March 2020

Kacey Musgraves will be returning to the UK in June as part of the 50th edition of Glastonbury Festival, with the event continuing to book top country artists.  Musgraves, who won four Grammys at the 2019 awards – including Album of the Year, which made her the first country act in nine years to win the non-genre specific award – has previously played at Worthy Farm, with the ‘Golden Hour’ star performing in 2014. The festival has a history of booking some of the best in the business when it comes to country music, with Dolly Parton, Carrie Underwood and Kris Kristofferson appearing in the last few years, while top UK acts such as The Shires, Ward Thomas, Catherine McGrath and Yola have also performed recently. It isn’t yet known exactly what slot Musgraves will have at Glastonbury, though it is very likely that she will be on the Pyramid Stage. The headliners for this year’s event are Kendrick Lemar, Paul McCartney and Taylor Swift, while Diana Ross is the Sunday legend act. The last few years have been extremely successful for Kacey Musgraves, with the Texas born artist winning awards left, right and centre, while her international presence has also grown as she headlined Wembley Arena in October 2018.

C2C 2020 has been postponed following a mixture of the ever-growing nature of the COVID-19 pandemic and President Donald Trump’s recently imposed travel ban. President Trump made the decision late on March 11 to ban all travel from Europe apart from the UK in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in America, which sent artists into mass panic as they – and those touring in Europe – had until midnight US time on March 13 to return home. As such, artists such as Brett Young (via his drummer), Gabby Barrett, Kassi Ashton, Willie Jones, Kylie Morgan and others announced on their social media that they would either be immediately returning to the US or had already gone home and as such, would not be performing at C2C. The mass uncertainty created by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is also something that played a part, as the possibility of a ban on mass gatherings as a result of COVID-19 would have also been considered – though in the end, the Prime Minister stated that UK citizens should merely avoid mass gatherings, rather than ban them outright. As such – and with many of the artists on their way home or home already – C2C 2020 had little choice but to postpone or cancel and ended up opting for the former, with news of rescheduled dates to come in due course. Speaking in a statement, the C2C 2020 organisers explained their stance and offered their apologies, while also stating that ticket holders should keep hold of their tickets for the foreseeable future. “Due to the global pandemic of COVID-19 and the changing nature of travel policies in other countries alongside possible extended future restrictions, it is with regret that Country to Country Festival 2020 – London, Dublin and Glasgow – is being postponed,” the statement read. “Ticket holders are advised to hold onto their tickets. More information will be announced in the coming days on the rescheduled event. “Thank you all for your understanding and patience at this very difficult time. C2C and its organisers apologise wholeheartedly for the time to work through the issues to get this statement out.”

While there is a lot of action going on across C2C weekend to try and catch, catering for all kinds of country music fans, here are five acts away from the O2 main arena that we think could make a huge statement Catherine McGrath (BBC Radio 2 Stage at indigo, CMW Hub – All Bar One, Garden Stage) For the third year in a row, the Northern Ireland star will be gracing C2C with her presence and even became the first UK act to appear on the Main Stage following her duet with Hunter Hayes last year. This time, McGrath has three sets locked in and there’s a strong chance we’ll get new music at them.  Tenille Arts (BBC Radio 2 Stage at indigo, Town Square, CMW Hub – All Bar One) The rising Canadian artist is tipped for huge things in her country music career and going by the strength of her recently released album ‘Love, Heartbreak & Everything in Between’, they may be coming sooner rather than later. Catch her on a smaller stage while you still can. Katy Hurt (Big Entrance Stage, Garden Stage) Hurt has spent the last year or so either in the studio or fine-tuning her live show, which – as those at The Long Road Festival discovered – now rivals just about anyone else’s on the circuit. Her C2C sets are set to be explosive, so make sure you check at least one of them out. Austin Jenckes (CMW Hub – All Bar One, Garden Stage) Someone else who shone at The Long Road Festival was Austin Jenckes, who not only managed to pull a crowd away from Cam, but also arguably outperformed her – which is no mean feat, by any means. He’ll certainly be keen to make an impression at C2C.  King Calaway (BBC Radio 2 Stage at indigo, Town Square, Big Entrance Stage) The group have been making waves both sides of the Atlantic and the release of their debut album ‘Rivers’ is only accelerating their progress further. With six on stage, there’s a lot going on – but they definitely know how to put on a good show.

