Videos of the Week: Natural Beardy, American Standard Time, Fretboard Journal
It’s been a while since our last “Videos of the Week”, which has given some of our friends ample time to put out some incredible work. Video is the new CD, and Vimeo is the new YouTube, so if you want to stay in touch with roots music today, check out these brand-new, stunningly gorgeous, video series:
Natural Beardy‘s Pickathon Sessions
Dylan MacNab, runs the website Natural Beardy out of rainy Eugene, OR. We had fun hanging out at Pickathon this past week, and while I was just crashing the party, he was hard at work taping beautiful videos of his favorite bands. He just released the first of six videos from Pickathon, and it features non other than a long-time Hearth Music favorite: Joy Kills Sorrow. Videos to come will feature Pokey Lafarge & The South City Three, Cahalen Morrison & Eli West, Breathe Owl Breathe, L.C. Ulmer, and Charlie Parr.
Joy Kills Sorrow – Reservations – Beardy Session from Natural Beardy on Vimeo.
American Standard Time‘s New Artist Video Portrait
Greg Vandy (KEXP’s The Roadhouse) is a visionary of today’s indie roots music scene. He’s also a Pickathon regular, having contributed essays to the new Pickathon book, and taped a mini-documentary on old-timey prophet Frank Fairfield at Pickathon 2010. He also runs one of our favorite blogs, American Standard Time (which I write for from time to time). He’s recently been developing his Artist Video Portrait series and I am completely in love with the results. Working with various directors, he drops by an artist at home or on tour, taping them playing and talking about music. His video portrait of Alela Diane is truly beautiful, and he’s got a bunch of other videos up and more coming.
Here’s his newest video, an insightful look at the music and legacy of old-time musician John Cohen. Cohen founded the New Lost City Ramblers, was a big influence on an early Bob Dylan, and coined the phrase “high, lonesome sound” after meeting Appalachian singer Roscoe Holcomb. Hear how it all went down on American Standard Time’s newest Artist Video Portrait, directed by underground cartoonist/filmmaker Drew Christie in a black and white hommage to John’s seminal films:
American Standard Time Presents John Cohen from colony on Vimeo.
In other news, Seattle-based, uber-magazine Fretboard Journal, has taken their standard of beautiful production and in-depth articles to the video realm, releasing a series of video shorts and mini documentaries. All impeccably filmed with great sound, these videos are great snapshots of some of the best acoustic roots music. Note: We’ve been promoting some of these artists, so it’s not like we’re unbiased, but have a look at the videos and you’ll surely agree that they’re great.
A sweet story from soft-spoken bluegrass mandolin powerhouse John Reischman about his treasured Lloyd Loar Gibson F-5. There are only 200 of these in the world, and they can sell for up to a quarter of a million dollars!
John Reischman’s Mandolin from fretboardjournal on Vimeo.
Cahalen Morrison & Eli West from fretboardjournal on Vimeo.