PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
The Arts Council
Contact: Kevin Ledgewood
205-758-5195, x6
pr@tuscarts.org
ACOUSTIC NIGHT FEATURES HURRAY FOR THE RIFF RAFF AND SPARROW & THE GHOST
(Tuscaloosa) Acoustic Night at the Bama Theatre will feature Hurray for the Riff Raff and Sparrow & the Ghost on November 6, 2012 at 7:30 p.m. The performance will take place at the Bama Theatre’s Greensboro Room, 600 Greensboro Avenue in downtown Tuscaloosa. Doors open at 7:00 p.m. with a $5 cover charge going to the artists. Presented by The Arts Council of Tuscaloosa, Acoustic Night features new and upcoming artists from around the country throughout the calendar year with a full-service bar always available.
Hurray for the Riff Raff
Hurray for the Riff Raff is Alynda lee Segarra, a 25 year old Puerto Rican from the Bronx. After leaving home at an early age to travel the country, she eventually settled in New Orleans where she began to perform and record with a revolving cast of musicians. She released two records (2008’s It Don’t Mean I Don’t Love You and 2010’s Young Blood Blues) mostly consisting of delicate folk and country songs. In 2011, the UK record label Loose Music (Felice Brothers, Dawes, Deer Tick), released Hurray for the Riff Raff, an album that collected the best songs from those records. The Times of London named Hurray for the Riff Raff one of the Top Ten Albums of 2011. Phil Alexander, the Editor-in-Chief of Mojo Magazine, raved that they “have immense potential and seductive power” and named them second best band at SXSW 2011.
Back in the States, Alynda and her longtime gunslinger on fiddle, Yosi Perlstein, met up with a young honky-tonk band called the Tumbleweeds, just as Alynda began to expand her musical palette to include rock n roll, pop and soul. In the tradition of Bob Dylan with Band and Neil Young with Crazy Horse, Alynda and Yosi recruited the Tumbleweeds to be their touring band, drastically altering the sound of Hurray for the Riff Raff.
Look Out Mama is the result of almost two years of Alynda and the Tumbleweeds criss-crossing the USA, playing over 100 shows in small bars and clubs. Recorded in Nashville by producer Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes), Look Out Mama is an exploration of classic American music as interpreted by Alynda lee Segarra. From the Swamp Pop of “Little Black Star” to the Classic Country of “Look Out Mama”, to the Psychedelia of “Ode to John and Yoko” and even the Surf-Rock of “Lake of Fire,” Look Out Mama covers a wide array of musical ground, with every song unified by Alynda’s soulful vocals and expert songwriting.
Sparrow and the Ghost
Stuart Bond and Rachael Roberts compose the male/female duo Sparrow & the Ghost, and they both bring a history of successful musicianship to the table. Bond and Roberts met while performing with local favorites The Still Guns, and Bond first cut his teeth as front-man for the now defunct Tuscaloosa group, The National Trust. A shared love of traditional music brought the two together, and they now inflect their own unique spin on the classic sounds of folk, country and the blues.
It is not unusual to see chains and hammers onstage at their shows, nor is it strange to hear the occasional murder ballad– but one will also garner a sense of the joy that music can bring. In a way, their music can be described as a celebration. Their music reveals what every bluesman and balladeer must have felt– the moment of clarity where they realized that singing about a subject also meant its release and a sense of freedom.
The Bama Theatre is located at 600 Greensboro Avenue is downtown Tuscaloosa. For more information about The Arts Council or Bama Theatre, patrons should LIKE the Facebook page “The Arts Council – Bama Theatre – Cultural Arts Center” and follow tuscarts on Twitter. Call 205-758-5195 or visit bamatheatre.org for further information.
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