Roots Soul and Jazz
Sam Philips is a full circle artist. Her creations take styles and medium, re-arrange them into a form that fits the art in her head. In her hands, music becomes putty waiting for its curves and lines to be bent and straightened as needed. Sam Phillip's latest release, 'Solid State', is the first physical release from her web-based music and art installation called Long Play. Long Play is a result of a year's music found while digging for inspiration and journaling the process of writing and recording. The experience has left five EP’s and a full-length album in its wake, all available from her website. The physical manifestation of the Long Play project is comprised of thirteen re-mastered tracks taken from all its releases. Sam Phillips is proud as an independent, stating the terms upfront "There is no record company involved — this is just between us".
The Alternate Root (TAR): How was the experience of creation during the Long Play project?
Sam Phillips (SP): It has been fun. The chance for fans to be a part of the project is still open, people are still joining. They will get a chance to walk through the website created. It is really a very old fashioned way of getting music out, it is so immediate. Making the music available as it was created, that part was fun.
TAR: Can you explain the process involved in Long Play a little more?
SP: The arrangement decisions never came across as separate notes or patterns. The
arrangements are like fabric covering rather than layers of clothing. I set very strict boundaries on myself. I would do a lot of material in a short amount of time. It became a little over a year, working very fast, those restrictions affected the final outcome of the songs.
TAR: Did allowing the music to interact with writing and painting help the process of recording?
SP: You use objects to display your own emotion and feelings, like in “When I'm A Camera”; the imagery is always consistent, like in a painting. The sounds are more like brush strokes, like allowing the orchestra to move to the front at the end of 'Broken Circle' for instance,
TAR: Did any of the songs that you have recorded for other albums change within the process, such as your re-make of “Lying”? Was that intended?
SP: Listening to the pop albums I made from the 90's and in the way I do the songs now has shown me a great freedom. There was nothing wrong with the production at the time. I have never been a pop star so I don’t feel that I need to do the hits. I have been able to go back and I am not one that looks back. I turned a corner musically.
TAR: Post Long Play, any plans?
SP: Things are clearer now. This has all been really fun and one project inspires the other. I have missed being on tour, on the road, playing with the band and working live. That shapes the songs even further and the show doesn't end with finishing the last note. My plan is to tour behind the album next year. The more I work, the more I work.
‘Solid State’ is a full on art force. Sam Phillips ability to hit multi-levels of emotion by the use of sound provides an audio experience that reaches into physical territory. Stark piano backdrops “So Glad You’re Here” as the narrator describes the joy she finds in 
having a child close. The strictness of the piano part allows the strings to enter and go low for a more somber tone. The music and lyrics counter each other, the happiness of a touch, and the knowledge that right beyond that late night embrace is darkness lying in wait. Beats exist on ‘Solid State’ as passing bursts and persistent sidekicks. “ Lever Pulled Down” is a mix of foot stomp and hammer hits, the acoustic guitar chords maintaining the rhythm as Sam voice steers the course. Album opener “Tell Me” throbs into existence with vocal acrobatics veering left and right, propelled forward with determined acoustic guitar chord plucks and strums.
Sam Phillips infuses her songs with art. Letting the mood of the track decide the music that supports its effort. As Sam points out in song, “get ready for the full frame picture” (“Happy Mediums”). Allowing all of her available art and muses to interact and frolic has given Long Play, with ‘Solid State’ becoming the physical manifestation of her internet presence. To hear more of ‘Solid State’, and find out more about Long Play, travel over the Sam Phillips’ website. Danny McCloskey
Kenny Vaughan fingers flip through country, jazz and rock licks like many of us flip through a telephone directory. With all the sonic choices, Kenny stays true to the one that brought him, and delivers a love letter signed with pride in album opener “Country Music Got a Hold on Me”, and re-visits those formative styles of his past in his own songs with “Stay Outta My Dreams”, “Hot Like That” and “The Things I Do”. Kenny’s memories of licks past and his playing tendency to light a path
for the future are a good balance for his songs. “Okolona Tennessee” slides and slithers through a swamp boogie love song to a siren of a woman and country harmonies come together for heartbreaker “Lilli Mae”. If Rock’n’Roll is the devil’s music, Kenny Vaughan and Marty Stuart co-write “Don't Leave Home Without Jesus” throws down that the man in the song title is here to take it back.
Kenny Vaughan has created a debut that should make him proud. It stands as a proper testament to a man who has lent his talent to others, making their songs the better for having him along. ‘V’ is the home to a thousand riffs; Kenny is a guitar man of the first degree. They move in and out of the songs and fill in every available space, relying on quality over quantity. Danny McCloskey
he’ll take me to the promised land”. The characters that pass through the songs on Buffalo Clover’s “Low Down Time”, have the same determination, and personality, that show confidence in their decisions, right or wrong. The suggestions are not hidden from the song titles, “Don’t Lie to Yourself”, “Seek Me Out”, “Cure Me” and worldviews ride the same bus of full disclosure “Nobody Cares”. 
