodie, father of three amazing little girls and one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet. Please join us in welcoming Jeremy to the Front Country family!”
Jeremy joins Jacob Groopman on guitar, Melody Walker on vocals, Adam Roszkiewicz on mandolin, and Leif Karlstrom on fiddle.
Front Country have also recently signed with Crossover Touring who represent a good many other bluegrass acts, like Sierra Hull, Del McCoury, Della Mae, Hot Rize, and The Gibson Brothers. Their upcoming fall tour will take them through the Northwest, then Southeast for IBMA’s World Of Bluegrass where they are an invited showcase act, and then a Bluegrass Underground TV taping before returning home to California for some shows out there.
What would you be willing to pay for 9 straight nights of live bluegrass, cybercast right into your home?
Well it doesn’t much matter, as the folks at Concert Window who have scheduled Bluegrass Roundup, their first ever multi-day bluegrass festival online, will be offering most of the concerts on a donation-based, pay-what-you-want basis. 50 different acts, from all across the US, are scheduled to perform back-to-back sets, festival style, using the Concert Window performance application.
Some will be beamed your way from concert stages, others from a performer’s home, or a hotel room. All will be delivered to your digital device, computer or TV set (depending on software and connections) in high definition video and sound. You can pick and choose the sets you’d like to watch, or plop down and watch them all, end to end.
The Bluegrass Roundup will run from February 20-28, starting each evening at 7:00 or 8:00 p.m. (EST) and running until 11:00 or 11:30. There will be traditional bluegrass from artists like Roland White, Mountain Faith, and Circa Blue; more contemporary grass from Jim Lauderdale, Sierra Hull, Lonely Heartstring Band, Railsplitters, Front Country, Town Mountain, and Barefoot Movement; and groundbreaking new sounds from Mr. Sun, Bryan Sutton, Mike Marshall & Caterina Lichtenberg, Jim Lauderdale and more.
There will also be instrumental workshops with Ned Luberecki (banjo), Lauren Rioux (fiddle), and Sierra Hull and Casey Campbell (mandolin).
Concert Window’s Artist Relations Manager, Emma Beaton, herself a contemporary bluegrass artist, says that grass is the perfect match for an online festival.
“A lot of people don’t think that bluegrass fits with new technology. But bluegrass artists have really embraced new technology, especially online. We’re very proud to be the first company to ever run an online bluegrass festival, welcoming these artists to the Concert Window Community and the online stage. We’re huge bluegrass fans and are excited to have folks doing shows online.”
There will be a set from a Japanese bluegrass band, The Blueside of Lonesome, and from college programs like The Bethel University Bluegrass Band (under the leadership of Stephen Mougin) and The ETSU Bluegrass Pride Band (under the leadership of Daniel Boner).
This week long event is being pitched to listeners of all types of modern acoustic music, hoping that fans of one group will log in for their favorites, and stay to experience other artists they may not be familiar with. Talent buyers and label representatives can benefit as well by hearing a lot of new acts from the comfort of their home or office.
70% of all monies raised is shared with the artists performing, and Concert Window can be viewed on any device that can connect to the Internet.
A full list of players and bands scheduled during Bluegrass Roundup can be found on the Concert Window site.
Front Country has a new music video which shows why this young group has been gobbling up critical acclaim all across the bluegrass world.
It features a live (in the country) version of the title track from their latest CD, For The Sake of the Sound,produced by Mason Jar Music and our friends at The Bluegrass Situation.
Mixing highly orchestrated arrangements with the compelling voice of Melanie Walker looks like a formula for success.
Do yourself a favor. No matter what you think of jam bands, Americana and other genres that reside at the edges of traditional bluegrass or beyond, swallow your preconceptions and listen to four songs from Sake of the Sound, the first full-length CD from Front Country.
Just four songs.
After that, my guess is many of you will want to hear more from this San Francisco-area sextet, even if every cut isn’t exactly your cup of tea.
The main reason is Melody Walker, the female vocal equivalent of Chris Stapleton or Dave Adkins. Her big voice can fill a room, but it’s not just volume. She wrestles the emotion from nearly every song, whether it’s the opener, a bluesy take on the traditional Gospel Train, or this fine CD’s closing number, Lovin’s for Fools, which demands a more plaintive approach. One thing is certain: No one will mistake Walker for Alison Krauss. Both are terrific singers, but 180 degrees apart in their approach.
The album’s bookend songs alone would leave me wanting to hear more. But for good measure, hold your opinions until you hear One Kind Word, the closest thing to a traditional bluegrass cut here, and Colorado, a grass-is-always-greener song that Walker wrote with producer Kai Welch. (In this case, the grass is literally greener, as she sings about leaving the parched brownness of Northern California for Colorado.)
The recording is solid from start to finish, inviting comparisons to a handful of other bands that have already established themselves in the new grass/Americana camp – Punch Brothers, the Infamous Stringdusters, the Hillbenders and Frank Solivan and Dirty Kitchen.
I’ve focused almost exclusively on Walker so far, but the five guys who join her in the band bring a lot to the table, too. Instrumentally, Front Country is inventive and well beyond solid, especially when fiddler Leif Karlstrom and guitarist/jack-of-all-trades Jacob Groopman play off of each other. And on mandolin, Adam Roszkiewicz invites favorable comparisons to Chris Thile. His approach is unpredictable but, almost always, just what the song requires.
>It’s no accident that Front Country won band contests at both Telluride and Rockygrass. As pickers, they and Jordan Klein (banjo) and Zach Sharpe (upright bass) can hold their own with just about any unit on the circuit. Groopman is no slouch in the vocal department, either, whether singing lead or harmony.
Surprisingly, though, for all of the talent, I find the project’s pair of instrumentals, the guitar-powered Daysleeper and Old Country, to be the least memorable of the 12 selections. They’re good tunes, expertly picked, but don’t pack the emotional punch or inventiveness of the other songs.
Even two of the more unusual songs are worth repeat listens. One, Glacier Song, is written and sung from the point of view of the glacier, reminiscent of a song on Tim Stafford’s recent solo project that is “sung” by a flophouse.
The other is Rock Salt & Nails. Upon first listen to this pretty conventional tale about a woman thinking about the conniving, double-crossing guy who broke her heart, I wondered where the unusual title came from. But I wondered no more when Walker, after working herself into a bit of rage offered her parting shot, saying that if she had the chance, “I’d fill up my shotgun with rock salt and nails.”
That, in songwriting jargon, is called the reveal, a surprise twist at or near the end of the song. This one is quite effective. I, for one, never saw it coming. (Perhaps I should have. Songwriter Utah Phillips is a master of this approach.)
The project, itself, is a revelation. To those who have heard Front Country, mostly in the western U.S., or the work of Walker and Groopman as a duo, the powerful work here may not be news. But for others, I’m thinking this CD will come as a pleasant surprise.
