Again, the frustration of not being able to catch all the showcase performers…

Downloading the Gold Heart photos last night, I missed Darin and Brooke Aldridge and Spring Creek, both of whom I had hoped to see. Darin and Brooke just announced last week that their next CD will be released on the Mountain Home label, probably early in 2010. There are more details and a YouTube clip of one of the new songs on the Mountain Home web site.

I had run into Taylor Sims of Spring Creek earlier in the day, when he stopped to speak with Alan Munde, who had been his teacher when Taylor and the other members of the band were enrolled in the bluegrass program at South Plain College in Texas. The pride was obvious on Alan’s face, meeting up with a former student at IBMA who was moving up in the bluegrass business.

I did make it back to the showcase stage in time to see The Josh Williams Band. Wow!

Josh has always been a confident performer, not to mention a fine singer and guitar player. He shone as a member of Special Consensus and Rhonda Vincent’s band, and has three solo projects under his name. All this before he has reached the age of 30. He debuted his own band at IBMA last year, and the difference over the past year is starkly dramatic.

His band consists of musicians from Williams’ home state of Kentucky, who are also long time friends close to his age. Jason McKendree was on banjo, Randy Barnes on bass and Scott Napier on mandolin.

I can’t think of the last time I heard a four piece band this strong – rhythmically solid and sonically powerful – since maybe the early editions of Lonesome River Band in the 1990s. Their sound is crisp, precise and in-your-face. With Josh’s easy charm and million dollar smile, it makes for a very engaging performance. The guys obviously have fun on stage, and Josh is perfectly comfortable with the attention on him.

He seemed sincerely appreciative for the chance to appear on an official showcase, and thanked the crowd repeatedly for the opportunity. The Josh Williams Band, whose debut CD won’t be released until next year on Pinecastle, was nominated as Emerging Artist of the Year for Thursday’s IBMA Awards, something that again elicited a grateful mention from the stage.

The only song from the show that I recall Josh specifically mentioning as being on the new album was his brilliant version of The Last Song, a classic from the Jimmy Martin repertoire. This song requires a skilled and confident vocalist, and Josh absolutely owned it. Another standout was the Mark Mathewson song Mordecai, from Josh’s 2004 CD, Lonesome Highway.

A big part of achieving success at IBMA is being ready to take full advantage of your shot at such a big stage. Josh showed last night that he and his young band are ready, willing and able.

Josh Williams has announced a personnel change for the Josh Williams Band. Bass player Tim Dishman has elected to spend more time at home with his family, and to devote more time to his day job.

Randy Barnes comes into the group to replace Dishman. No, not that Randy Barnes, this one.

Randy formerly played bass with New Found Road. Since parting ways with NFR, Randy has been looking for a band that he felt was the right fit for him. It seems he found it with the Josh Williams Band.

We look forward to hearing him with this exciting young band.

The Mashville Brigade may not be that familiar a name to most festival going bluegrass fans, but the individual members of the band should be. The Brigade is comprised of: Aaron McDaris (The Grascals) on banjo and harmony vocals; Darrell Webb (Rhonda Vincent & The Rage) on guitar and lead vocals; Ashby Frank (Special Consensus) lead vocals and mandolin; Jim VanCleve (Mountain Heart) on fiddle; and Randy Barnes (NewFound Road) on bass.

The Brigade is today’s modern version of the Sidemen. Started a year or so ago as a fun midweek gig at The Station Inn in Nashville, The Mashville Brigade releases it’s first CD on April 22, 2008. The CD is produced by the band’s own Jim VanCleve, and contains 16 tracks, all of them standard bluegrass hits. Bearing the title Bluegrass Smash Hits, Volume 1, this disc is the first in a new series of releases planned by Rural Rhythm Records.

Ashby Frank commented on the genesis of the group.

I’ve gotten to pick with these guys at various festivals and in the halls and rooms of events like IBMA, SPBMGA, and the Galax Fiddlers Convention for years. Since we both grew up in North Carolina, I’ve known Jim for the longest, actually before I even really got into Bluegrass. The first time I ever played on a Bluegrass Festival stage was with Jim in Denton, NC. I think we put together a band with my sister and opened up the festival on a Tuesday or Wednesday night.

Randy, Darrell, Jim, Aaron and myself have performed with each other as a part of quite a few different collaborations, through fill-in work or special events like the MACC Festival in Columbus, OH. Once all of us had moved to Nashville, we talked about getting something together to play around town and maybe a festival or two. It took us a few years to get together, but it’s finally worked out, and it’s a whole lot of fun.

The band started basically as a new version of the Sidemen, the infamous group that used to perform every Tuesday night at the Station Inn. The Mashville Brigade started filling that same time slot and as Jim VanCleve tells it, one thing just led to another.

The Mashville Brigade has really grown into something much larger than we ever could have anticipated from when we first began playing at the Station Inn a little over a year ago. It all basically started as an outlet for us to have some fun while playing the music we all grew up on. But since the bluegrass culture around Nashville is really a pretty tight-knit bunch of friends, we suddenly had a good sized audience each Tuesday night, full of friends and family, in a room that is known for bringing out the best in people. This comfortable atmosphere really allowed the music to grow and take on it’s own unique personality. It was really starting to blow up, and the crowds just kept getting better each week. So, after some time, we started thinking, “this band really needs to record something”! Now, after listening back to the masters of the Mashville Brigade’s first album, I can honestly say that we are all very happy with what we were able to do!

The CD was recorded in a rather unique manner for the age we live in. The guys met at the Station Inn, their primary creative outlet, during the daylight hours and tracked the entire thing in under 8 hours with no overdubs. (more…)