Kerri Watt has given fans a more intimate feel to her most recent single Kissing Fools, by releasing a special acoustic version of the track. You can watch a picture video of the new version below. [wpdevart_youtube]hXneI5aALWc[/wpdevart_youtube] The full version of the track will feature in Watt‘s upcoming album, which is due for release at some point in 2020 and is certainly a record to keep an eye out for as 2020 unfolds. Speaking about the song, Watt explained that it came together in the studio while they were “jamming until we found a great groove that felt sentimental, but fresh” and that it was her ” favourite song on the album to record.” Watt also stated that she remembers “being so excited when we captured those opening and ending piano twinkles” as “they just add that movie magic feel.” In our January/February 2020 issue, we named Kerri Watt as one of our ‘One to Watch’ artists for the year ahead and for that issue, she told us that she is delighted that she finally had the chance to not only make a record, but to make an album that she is very proud of. “I’m releasing the music that I started off writing years ago and if I don’t have any success after today, I’ve made an album that I’m proud of,” she stated. “Even if no-one listens to it, I will have it forever.”

Now in its seventh incarnation, C2C will be returning to London’s O2 Arena, The SSE Arena in Glasgow and Dublin’s 3Arena between March 13-15 to showcase some of the best that country music has to offer The growth of country music in the UK has been nothing short of extraordinary over the last decade and the progress of that is always captured by Country to Country Festival, which becomes more popular with each year. Last year, C2C set a new record in terms of footfall, with over 60,000 people attending the festival over the course of the three days and even despite corona virus fears, it is very much expected that figure will be topped this year with yet another stellar line-up. This time around, Eric Church, Darius Rucker and recent CMA Award winning Male Vocalist of the Year Luke Combs will be topping the bill, marking the first time that Church has headlined in four years and also the first time that Rucker and Combs have reached the summit. The rest of the line-up is also chock full of quality, with Grammy Award winning artists Tanya Tucker and Old Crow Medicine Show gracing the Main Stage. Sadly, two-time CMA Award Vocal Group of the Year winners Old Dominion pulled out of their sub-headline slot, but they have been replaced swiftly with The Shires, who have become the first UK act to be booked for the Main Stage at C2C. Meanwhile, the likes of The Cadillac Three, Brett Young, Jordan Davis, Runaway June, Charles Esten, Abby Anderson, Tenille Townes and Eric Paslay will be joining them on the biggest platform at C2C, making for an outrageous level of talent spread out across the three days. Those Main Stage acts will be flanked by nine very talented performers on the Spotlight Stage, who are made up of ‘the next Carrie Underwood’ in Gabby Barrett, the controversial but hugely popular country-rap artist Willie Jones and Mitchell Tenpenny among others. The only UK act on the Spotlight Stage will be Twinnie, while Caylee Hammock, Noah Schnacky, Kassi Ashton, Niko Moon and Kyle Daniel will all perform 15-minute segments in-between Main Stage acts. Getting the most out of your ticket Some of those Spotlight Stage acts will be performing other sets over the course of the weekend, most of which will be taking place on other stages that you need either a one-off wristband for or your C2C ticket. Some of these stages are subject to availability, so make sure you allow plenty of time if there’s an artist that you want to see in a small capacity room. Artists like Ashton, Daniel, Barrett, Tenpenny, Schnacky, Hammack and Jones will all be performing in the 2000 capacity indigo along with people like Filmore, Tebey, A Thousand Horses and Tenille Arts, all of which are set to be hugely popular events. Meanwhile, over in Town Square, you’ll find Haley & Michaels, Everette, Angie K, Seaforth, Robert Counts and Spotlight Stage act Niko Moon – giving those who like the Spotlight Stage artists a chance to see an extended set. The only other Spotlight Stage act yet to be mentioned for other shows so far is Twinnie, who will also be performing in the CMW Hub at the top floor of All Bar One. For this venue in particular, make sure you are there way ahead of time as it is capped at about 100 people (or so it feels), but the intimacy of the performances on hand make them borderline unmissable. Joining Twinnie on that stage will be Austin Jenckes, Moon, Kylie Morgan, Leslie Stevens and Alex Hall, while Catherine McGrath, Schnacky and Arts will also be present for some C2C magic. The magic behind the track C2C doesn’t technically start on the Friday, though – it actually kicks off on the Thursday before with the CMA Songwriters Series, which takes place in indigo inside the O2 Arena. The Songwriters Series has proved pivotal for a number of artists from across the pond, including the likes of Combs, Maren Morris, Brandy Clark, Jimmie Allen and Travis Denning – all of whom made their first ever UK appearance at the Songwriters Series to get the C2C ball rolling. This year, the line-up is once again brilliant as it not only includes Jaren Johnson from The Cadillac Three and Niko Moon, but also Tenille Townes, Caylee Hammack and Phil Barton. Hillary Lindsey, Lori McKenna and Liz Rose, who are dubbed the Love Junkies in Nashville, were initially pencilled in for the event, but unfortunately pulled out. Seeing top talent for free One of the best things about C2C though is the community element to it – you don’t actually need a ticket to get involved with the festival, as there is a lot of free music available to indulge in. The Big Entrance Stage is available to you as you walk into the O2 on the right hand side, while up the escalators on the left is the Icon Stage – both of which are displaying a host of excellent artists that you can see free of charge. These include the likes of Temecula Road, who recently made their Grand Ole Opry debut, The Luck, Una Healy, Laura Oakes and Kaitlyn Baker – but the free stuff doesn’t just stop there. This year, C2C is introducing a new area in the shape of the Garden Stage, which is going to be a hot destination for those without a ticket as some of the artists on that stage are very notable in terms of profile. The likes of Catherine McGrath, Austin Jenckes, Holloway Road, Katy Hurt and The Remedy Club will be making appearances on that stage, along with Danny Burns, Danny McMahon, Hayley McKay, Lucy Grubb and Izzie Walsh. Keeping the party going Much like previous years, there will be performances after the headliner has finished, which will take place in indigo and All Bar One’s top floor once more, which transforms into The Saloon after those final few

