Sarah Shook fronts The Disarmers at Pearl Street Warehouse on Sept. 12, 2018. (Photo by Marc Caicedo)
I was expecting Lucinda Williams meets Dwight Yoakum when Sarah Shook & The Disarmers took the stage at Pearl Street Warehouse recently. Well, I got that… and a whole lot more.
Sol Roots performs at The Soundry on Aug. 9, 2018. (Photo by Ari Strauss)
Sol Roots and his band gave a hot performance recently at The Soundry in Columbia, Maryland, putting in a 45-miute opening set before New Orleans-great Jon Cleary took the stage.
Rhiannon Giddens performs at Wolf Trap on Aug. 11, 2018. (Photo by Ari Strauss)
On Saturday, I was really excited to see Rhiannon Giddens at Wolf Trap as the opening act for Mary Chapin Carpenter. Rhiannon and I both attended Oberlin College, a liberal arts college and music conservatory in smalltown Ohio, about 40 mins southwest of Cleveland. Rhiannon was classically trained at Oberlin as a opera singer. I, on the other hand, have exactly one musical bone in my body — my right tibia, which is not an especially useful bone for music — and was in the liberal arts college.
Porter Robinson (Photo by Peter Don)
Porter Robinson has developed a new concept, Virtual Self. With this new identity, Porter revels in his love of early ’00s visuals to “combine three tropes from the period that didn’t overlap much at the time: digital abstract, arcane magic design, and digital grunge, all into a single early-aughts flavor.”
With a show at Echostage on Monday, Sept. 3, Porter will bring Virtual Self to DC.
Rhiannon Giddens (Photo by John Peets)
Rhiannon Giddens released Freedom Highway, her second solo album, in 2017 via Nonesuch Records. She’s coming to Wolf Trap to open Mary Chapin Carpenter on Saturday, Aug. 11! Be sure to arrive early for Rhiannon’s set.
Sylvan Esso dazzles a packed The Anthem on July 26, 2018. (Photo by David LaMason)
There’s a magic that Amelia Meath (vocals) and Nick Sanborn (producer/sound engineer) create. It’s an infectious feeling generated by Amelia’s compelling voice and energetic dance moves — itself buoyed by the soundscapes formed and molded by Nick’s panel of sounds. Over the past two LPs (2014’s self-titled Sylvan Esso and last year’s What Now), the North Carolina-based Sylvan Esso created beat-soaked tunes that stick in your head. But it’s their live show that’s a force to behold.
On Thursday night at The Anthem, the duo pulled no punches.
The Avett Brothers perform at Union Band and Trust Pavilion in Portsmouth, Virginia, on July 20, 2018. (Photo by Nathan Payne)
Recently, The Avett Brothers released “No Hard Feelings,” a single held over from their last studio album, True Sadness, published in 2016 by American Recordings. The band, led by brothers Scott Avett (banjo, lead vocals, guitar, piano, kick-drum) and Seth Avett (guitar, lead vocals, piano, hi-hat), undertook an extensive summer tour that took them to the Union Band and Trust Pavilion in Portsmouth, Virginia, on Friday. Nathan Payne was there to shoot some pictures!
Of course, The Avett Brothers arrive locally to perform at Wolf Trap on Saturday, Aug. 18, in a sold-out show.
