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Hiss Golden Messenger Brings Their Complex Southern Sound To The Broadberry

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Hiss Golden Messenger’s music may be hard to explain in a single sentence, but as bandleader MC Taylor tells us, that’s entirely intentional.

Assigning a genre to Hiss Golden Messenger is a difficult thing to do. Elements of folk, gospel, rock, roots, Americana, and country are all embedded somewhere in the makings of the Durham, NC-based outfit. It’s the confluence of founder, singer and songwriter M.C. Taylor’s introspective musings and the soundscape his chosen collective of musicians create that makes their sound so singular. For his 2019 effort, Terms of Surrender, Taylor enlisted Jenny Lewis (Rilo Kiley) and The National’s Aaron Dressner to take part in writing the latest chapter in the metamorphic songbook of Hiss Golden Messenger.

We caught up with M.C. Taylor to talk about the new record, life in the south, and the evolution of the band.  

RVA Mag: Hiss Golden Messenger is a collective of musicians and artists you surround yourself with in the studio and on tour to give your reflections and observations a certain texture. The sound can be called Americana, southern folk, etc. I have a hard time defining it. What’s the process of finding collaborators to create the sound you’re looking to capture? What would you call it (if you had to)?

M.C. Taylor: I have a hard time explaining what Hiss Golden Messenger sounds like (in a single sentence) too. That’s intentional. I want to be part of the creation of things that are hard to explain. All of my favorite art has many layers and isn’t meant to be understood on first listen or viewing. I’m trying to create something that keeps listeners coming back to develop their understanding of their relationship with the music. As far as collaborators, I’m looking for kind people that have confident and recognizable voices on their respective instruments. I don’t necessarily need technical virtuosos, but I want players whose personalities you hear when they play. 

RVA: 2019’s Terms of Surrender, like most of your records, has an inward journeyman’s feel to it. How much of your songwriting comes from inside and how much from what you see happening around you? I know having children has changed your perspective. What about the current political climate?  

Taylor: It comes from all over the place. Inside, outside, all around. As someone wise once said, the personal is political. 

RVA: What has relocating to the southeast done for you creatively and spiritually? How did the move in 2007 come to fruition, and what has kept you in North Carolina? 

Taylor: In 2007, my wife and I felt that a change in our lives was needed. This was before we had kids. We packed everything we owned into the back of our station wagon and drove across the country. We didn’t know anybody in North Carolina. But, having been here on tour several times, I felt that it could be a good location in the South to attempt to begin an understanding about this region in a real and engaged way. The most important things in my life — music, art, food, literature — have their roots in the South, and I wanted to know why. The only way to know was by living here.

Hiss Golden Messenger at Red Rocks, via Facebook

RVA: ABC News said Terms of Surrender is “as good as anything the band has ever done … easily one of the best Americana albums of 2019.” Recently, HGM was on CBS Saturday Morning. Is there anything different about this record that’s attracting a wider audience? 

Taylor: I’ve just kept my nose to the grindstone. What I feel is incremental upwards movement. Perhaps listeners hear some new sounds on Terms, but I see it as a continuing evolution.

RVA: Songwriter John Hiatt’s daughter Lilly is opening for HGM at the Broadberry. How did that come about?   

Taylor: Lilly is a friend, and someone whose music I like very much. I think that she’s a great songwriter.

RVA: What current or up and coming artists do you have your ears and eyes on? 

Taylor: I have to say that I spend more time with older music. It’s not that I’m not interested in new music — I very much am — but there’s still so much to learn from older stuff. Lester Young, Alice Coltrane, Roots Radics — these are all artists I’ve spent a lot of time with lately.

Hiss Golden Messenger comes to The Broadberry with special guest Lilly Hiatt on Thursday, Jan. 16. Tickets are $21-26 in advance, and can be purchased here.

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Finding The Sweet Side Of Virginia With Sid Kingsley

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Richmond singer-songwriter Sid Kingsley wants people who hear his music to feel free and uplifted, and to realize the full potential of human emotion — “however you interpret that.”

Richmonder Sid Kingsley‘s musical career has been marked by continuous growth. His latest single, “Sweet Virginia,” is a sign of that growth in his subtle, yet successful, departure from his previous material.

