Among my circle of high school friends, way, way back in the late 90′s (if anyone has a time machine, I volunteer to go back), I was in the know on what music to listen to. In particular, that was Guster, Huffamoose, and anything playing on Y100. And that was all well and good, but as I’ve aged (just working through my first few weeks as a 29-year-old), I’ve become increasingly interested in listening to different genres of music. I’ll credit Matt and company for this — he and his friends are quite the music snobs. In college I got hooked on alternative country (even though back in 1998, I thought I’d die before I’d ever listen to anything even loosely related to country) and more recently have started to like what I consider to be alternative blue grass. And that’s been my kick over the past month or so — fiddles and banjos brought to you by the fine men of both Old Crow Medicine Show and the Avett Brothers.
courtesy of amazon.com
We heard a song from an Old Crow Medicine Show album, Tennessee Pusher while hanging out at DuBois’ own, The Hitching Post and decided to head on over to Amazon to pick up a virtual copy. As an aside, just buying MP3s isn’t a philosophy with which Matt and I necessarily agree … we like the cover art, the holding something tangible, the fiddling with the CD/record player … but we’re totally out of space. While that album itself didn’t catch me in particular (it was enjoyable — worth listening to), it drew me back into another album by Old Crow called Big Iron World. And I’m just in love — banjos, fiddles, harmonies. What’s not to like?
And then I noticed that a band I really like one album by (I and Love and You by the Avett Brothers) had another one of their earlier albums on sale (virtual-like) for just $3.99 at Amazon. Alas, I’ll never enjoy the clever cover art, the joy of reading the lyrics in some intentionally artistic/edgy scrawl font/ironic liner notes from this album either, but the music! It’s so what I’m in the mood to listen to right now with spring springing and the sun shining.
courtesy of theavettbrothers.com
What I really like about this band is that they throw in some rock edge every once in a while that causes the lead singer to shout briefly in a few of the songs. The album is Emotionalism and it has a lot going for it: slow ballad-type songs, plenty of upbeat music that you kinda want to clap to while you’re in the car waiting for the light to change, and some harder, dirtier guitar riffs. All things I enjoy. My current favorite song is Pretty Girl from Chile. It starts out kinda sleepily, but wait for it. And some late breaking news: I just got tickets to see them in a few weeks! Stoked!!
You can make fun of me if you like, but this music puts me in an exceptionally good mood that makes me all but completely immune to jeers from people who just don’t know any better 
You should definitely give them both a chance if you’re not a fan already.
