Sound Stories & Interviews

When Yonder Mountain String Band members line up on stage, what you're seeing and what you're hearing are often at odds. These four inconspicuous looking white dudes look casual, but their crazy excellent musicianship is evident when they shred, their fret boards a blur of fingers and strings.
If you've been musically conscious since 1998, when the band formed, and have any interest in bluegrass or all-around kickass live acts then you've probably seen this bass, guitar, mandolin and banjo playing quartet play. After all, these boys now head a progressive bluegrass empire which includes their own record label, Frog Pad Records, and the extremely successful site youndermountainlive.com, an archive of hundreds of their live performances dating back to their inception that is available for download and sale.

Every now and then an artist comes along who reminds us to look beyond our surroundings and consider what's going on in this world. For years now, folk singer Todd Snider has been one of those artists. If you haven't yet answered his knock, perhaps the release of his latest album, Agnostic Hymns and Stoner Fables, will be a rap at the door too inspiring to ignore.
On Agnostic Hymns, Snider wades neck deep into the fray between America's rich and poor – the thoughtful and hilarious singer/songwriter said he merely wanted to paint a picture from his vantage point.

The Shook Twins write three kinds of songs- songs that give you goose bumps, songs that make you laugh, and songs that do both. Straight out of Sandpoint, Idaho, Laurie and Katelyn Shook play modern folk music that ranges from dark and progressive to light and humorous.
“We describe our genre as quirky folk,” says Laurie. “Kind of a twist on the idea of folk that most people have.”
The identical twins' indistinguishable voices make for a special kind of twin harmony, which makes regular people singing harmony seem inadequate.

Rachel Brooke is psyched that there are no more international border checkpoints to negotiate while driving from California to Bend. On Wednesday, the 27-year-old Michigan-based country crooner experienced a close encounter with some rabid border agents after playing a show in Las Cruces, New Mexico, a city that's perched a scant 20 miles from the renowned Mexican drug haven of Ciudad Juarez.

Call them pop, folk, indie or Americana, just don't call the Ascetic Junkies bluegrass.
This Portland four-piece band is at odds with the assumptions that many people make when they see a band featuring a banjo. Moreover, with the recent departure of one of their longtime members, the new lineup is sans banjo, which the band hopes will help to clear things up.
Kali Giaritta and Matt Harmon, the group's songwriting duo, explained their beef with the bluegrass label when I spoke with them about their upcoming album, their recent tour, and their new lineup that's heading to Bend this week.

Imagine you're a young jazz saxophonist, fresh out of college and living in Manhattan. The year is 1977: John Travolta is dancing at the discoteque in Saturday Night Fever, America is swept up in three-piece suits and neck scarves, and you have just landed a spot in Art Blakey's Jazz Messangers, a group that's been the definitive New York jazz ensemble for more than two decades.

There are two distinct sides to the country music coin.
On one side is Rehab, a country hip-hop band whose new single, “Woho by the Hoti,” featured in the No. 2 spot of their February album release Gullible's Travels, is a catchy song outlining the wonders of a fortuitously close spatial relationship between their hotel, a Waffle House and a strip club. And it's clear that Danny Alexander, Rehab's front man, found more inspiration in Run DMC than Don Williams.