“Sweet Virginia” still has sounds of singer-pianist Kingsley’s Americana roots, and it echoes his debut album Good Way Home; but it also points towards a musical shift for the artist, now moving into a more self-styled blues direction, a la Marc Cohn’s classic “Walking in Memphis.” Like “Walking in Memphis,” Kingsley’s single represents an ode to a city; this time, it’s Richmond. References to places like Texas Beach appear in the song, as well as other subtle Easter eggs for fans that listen closely.

Despite its carefully-placed references, “Sweet Virginia” doesn’t have a specific meaning.

“I don’t usually like to give the listener a ‘this is what the song is about’ explanation, because then they’re not allowed to use their imagination,” Kingsley said. “I’d rather invoke an emotion, like a feeling. It’s your song. You can interpret it however you want to.”

Photo via Sid Kingsley/Facebook

In Kingsley’s mind, “Sweet Virginia” feels like a road trip song. With its references to geographic locations — powerful, rising melodies and a strong, clear voice — it makes you want to drive down the highway with your windows rolled down.

The track also incorporates the feeling of change, and a lot has changed for the artist since his debut album with American Paradox Records. Most notably, this single is independently produced: Kingsley recorded it at Audio Verite in Richmond’s Northside, which is operated by producer, engineer, and musician Pedro Aida. The only people involved in the recording were Kingsley, the audio engineer, and Jordan Stoll — a drummer that Kingsley brought onboard as a full-time collaborator in August 2018.

Kingsley and Stoll met five years before they began to formally collaborate, played a show together in Northern Virginia soon after their meeting. Three years ago, Stoll moved from NoVA to Richmond, where he began to encounter Kingsley more often at shows. Once they got to know each other, he reached out to pursue playing together regularly.


Stoll was having a hard time finding a band that he truly enjoyed drumming for, while Kingsley was having trouble keeping band members that were consistent and reliable. He needed a drummer that could go on a cross-country tour, and Stoll got the call.

“Going across country alone, it’s like, ‘Is this going to work or not?’” Stoll said. “You’re in a car with someone for so long. You’re going to learn to know if you like them or not. But it worked out.”

After returning from their tour, Kingsley and Stoll solidified their partnership and began creating music together. Together they made their first single, “Bar Room Queen,” which was recorded live with a raw and stripped-down sound. Over the past year, they wrote “Sweet Virginia,” and recorded it in an actual studio.

On the new track, Kingsley took care of vocals, bass, and keys. Stoll played drums and supplied backing vocals. The result sounds like there’s more than two people playing, which shows the musical magic that the two can create when collaborating together.

To Kingsley, there was more recording freedom on the “Sweet Virginia” single compared to his previous album. While there was an audio engineer present, Kingsley said that he didn’t do much in terms of controlling how the single came out, which allowed Kingsley and Stoll to be as creative as they wanted to with it.

“This was us able to go in and write the song ahead of time, really know what we want to go for. When we got in there, [we knew] everything was going to fall into place, because we already had a game plan to begin with,” Stoll said. “And then it’s such a better-sounding quality.”

It is that freedom, in both the interpretation and the creation of music, that Kingsley and Stoll believe in so strongly. By listening to their music, Kingsley hopes that listeners can have the freedom to experience all the range of human emotions, but come away feeling positive and uplifted.

“Music should be human,” Kingsley said. “It should be all those emotions. We’ve been tossing around this term calling it ‘freedom music.’ Not to say that all music isn’t free, but this is more about feeling free — however you interpret that.”

Photo via Sid Kingsley/Facebook

For Kingsley and Stoll, after the release of their “Sweet Virginia” single, the next step in spreading their “freedom music” is the release of more songs that are currently in the works. They’ve also been on a mostly local tour: on the weekend of their single release, they played at Hardywood on Friday, The Hofheimer Building for the release on Saturday, and traveled to Greensboro, NC on Sunday.

On November 9, the duo played at the historic B.B. King’s Club Ebony in Indianola, Mississippi, a show that benefited educational programs offered by the B.B. King Museum for youth in the area.

Playing at the club is a huge honor for both Kingsley and Stoll, who view the venue as something sacred due to the amount of blues and other musical legends that have played there.

“They’ve kept it the same as they did back when it was still a segregated club,” Kingsley said. “It is a very sacred space to play in. It would be nice to get the blessings of the legends who played there.”

Top Photo via Sid Kingsley/Facebook

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Let Thorp Jenson Carry You Home

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You might call it Americana, but if you ask Thorp Jenson, his new single, “Carry Me Home,” is nothing more than good old rock n’ roll.