Steve Bonham, complete with Chris ‘The Bishop’ Lydon and ‘The Big Man’ Kev Moore, make up The Long Road and their plan of releasing unique music throughout 2020 is a golden one They say that the best things come in threes and for Steve Bonham and the Long Road, that is very much the case. With decades of experience between them, the trio have decided to make 2020 a very busy year with a series of new releases spread out throughout the year. The music in question is something that they have given their own signature name to and the trio are confident that what they have is not only of value, but also a lot of substance. “I think it’s like a feeling that in country music, there’s no point writing a song unless someone has already written it better,” Bonham says. “The great thing we have here is that we have Mr. Rock and Roll with Kev on bass and he’s done it for decades now, then we’ve got Mr. New Orleans in The Bishop over here and I guess I’ve been bumming around the country and folk scene since the early ‘80s. The idea is let’s go back one step behind the songs and see what we can weave together again, or as we like to call it, moonshine music. What can we distil?” Staying fresh in the mind Bonham is certainly a character and his songs that are inspired by reimagining what might come out of America’s musical roots today are chock full of quality, but what is interesting is how the trio are releasing their music. By drip-feeding their work across the year (one EP has already been released in ‘American Wilderness’), Bonham and the Long Road are aiming to release four EPs, each with three or four tracks on, with the intention of always sticking in people’s minds – and also adapting to the music industry of 2020. “I think the thing we have all realised is the music industry has changed a lot in the last five to 10 years and the idea of creating an album that embodies your idea of a musical statement is still a valid one – people still do it and we might still end up releasing the tracks we are recording now as one body of work eventually – but the way that people consume music has changed,” Lydon says. “So we figured, ‘let’s try something a bit different.’” “It’s a way to keep your name in people’s minds,” Moore adds. “It’s a natural cycle with an album as with the best will in the world, you could have 12 fantastic songs, but after the first initial rush of interest, it’s hard to keep that interest there. However, if you can split it into different releases…we’re hoping it will pay off.” Being found by songs By doing that as well, the three aren’t limited to what they have in mind – they can always take out and change songs for the later releases, depending on how they feel is best to approach the situation. When it comes to writing songs, Bonham certainly has an art for it and when explaining his process, it’s clear that his methods work best when he has both Lydon and Moore to run his ideas by. “I’ve got 32 notebooks from the years of travel and it’s like picking up pebbles,” Bonham explains. “You see something or you have an idea and you write it down. I personally don’t rush to record it, I let that hang around in my brain for a while and then sometimes something else occurs to you and you have this kind of spirit or something. Then comes this interesting job of extracting it and making it into something that other people can hear and listen to. That’s when I work with these two magicians and we pull it together and make something solid out of it. “Some of the songs I can sit down and write in two minutes and others take years, but I just keep picking them up, putting them down, polishing them and then seeing what is going to occur. To me, every song on the EP, I can point to a moment on my travels where it found me. Songs find you, you don’t create them.” Everything about Steve Bonham and the Long Road is out of the ordinary, but with the songs they have at their disposal and with the forward thinking to deal with the present day, there’s no reason why they can’t flourish all year round.

