Electric Ghost did not “form” in the usual sense. There were no flyers, no ads for a drummer, no accidental garage rehearsals that turned into destiny. Instead, the band was assembled deliberately, with intent, inside a space that most artists still pretend doesn’t exist.
Electric Ghost was designed. Not fabricated — designed. Continue reading
A Conversation with Rob Zillon, E.J. Gold, & Rolling Stone
The kitchen is quiet except for the rustle of a newspaper and the soft click of a coffee cup being set down. Rob Zillon sits at the table, his guitar leaning against the wall within easy reach. E.J. Gold is sitting nearby, not so much participating as occupying the room the way a tuning fork occupies air. Nothing feels staged.
Rolling Stone: You’ve been described as a protest singer, a folk revivalist, and lately as “troubling.” Which one bothers you the least?
Rob Zillon: Troubling is fine. It means something’s working. Continue reading
“The Songs Never Left” — Janice Returns to the Road
A backstage conversation with Janice of Janice & Lost Horizons, on the current comeback tour
When Janice walks into the room, there’s no announcement. No entourage drama. Just a calm, warm presence — like someone who knows exactly who she is and no longer feels the need to defend it. The stage lights may still burn bright, but offstage she radiates something steadier: confidence without urgency. Continue reading
LINER NOTES
There are some voices that don’t belong to a person. They belong to a room. Sister Sara Simmons is one of those voices.
No one can quite agree when she first sang in public. Some say it was in a borrowed church with folding chairs and a piano missing three keys. Others insist it happened outdoors, under a stormy sky that wouldn’t make up its mind, with people gathering because they heard something before they saw anything. What is agreed upon is this: when Sister Sara opened her mouth, the room leaned in. Continue reading
Winestock began, according to every reliable source, by accident.
It started as a small end-of-season grape harvest gathering at a Northern California vineyard whose owners believed—incorrectly—that inviting a few friends, a few musicians, and a few cases of unfinished wine would result in a quiet afternoon. Someone hung a handwritten sign that said “Music Later”. Someone else added “Bring a Bottle.” No one remembers who added “Free.”
By mid-afternoon, the parking problem had become purely philosophical. Continue reading
Polly Barton was born already late for chores.
That’s how she tells it, anyway. According to family legend, she arrived one humid morning in eastern Tennessee while her mother was halfway through hanging laundry and her father was fixing something that didn’t need fixing yet. From day one, Polly had a way of appearing right when work was underway, smiling as if to say, “Don’t stop on my account.” Continue reading
The Minkeez did not form the way bands are supposed to form. Continue reading
Gorby’s Barbershop Quartet insists they did not form on purpose. They say the group assembled itself one afternoon when four men reached for the same chair, missed, and instinctively harmonized their apologies. A chord locked. No one sat down. History was made. Continue reading
janice (always spelled lowercase) isn’t a revival, a tribute act, or a reconstruction. She’s a frequency — a voice that shows up when a singer stops trying to survive and starts telling the truth out loud. Continue reading
Worked all night organizing & reviewing song inventory. Will play same at today’s zoom meeting, see you there! Continue reading