What do you call a ginger in a Canadian tuxedo with a mustache and a guitar? If you’re having this encounter in Richmond, you call him Thorp Jenson, and he has new music on the way. The local sideman-turned-frontman garnered national attention as an Americana artist with his debut album Odessa back in the fall of 2017. His new single, “Carry Me Home,” is his first release since then. 

Odessa was well-received thanks to its cohesive heartland rock sound, inspired by Tom Petty as well as The Rolling Stones of the early 70’s, when they were hanging out with Gram Parsons and experimenting with a country music influence. Rolling Stone featured Jenson in September 2017 as one of 10 new country artists to know about, and Yahoo! Music published a glowing review of his dreamy, folksy cover of Modern English’s “I Melt With You.” His romantic take on the 80’s hit blends seamlessly with the original tracks on Odessa, most of which show off Jenson’s songwriting chops as a storyteller from the respective schools of Bruce Springsteen and Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter.

“Carry Me Home” tells the story of two characters that have just met but instantly feel like they can be vulnerable with one another. The idea was derived from a recent experience Jenson had in which he reconnected with an old friend. “This person wasn’t a close friend before and I hadn’t seen them in awhile, but we had one of those nights where I just felt so at ease with them,” says Jenson. “It wasn’t romantic, but it inspired me to write from that spark when you meet someone and feel like you’ve known them in three past lives.”

Lyrically, the single falls in line with standard Thorp Jenson fare. But stylistically, expect something you haven’t heard from him before. “It’s acoustic driven but it has a synthesizer in it too, which definitely made the song take a different turn,” says Jenson. “I also ended up using a scratch vocal on it. I could’ve sang it better but there was a vibe to it that just felt good.”

“The synth was a little out of left field,” he says. And in this case, “out of left field” refers to the mind of Jenson’s friend and colleague, local keyboardist Daniel Clarke. “We have a [version] without the synth, and I’d like to release both,” says Jenson. “That’s the long-term plan.”

Jenson graduated from VCU with a fine arts degree in jazz guitar, and quickly established himself in the Richmond music scene. Throughout the 2000s, he played jazz guitar in neo-soul band Beast Wellington, was a founding member of Richmond jam band Mekong Xpress, and also found time to play in a wedding band. Jenson loved being a sideman for all those years. “There’s a zen to it, just being in the back line and having a good old time,” he says. “But I started writing songs again and realized I had to do my thing.”

“Carry Me Home” was recorded by a star-studded cast of friends in the industry that Jenson has made along his way. It features his go-to drummer, Dusty Ray Simmons of Cris Jacobs Band, along with Corey Wells of VILLAGES on slide guitar and Andrew Randazzo of Butcher Brown on bass. The Big Payback’s Suzi Fischer played the saxophone and contributed background vocals, and the keys were laid down by his former bandmate Ben White, of Mekong Xpress.

The single was mixed by Adrian Olsen at Montrose Studio, with Jenson’s input, and mastered by Ed Brooks. But Jenson recorded and produced it himself at the studio he built in Scott’s Addition, which he and his compatriots have dubbed “the clubhouse.” Odessa, the sessions for which began with two and a half days at White Star Sound in Louisa County, was also finished up at the clubhouse.

The DIY aspects of Jenson’s music don’t end there. He created his own label, South Boulevard Records, for releasing his work. He jokes that its smoke and mirrors, since he’s technically an independent musician with no record deal. But when it came time to release Odessa, it just made sense to Jenson to give his operation a title. “They ask you for your label when you’re using a distributor like CD Baby,” says Jenson. “I thought, ‘Well, I guess I am a label. I’m my own label.’”

While on the topic of smoke and mirrors, Thorp Jenson is a stage name. It was originally a comedic nickname bestowed upon him by his friend Dusty Simmons when he showed up to a gig with a mustache, having previously always been a beard guy. “At first it was just an inside joke. They’d call me that whenever I had a mustache. But then I started introducing myself as Thorp Jenson on stage,” he says. “Sometimes being the frontman is awkward. The writing is the real me, but it helps to deliver it as a character.”