Ahead of the release date of their second album ‘OK Hotel’, Danny Core – front man of Broken Witt Rebels – spoke to Maverick about the album and how they’ve grown as musicians. You can watch their recently released video of their latest single ‘Running With The Wolves’ below [wpdevart_youtube]yoSnDS75zcQ[/wpdevart_youtube] ‘OK Hotel’ is released this Friday, how are you feeling about its release? I can’t wait to release it, we’ve been sitting on it for a while now and it’s that exciting time where it no longer becomes ours, but belongs to the rest of the world. We’re so confident though with what we’ve made and we’re really chuffed with it. It’s your second album as a band now – how would you say you’ve evolved as a group? We’ve got older, we’ve had more life experiences, we’ve got better as musicians and we’ve travelled the world – we’ve been to the US and Europe multiple times now. I think since our first album, we’ve been constantly learning and constantly evolving into better musicians and better human beings and that helped shape the album. In-between records, you spent a lot of time performing and growing as musicians as you touched on there – do you think that shows on this record? I do, yeah. I think less is more and we probably learnt that the hard way – we used to throw everything at it, with the effects and show off a lot of guitar and stuff like that, but we really wanted to strip it back and that comes with age. We just wanted to keep it simple, work on the melody and the lyrics and not throw all the bells and whistles at it. We think, as musicians, we’ve learnt that and we think that’s the best approach moving forwards. From the songs on the record, would you say there’s a particular theme to the lyrical content? It certainly comes across as a more self-reflective record. Definitely. There were a lot of things happening – I lost my father and other things happened, so I was dealing with things that I hadn’t been through before and as a songwriter, I wanted to make sure I went to those places. It was scary, but you have to evolve as a songwriter and in order to do that, you have to go to those kind of places. This record just reflects on everything that was happening at the time. We had three months off to write it and went back to basics – we went back to Luke’s parents’ shed, where we used to rehearse years ago when we were skint, but we loved doing it. We treated it like a job every day, we’d get there and just write music endlessly and so many songs came out from that. You’re hitting the road towards the back end of March and start of April for a headline tour, what songs from the record are you most looking forward to playing? Over the last six months, we’ve been dying to play new music so at our shows, we’ve been sneaking in some of our new stuff – maybe five or six songs from the new album?  With all due respect to our old material, we’re sort of bored of it – as a band, you’re dying to play your new stuff and seeing how it gets on. I’m looking forward to playing Around We Go– that’s a track that we haven’t played yet – and Running With the Wolves, which even before it was released, became a massive thing for us. We were playing it at the start of our last tour and we’ve never seen anyone react in that way to one of our songs. OK Hotel is another one we haven’t played live yet that I’m really looking forward to playing. We’ve got such a massive catalogue now that in rehearsals, we’re making massive decisions to cut certain songs out which could even end a set, but it’s a great position to be in as a band and we love playing new music. ‘OK Hotel’ by Broken Witt Rebels will be released on March 13

