One and Done True to his bluesy style, Steve Schecter, aka Ghostwriter, borrows his touring philosophy from a stranger down in Birmingham, Alabama––a man who asked the one-man band about going on the road as a solo act. “I said, ‘Oh, I don’t have any friends I like to travel

There are times when it feels like Southern Oregon has more banjos than Deliverance, most of them making the baffling choice to dress up and celebrate the dustbowl, when people were poor, starving and battling polio; you know, “the good old days.” But a growing number of string bands are

Yes, yes, weed is now legal. But we’ve all made pot mixtapes before, including this reporter. And there’s another major news item that we haven’t yet mixified: marriage equality enshrined by the Supreme Court. And while we could be cliché, packing it with Elton John, we went another route, compiling

An Excuse to Drink on a Tuesday Evan Wilson, music booker at Brickroom knows that smaller markets like Southern Oregon are notorious for off-night performances, as musicians work their way to and from weekend gigs in larger urban areas. Still… “It’s crazy how many sleepy, singer songwriter types we’ve had

American, Not Gothic Music genres are an endless parade of innovative portmanteaus, mashing up existing words with microniche trends. The one most commonly applied to Denver band Slim Cessna’s Auto Club is gothabilly. “I don’t know where that came from,” laughs Slim Cessna, the band’s frontman. “I think we’re closer

  Tuscon-based band Calexico formed in the ‘90s, and its latin-themed indie sound has been on the who’s who list of the underground pretty much ever since. The band will be performing at Britt on Tue., July 14, opening for The Decemberists. The Messenger caught up with frontman Joey Burns

Professionally Lific Most bands release an album every two years or so. Some workaholics crank out a new work annually. Jerome Arizona-based Nathan Payne, who will be playing at Club 66 in Ashland on Mon., June 29 with his band The Wild Bores, has 26 albums available on Bandcamp—15 from

Boom Bap Banjo The average listener would find little in common between banjo-plucking and turntable-scratching. Leah and Chloe Smith, the principal members of folk band Rising Appalachia, who will be performing at Britt on Thur., July 9 are not the average listeners. “I think hip hop is the contemporary folk

What makes The Legendary Goodtimes work is a total lack of hypenation. While other bands are exploring sub-genres and micro-niches, they are unapologetic about their one-word genre: rock. Even the band’s cover of funk masterpiece “Superstition,” by Stevie Wonder is a purely power-chord affair, with amps cranked and no fucks

E-D-M not R-A-P Ever since Vanilla Ice sent word to your mother, the criticism of white rappers has most commonly been a lack of self-awareness. Louisville-based rapper Calen Schaeffer, better known as Cato, swings pretty far in the other direction. “I’m just like every other white rapper,” he says. “I’ve