But the main motivation behind the nom de plume was the realization that his real name, Chris Ryan, is incredibly common. “I did feel a little weird about using a fake name at first, but then I did a SoundCloud search of ‘Chris Ryan’ and there were endless ‘Chris Ryans,’” he says. But there are no other Thorp Jensons, so he couldn’t be easier to find on Google with that moniker. “It’s also just a good way to not take yourself too seriously,” he says. “I think that’s important in this crazy life.”

Despite the fake name and the label that isn’t actually a label, Jenson exudes authenticity. He’s got a contagious, hearty laugh and a youthful charisma like the classic small-town, salt of the Earth guy that he is. Hailing from Chester, Jenson likens his childhood to a John Mellencamp song. Raised by a divorced father who was loving, but on the road a lot since he was a truck driver, he and his brother were often on their own. A close friend affectionately described them as “feral children.”

As a little kid, Jenson had always wanted to be a singer. He carried around a toy karaoke microphone and wanted to be the next Jim Morrison or Axl Rose. He sang in church and often got solos in his middle school choir, but once puberty hit and his voice started to change, he didn’t feel like singing much.

He picked up an acoustic guitar at 14 and learned a few Tom Petty riffs, which made great party tricks. But he wasn’t serious about it until he went to a jam session in Chester and met a peer that could really play. Jenson remembers thinking, “Wait, you’re not a wizard, you’re just a normal guy. I didn’t think that was possible.” After that, he got an electric guitar and started “practicing like a nut.”

Photo by Garritos Photography, via Thorp Jenson/Facebook

Jenson grew up on rock and roll of all kinds. His dad liked classic rock that was a bit off the beaten path — The Band, and Derek and the Dominoes. His stepmom loved The Doors, and a childhood friend introduced him to harder stuff like GWAR and DRI. The first concert Jenson ever attended was a GWAR benefit show when he was in third grade. “They weren’t in costume, so that’s how I got away with going,” he says.

He listened to grunge in middle school when it was all the rage, but really got into Tom Petty. Wildflowers came out when he was in seventh grade, which was a pivotal time in Jenson’s life. “I started smoking pot every day when I was 12,” he says. “I had a weird journey with that.”

While he was in high school, his brother had embraced hippie culture and became a deadhead, which played a role in Jenson’s tastes. He traveled around to see Phish concerts and started listening to Frank Zappa, which shaped him as a guitarist. “I realized what you could do with music,” says Jenson. “It’s a lot more than just songs.”

Despite his zig-zag journey through listening habits, Jenson never got into country music. But he has an affinity for what he describes as “that jambalaya of music that happened here in the south.” He doesn’t think of himself as a country artist, but also doesn’t sweat about what others think. “You can call me whatever you want, if you’re calling me,” he jokes. “The buzzword of the past few years is ‘Americana’, but to me, it’s just rock and roll.”

Jenson has another album in the works, but he’s given himself no deadline and he’s not even sure if the single, “Carry Me Home,” will make it on the album once it comes together. “I was just feeling angsty and needed to create some energy,” he says. “I’d been writing all winter, just going through the motions. I wrote a lot that I probably won’t ever use, but that’s part of the process.”

Jenson says he threw out a lot of songs that he liked when he was assembling Odessa, because they just didn’t fit the aesthetic of the record. “I don’t want everything to sound the same, but I like a record to have some level of cohesiveness, and I like when there’s an arc,” says Jenson. “Bruce Springsteen was a big influence on how I shaped Odessa. I think if you listen to it from front to back, it has an arc.”

Photo by Robert Davezac, via Thorp Jenson/Facebook

One thing he’s planning for the next record is to write more acoustic driven tracks. “I got some offers to tour solo, but I didn’t feel comfortable representing any of the music on Odessa alone,” says Jenson. “I’ve also just recently become more comfortable with an acoustic guitar. I’ve always been an electric player, but I got this acoustic that I’ve fallen in love with, so I’ve been writing on that now.” He has two big ideas for future records, but didn’t want to share them in case they never come out. You’ve got to know when to hold ‘em, right? 

Whether you call it country, Americana, or just plain old rock and roll, Thorp Jenson makes music that’s hard not to like. And if you’ve met the guy, it’d be hard not to like him too. “Carry Me Home” is available for streaming today, so look out for it on Spotify, Apple Music, and Play Music.

Top Photo by Melissa Brugh

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Wandering Through Virginia With the Way Down Wanderers

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Ahead of folk/Americana quintet The Way Down Wanderers’ three shows across Virginia next week, Graham Stone caught up with the band’s principal songwriters to talk illusions, inspirations, and good times.