Lindsay Ell has backed up the release of her most recent single I Don’t Love You by unveiling a very powerful music video for the song. You can watch the video below. [wpdevart_youtube]0K-G0ig1p0g[/wpdevart_youtube] The song resembles the first piece of music that Ell has released ahead of her upcoming album, which is the much anticipated follow up to her first major label album release in ‘The Project’. The video itself – directed by Justin Keys – centres around Ell in a field of flowers, with petals falling in the same vein as the classic ‘they love me, they love me not’ game that we have seen many times in films and TV shows. Speaking about both the song and the album to Billboard, Ell said that she is very proud of what she has created and that she feels that by working with Dann Huff, she is able to take her craft to a whole new level. “I am really proud of this music and I Don’t Love You was the perfect thing I wanted to come out and say first,” Ell said. “Working with Dann Huff has challenged me musically in ways I’ve never showcased before and I feel I Don’t Love You pushes those boundaries in a whole new voice I’ve never used before.” 2020 has already been hugely productive for Lindsay Ell, with the Canadian artist being nominated for both New Female Artist of the Year and Music Event of the Year for her smash hit duet What Happens in a Small Town with Brantley Gilbert for the upcoming ACM Awards.

The CMA Songwriters Series will have a slightly different line-up after Hillary Lindsay, Liz Rose and Lori McKenna all pulled out of the event. However, organisers have acted quickly to find alternative replacements, with Tenille Townes, Caylee Hammack and Phil Barton to step in for them, joining Jaren Johnston of The Cadillac Three and Niko Moon. The news comes hot on the heels that Old Dominion have pulled out of C2C citing corona virus fears and while we don’t have an exact reason for Lindsay, Rose and McKenna dropping out, it is suspected that the reasons are the same. “After much consideration, we have decided to withdraw from our upcoming performances as part of the C2C Music Festival in Berlin, Amsterdam, Dublin, London and Glasgow,” the band said in a statement. “We are so sorry to disappoint our fans overseas; however, with the growing uncertainty and unpredictable nature of the virus that is spreading throughout the world, the safety and security of our entire team is the top priority. “We are forever grateful for every opportunity we get to witness just how far our music is reaching and we will be back across the world as soon as we can. Much love and thank you for your support.” With Old Dominion dropping out of C2C, The Shires will be taking their spot on the Main Stage across C2C weekend in London, Glasgow and Dublin, thus becoming the first UK artist to be a pencilled in Main Stage performer in C2C history. The CMA Songwriters Series takes place on the Thursday of C2C week, so it will be taking place on March 12 this year.

The Shires will be stepping up to replace Old Dominion on the Main Stage of C2C 2020 after the American group dropped out following corona virus fears. Old Dominion – made up of Matthew Ramsey, Trevor Rosen, Whit Sellers, Geoff Sprung and Brad Tursi – were pencilled into to sub-headline the Saturday of C2C, but have now pulled out after the threat of the virus continues to grow. Speaking in a statement, the band said that they were gutted that they have to pull out of C2C – also in the Netherlands and Germany – but explained their reasons for doing so and pledged to return soon. “After much consideration, we have decided to withdraw from our upcoming performances as part of the C2C Music Festival in Berlin, Amsterdam, Dublin, London and Glasgow,” the band said in a statement. “We are so sorry to disappoint our fans overseas; however, with the growing uncertainty and unpredictable nature of the virus that is spreading throughout the world, the safety and security of our entire team is the top priority. “We are forever grateful for every opportunity we get to witness just how far our music is reaching and we will be back across the world as soon as we can. Much love and thank you for your support.” As a result of Old Dominion dropping out, The Shires will take their slot on the Main Stage and thus become the first UK act to be pencilled in to perform on the Main Stage at C2C. Last year, Catherine McGrath became the first UK artist to appear on the Main Stage when she duetted with Hunter Hayes, but this will represent the first time than a UK act has actually been booked for a slot of that nature.