High Horse is a new young experimental/progressive stringband based in Boston, featuring a quartet that met while enrolled as students at the Berklee School of Music and the New England Conservatory of Music. They have all completed their degree programs now, but the band continues on, with a debut self-titled album dropping on Friday with Adhyâropa Records.
The ensemble format is a bit novel for the greater bluegrass world, though becoming more common, made up of Carson McHaney on fiddle, Karl Henry on cello, G Rockwell on guitar, and Noah Harrington on bass. Noted alt-grass mandolinist Jacob Jolliff produced the record, and appears as guest mandolinist on several tracks.
A single is available, with a live performance video, that finds High Horse playing a tune Rockwell composed, called Tombstone Territory. Jolliff performs on the single, but doesn’t appear in the video, a true home recording shot in one of the band members’ kitchen.
Their sound is a bit like what Jolliff has recorded with his group, and similar to what you may have heard from groups like Mr Sun or Hawktail. They show tremendous promise in this first recording, employing the same sort of complex harmony as these other artists, and which they all surely studied in college.
Check it out…
High Horse isn’t a strictly instrumental outfit. A previous single, Discern, has Henry on lead vocals, with harmonies from Rockwell and Harrington. They have some fun with meter on this one.
Look/listen in this earlier video.
Both singles are available now from popular download and streaming services online. Pre-saves for the album, due December 6, are likewise enabled.