Austin Krause-Thompson and Collin Krause of central Illinois group The Way Down Wanderers have been playing music together since their teen years. Fresh off their performance at Americanafest 2019, I got to talk to the two of them together about their band, a few of their songwriting influences, and the upcoming tour that will bring them back to Virginia for several shows.

I’m talking to y’all right after your Americanafest show yesterday, right? How was that?

Collin: Yeah, it was amazing! Playing in Nashville is always a blast. We had a great show with a great crowd, and just to be surrounded by so many great musicians — it really was an incredible time.

For folks that might not have heard of y’all yet, I wanted to see if you could help give a little bit of background on the band itself. When did The Way Down Wanderers form, and how did this journey begin?

Austin: Well, I guess officially it was back in 2013. Myself and Collin had been in a few different bands together by that point. We’ve always loved folk and bluegrass music. We wanted to keep in that vein but branch into more musically diverse song-based sounds, and be able to include things like drums, electric guitar, and keys, for example. We started writing songs together in our teen years. Once we found some mutual friends who had like-minded ideas, we all came together to form this band, and we’re about six years in at this point!

It’s cool to hear y’all talk about the influences that folk and bluegrass music have had on your sound. As the band’s primary songwriters, I’m interested to know who y’all would list as some of your favorite songwriters, or biggest musical influences.

Collin: Well for me, I got really into songwriting around the same time I first heard the Avett Brothers. I was about 14 years old. I heard Seth and Scott and was super inspired by their ability to say really profound things in a totally new way. I also really love the Tallest Man on Earth and Bob Dylan. As far as bluegrass sounds, though, I grew up listening to a lot of Nickel Creek, and going to their concerts every time they came through my town. I love Chris Thile and the Punch Brothers too! And we actually got to go on tour with the Infamous Stringdusters last year, which was amazing. I think we all really look up to them as probably one of our current favorite bluegrass bands.

Austin: When it comes to songwriting specifically, my first and biggest influence was probably Paul McCartney. To me, he is someone who not only paved the way for rock and roll but really for song-based music. I’d probably have to say John Lennon, Bob Dylan, and also the Tallest Man on Earth for me as well.

Photo by Tom Wickstrom Photography, via Way Down Wanderers/Facebook

Tell me a little bit about the upcoming tour that brings y’all back to Virginia.

Collin: Sure! We’ve played in Virginia a bunch and always loved it. We’ve had great shows in Charlottesville and Richmond before, but we’ve never played the Tin Pan, and Jammin’ Java will be a new room for us as well, so that’s exciting for us.  

Austin: Yeah, we’ve always had great shows in Virginia in the past, and have played a couple festivals there too: Red Wing Roots and Devil’s Backbone Hoopla, which were a ton of fun. This tour is set up to be more of a solo headlining tour, so there might be support on a few dates here and there. But that’s exciting for us, because it means we will be playing longer sets. Although, we also really love meeting local bands, new talent, and making new friends.

When it comes to your live show, what aspect of the performance are you most excited about?

Collin: It’s a feeling that’s really hard to describe, but when we get on stage and we are in front of an audience that is enjoying what we’re doing, it’s just so joyful for us. It makes it really easy for us to have fun on stage. Anytime we get to play a good venue for a nice crowd, we get really excited about it.

Austin: Yeah. We’ve also heard that the Tin Pan is a really nice listening room, so we’re definitely excited for that. We have a bunch of lively tunes, and a pretty dynamic set overall, but there are also some pretty tender moments that I think will be perfect for a room like that.

Photo by Emily Stone, via Way Down Wanderers/Facebook

You released your latest album, illusions, earlier this year. What’s next on the horizon for the Way Down Wanderers?

Austin: Well, Collin and I have been writing some new music, which is cool. We’re slowly getting some of that together. But we also host our own music festival in southern Illinois called The Wander Down Music Festival. This is our third year doing it. We’ve got a great lineup including the Stringdusters, Old Salt Union, Chicago Farmer, and a bunch more really great artists. There is also camping and lots of workshops, and it’s a very family friendly event. This year we’re also planning to do a live recording of our set and release that as a live album — so keep an eye out for that too!

The Way Down Wanderers will be playing three different shows across Virginia in the coming days. They’ll be at Charlottesville’s The Southern Cafe on Tuesday, September 24, then at Jammin’ Java in Vienna on Wednesday, September 25, before coming to Richmond’s Tin Pan on Thursday, September 26.