Ivey, after meeting in Nashville in 2008. The power of three forged the group core when guitar/banjo player Matt Gardner came into the band photos in 2009. On their Palaver Records full length debut, ‘Low Down Time’, Buffalo Clover power push songs with flashes of soul (“Good Man”, “Oh Well”), coast on a low slung groove (“Oklahoma”) and use the white lines rushing under the touring van to count time for a road song (“Saint Cathleen”). Buffalo Clover use styles and instrumentation as needed on their songs; Farfisa organ bounce and delicate piano meditations share shelf space. The secret weapon in Buffalo Clover are the simple riffs that crawl quickly into your brain and lodge themselves in the roughly three minute and change time the songs take make their points. Saying these riffs are basic is like saying short sentence folk wisdom does not knock the socks off a $100 an hour psych session. The guitar patterns are, in most cases, held together with a few hearty notes but, man, do they get under your skin.
Art finds a way to shine through in all environments. Once the art is given a fertile place to grow, it returns the favor in various mediums. For Antsy McClain, he has honored a small town America/single wide upbringing in a family prone to laugh a lot. In ‘Heroes Last Forever’, his most recent release, Antsy McClain and the Trailer Park Troubadours tackle topics such as that special love that allows you to take something out of someone’s hand if the price is right (“Everything’s A Dollar”), keeping your quiet around a particularly feisty relative (“Aunt Beulah’s Road Kill Overcoat”), equally road wary brothers in fur (“The Ballad of Skippy and Rover”) and those moments when the screen turns blue (“Facebook Blues”).
other things he holds dear, a Buddy Holly plane crash where everyone lived, Patsy was playing The Opry at 65, no one died a soldier, The King was still alive, Marilyn and Joe had a cottage on the coast and God was in his heaven. The scene plays out over a note plucked reverie and a faithful heartbeat. Antsy’s dreams turn to the man who gave us all reasons to imagine, chronicling the life of a Beatle in “John Lennon As An Old Man”. The Trailer Park Troubadours provide near samba shuffles (“My baby Whistles When She Walks”), rave up and rev up (“Summertime Blues”) and tone down to a whisper to offer warmth for “Leftover Birds”.
What is it about the end of the street? The combination of mystery and the challenging tease of darkness. Though on the surface the house that marks the end is just another home, unassuming, four walls, roof, etc. Through the door, though, things are not always the same. The edge of the wilderness allows for a little more excitement bordering the norm. On his latest album effort, ‘Last Planet on the Left’, Digney Fignus takes full advantage of the benefits of all the fun out there on the edge.
inner mind in real time. As a pounding drum beat heralds its arrival, “Crossed the Line” barrels in and takes no prisoners, never letting up on its drive or its message. An island breeze blows in, carrying “Boom Ba Da Da Boom” along in its wake, the song bends and twists, bare feet taps adding to the use of rhythm that supports the track. The rhythms stay on board for “Why Work”, as the path through the jungle is traded for the bump and sway of a country road as Digney reminds us what is really important, “I don’t care what some people say, I know that there’s a way to be happy each day. do what you love, want what you do, don’t let nobody make a fool of you”
It takes about one minute for Jefferson Fox to hit the midway on “Don’t Go There”. For the first sixty seconds, there is a lot of reflection about self support and maybe a little sabotage of same. As a carnival organ leads the way for the music to hit its stride, memories of places he’s been, and the observations made, come pouring in. Jefferson travels the country through song, the trunk tags come in the form of city names and one liners that can be picked up and used for other stops on the road of life. The song is a calling card opener for his recent release, ‘Chronicles of Harvey’, and the intro sets the standard for the album. Following suit, characters and tales bounce around like pinball inside his head, coming out as valuable insights that clock in around the three or four minute range.
our actions, allowing the scent of warm flesh and blood to waft in. That look at real life, letting in the good and the bad, and learning from both, is his way of doing business as a songwriter. The honest re-telling of tales, and the creation of new ones from old stories, trademarks the songs of Jefferson Fox. He bares his soul, letting promises pin him to his decision on “Smoke”, memories take form as time slips its hold and we glimpse back to the days of Grandpa and his cronies in “Ghost Story”. 
Weather plays a part in our plans, even on a subtle level. When El Nino cancelled Angie Mattson’s plan to cross the Pacific by boat, she relocated to Los Angeles. What may seem to the less adventurous like a dart board decision comes as second nature to Angie. She was handed her name courtesy of her mothers favorite Rolling Stones song, moved to North Carolina with a lover at eighteen, lived in an old blue school bus and sold her art, learned to play guitar on a sailboat in the Caribbean where she lived for a year and moved to Tokyo to become a model. 
