Seattle Theatre Group (STG Presents), Live Nation, and The Lakeside Group present the first-ever No Depression Festival, sponsored by the pioneering and influential roots-music magazine and website. The festival will take place Saturday, July 11, 2009, at Marymoor Park in Redmond, Washington, just outside Seattle. The all-day event will feature Gillian Welch, Iron & Wine, Patterson Hood & The Screwtopians, Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter, Justin Townes Earle, Jessica Lea Mayfield, a Seattle roots-music all-star revue, and Zee Avi.
No Depression launched as a quarterly (and then bimonthly) magazine in Seattle in 1995, and quickly became known as the foremost journalistic authority for roots-music genres ranging from alternative-country to singer-songwriters to bluegrass to trad-leaning indie acts, and beyond. In 2008, No Depression shuttered its print publication and launched a website, NoDepression.com, which in 2009 has transitioned into a community-oriented site that will soon house an extensive archive of the former print magazine's content. In addition, No Depression has partnered with University of Texas Press to issue a series of "bookazines," the second of which hit shelves this spring (a third is due in the fall).
Tickets, $45.00 (not including applicable fees), are on sale Friday, May 15th at noon at all Ticketmaster outlets, online at
www.ticketmaster.com, or charge by phone 206-628-0888. Tickets can also be purchased online at
www.concertsatmarymoor.com. For more information, please visit
www.stgpresents.org and
www.nodepression.com.
About the performers:
Gillian Welch has been one of the most prominent names in American roots music ever since her 1996 debut album, Revival, was nominated for a Grammy in the Contemporary Folk category. She has released four albums as well as a live DVD, and was a key contributor to the multi-Grammy-winning soundtrack for O Brother, Where Art Thou? (and the associated live-performance album Down From The Mountain). She appeared on the cover of No Depression in Sept.-Oct. 2001. Performing with her longtime accompanist David Rawlings, Welch has been a major draw at roots-oriented music festivals for more than a decade.
Iron & Wine, a.k.
A. Singer-songwriter Sam Beam, has bridged the gap between acoustic-roots and indie-rock audiences with a degree of both commercial and artistic success that few other artists have managed to approach in the past decade. Through three full-length albums on Sub Pop plus a handful of EPs (including a celebrated collaboration with the Arizona band Calexico), Iron & Wine has garnered a considerable following since his 2002 debut. Around The Well, a two-disc compilation of B-sides and rarities, is due out via Sub Pop on May 19. Beam was featured at length in No Depression in March-April 2004.
Patterson Hood & The Screwtopians is the touring outfit that Drive-By Truckers frontman Patterson Hood has assembled to support his upcoming solo release Murdering Oscar (and other love songs), due out June 23. The Screwtopians include DBTs veterans
John Neff (pedal steel) and Brad Morgan (drums), Will Johnson (guitar) and Scott Danbom (keyboards/fiddle) from Texas indie bands Centro-Matic and South San Gabriel, and Murdering Oscar co-producer David Barbe (bass), formerly of Bob Mould's band Sugar. This is the second solo release for Hood, who appeared with the Drive-By Truckers on the cover of No Depression in July-August 2003.
Jesse Sykes & The Sweet Hereafter have been one of Seattle's foremost roots-music acts of the past decade, with three acclaimed albums (including two on noted indie label Barsuk Records). Joining singer-songwriter Sykes in the Sweet Hereafter are guitarist Phil Wandscher (who appeared with Whiskeytown on the cover of No Depression in July-August 1997), bassist Bill Herzog, and drummer Eric Eagle.
Justin Townes Earle recently released Midnight At The Movies, his second album for the renowned insurgent-country label Bloodshot Records (and his third disc overall). In 2008, Earle was nominated in the "Emerging Artist" category of the Americana Music Assocation Awards. Having been profiled in the March-April 2008 issue of No Depression, Earle was also written about recently on the ND website, and will be featured in the upcoming fall edition of the No Depression bookazine.
Jessica Lea Mayfield released her full-length debut album in September 2008, at age 19. The disc, With Blasphemy So Heartfelt, was produced by Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys, who had featured Mayfield as a duet vocalist on a track from their 2007 album Attack And Release. Mayfield's solo disc quickly received widespread acclaim in both roots and indie circles, establishing her as a promising young singer-songwriter.
An all-star revue of Seattle roots musicians will play songs oft-associated with the genres that No Depression has covered over the past 14 years. The participants include Star Anna, Sera Cahoone, Ian Moore, Zoe Muth, Mark Pickerel, Kristen Ward, and members of the Maldives and North Twin, backed by a core band featuring Ty Ballie, Jeff Fielder, Erik Eagle and Rebecca Young.
Zee Avi hails from Malaysia and is a new singer-songwriter signee to Brushfire Records, which will issue her self-titled debut album on May 19. She came to the label's attention through a series of videos she posted to YouTube under the name KokoKaina.
Seattle Theatre Group is the 501 (c)(3) non-profit arts organization that operates the historic Paramount and Moore Theatres in Seattle, Washington. Our mission is to make diverse performing arts and education an integral part of our region's cultural identity while keeping these two landmark venues alive and vibrant. STG presents a range of performances from Broadway, off-Broadway, dance and jazz to comedy, concerts of all genres, speakers and family shows - at both historic theatres in Seattle and venues throughout the Puget Sound and Portland, Oregon.
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