Top Photo by Keith Cotton, via Way Down Wanderers/Facebook

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

For Landon Elliott, Love Is A Hurricane

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“This record is the most honest I’ve ever been with myself and with the songs,” said Richmond songwriter Landon Elliott of his forthcoming album. 

At 8 a.m. on a sunny weekday morning, local Richmond musician Landon Elliott walks into the small but quaint Cafe Nostra near Brookland Park. Based on their brief exchange, it’s clear that he and the barista know each other. Elliott has a friendly tone to his voice, and there’s a spark in his eyes as he sits down to discuss his new single “Hurricane,” which came out at the end of August. Its music video was released shortly after on September 4, with the Richmond-based recording label American Paradox Records. 

“I’m excited to get the record out,” Elliott said. “I’m still processing it’s happening. It’s been a long time coming, and a long journey to make this happen. It has a lot of sonic differences than what I’ve done before, but I’m still staying true to my songwriting sensibilities. This record is the most honest I’ve ever been with myself and with the songs.” 

The partnership between American Paradox Records and Landon Elliott began in December 2017, after owner Scott Lane saw Elliott play earlier that fall at an open mic night at Poe’s Pub. 

Lane had just moved back to Richmond from Denver when he started his new label, he said, and was wrapping up a record production with Kenneka Cook when he decided to take Elliott on. 

Photo by Joey Wharton

Elliott and Lane had already begun a friendship by that time, and deciding to work together seemed like a natural addition to their relationship. 

“Scott has done a good job of pushing me,” Elliott said. “He’s the label, but also my producer. We co-produced this record together. What Scott was able to do was honor my vulnerability and my personality, and my voice as an artist, while also pushing the direction of things a little bit.” 

“Hurricane” is the first single to be released for Elliott’s new record, Domino — and with a yet-to-be-announced release date, the album represents a period of transition and questioning of a lot of things in his life and his worldview. 

As he hinted, the new “Hurricane” single does have a slightly different tone and sound than the Wildflowers EP he released in 2017, under the name Landon Elliott and The Goods. While the EP with The Goods had a stronger country/folk/Americana sound, which clearly had roots in artists like Johnny Cash and Hank Williams, Elliott said he was more inspired for the new album by the 1980s synth pop-rock sounds of Bruce Springsteen, Peter Gabriel, and Fleetwood Mac. 

And it shows. The sound of “Hurricane” is multi-layered, and while you can still hear his original Americana sound, there are also layers of synth and a slightly-more refined and mainstream sound than his earlier EP. The pop sound almost hides the raw, honest lyrics about the difficulty of being honest in a healthy relationship… almost. There are plenty of references to ghosts of the past, and the destruction that they can leave in their wake like a hurricane, as the title suggests. 

“This track is about relationships and its many forms,” Elliott said. “The struggles that go into making love work. Love is hard work, to really care about someone truly and know someone fully takes a lot of work.” 

The music video for “Hurricane” also reflects the struggle Elliott believes can be present in maintaining honest and loving relationships. Departing from the usual music video conventions of its genre, this video presents two dancers in a choreographed and improvised struggle for dominance and equality, before they end their performance in unison. Elliott himself is present, and sandwiched between them as they mouth the final lyrics together. 

“I had this vibe in my mind of an 80s ‘Dancing in the Dark’ aerobic style movement,” Elliott said. “I wanted to do a dance video. For my style of music, you don’t necessarily see a more dance-style music video.” 

Lane liked his idea, and suggested doing something even more out-there, Elliott said. 

“I suggested a total visual departure from his Americana genre,” Lane said. 

Lane had seen a dance performance in New York City based on similar themes of the struggle between love and hate. The performance was by a dancer named Georgia Usborne with Brooklyn’s Gallim Dance Company. Lane reached out to her about the possibility of choreographing something similar for Elliott’s video, and she agreed. 

“What Scott really connected to was the raw physicality paired with a space for emotional connections between dancers, and also that emotionality can draw the audience into a story without there actually being a story or narrative,” Usborne said. “So we used that as a starting point, having a man and a woman, and discussing the light and shade of the relationship that can be shown through big physical movements — and also less physical, highly charged moments.” 

The shoot was done in New York City, where Elliott and Lane met personally with Usborne, the dancers and the music video director. While the two dancers, Kayla Farrish and Sebastian Abarbanell, had been able to rehearse the choreographed parts once before — and some of the material was already familiar to Farrish, as much of the performance was inspired by a previous one of hers — they hadn’t had a lot of prior experience working together. 

Landon Elliott, from the “Hurricane” Music Video

To make the pressure even tougher, they only had five hours to shoot the entire video, including setup and take-down, Lane said. 

Despite the intense time pressure, they did it. Their team managed to film an entire music video, complete with some last-minute decisions, such as putting Elliott himself in the video. 

In the end, the video presents itself as a nearly surreal and chaotic dance. The pair of dancers fight and work together throughout the routine, visualizing the struggle of making a relationship work as Elliott sings, nearly motionless on the floor. At times, Abarbanell is seen leading. At others, it is Farrish. Occasionally they work together, and oftentimes their movements seem to contradict each other. In the end, they appear to make their differences work out, coming to lie down on opposite sides of Elliott as the song comes to a close. 

“This is the first music video I’ve worked where the musician was in the video,” Usborne said. “It was fabulous, I loved it. It was very focused, and we all cared a lot about it; there was real heart behind it. The track was super catchy, and it all came together well. It was a real pleasure, and I’d love to work with them again.” 

After the release of the music video, a new single will be released in September. Right now Elliott is on tour with fellow Richmonder Deau Eyes, and the last few dates of the tour will find them pairing up with Josiah Johnson, formerly of The Head and the Heart. 

Locally, Elliott will also be playing at The Broadberry on September 28 for the Shack Up festival, thrown each year by The Shack Band. This will be his first year playing at The Shack Up, Elliott said, and one of his first times playing solo on a platform that big. 

“I love the Broadberry,” Elliott said. “They’re all really good friends of mine. I’m looking forward to hamming it up with them. There’s a lot of bands I love on the bill.”

Top Photo by Joey Wharton

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Mitchel Evan Finds The Contemporary Side Of Nostalgia at The Darkroom

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On Friday, February 22, Mitchel Evan celebrated the release of his album, Nostalgia Side B, at The Darkroom, one of several venues located inside the recently-opened HofGarden in Scott’s Addition. Evan’s sincere approach to his alt-country/folk/Americana style has led him to focus on lyrics when creating his music.

“I’m just writing from my experience, trying to make sense of my life and my feelings through songs,” Evan said. “I just write about whatever I’m going through; I don’t find myself too often seeking out inspiration from external sources.”

Born and raised in the West End of Richmond, VA, he’s moved around from Virginia to Pennsylvania to Colorado over the years. “Denver and Boulder were kind of my music hubs for the past several years,” Evan said. His Colorado group, Mitchel Evan and The Mangrove, marked his first time releasing music under his own name and fronting a band that played his songs. With the Mangrove backing him, he released two EPs and a full-length album before leaving Colorado.

Now that he’s back in his old hometown, he’s leading a new six-piece band, Mitchel Evan and The Saboteurs. That group began their set at the Darkroom with positivity and love. Members greeted each other with hugs and smiles before beginning their performance. The acoustic sound incorporated violins, guitars, and drums, as well as unique vocals from Evan and co-vocalist Blake Smoral. Their music clearly flowed from their hearts to yours; you could feel the emotion behind every lyric that was sung and every sound that was played.

Evan has been playing frequent gigs all around Richmond and the surrounding areas, both with the Saboteurs and on his own, leading up to the show at The Darkroom, which also served as a release party for his latest EP, Nostalgia (Side B). He’s worked hard to make a name for himself through the constant gigs, and will be kicking it up a notch in the coming months with tour dates that will keep him on stages in Virginia and around the country throughout 2019.

As they continue to write, record, and tour at a productive rate, you can expect a lot from Evan and the Saboteurs. “This summer I’m just taking time to come back to the roots,” he said. “I’m working on some new material that I’ve been teaching the band. We’ve been practicing a lot.”

It may seem like a rather rootless lifestyle to choose for oneself, but for Evan, it’s what he always wanted. “I think the dilemma with being an artist is that there’s no result,” he said. “It’s a process, and it’s something you continue to live by and do by. It’s kind of just a way you make sense of the world.”

“If you know you want to do it, then just don’t do anything else,” he said. “That’s what I did.”

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond