15 June 2020

Sunny Ozell will be realising a live acoustic EP titled ‘Live at The Village’ on July 17, which will feature a number of songs from her recent album ‘Overnight Lows’.  The first single from it is Hammer and Nail, which you can listen to here. The EP is made up of four songs from the album as well as a cover of The Valley by Los Lobos, all of which have been recorded in a live environment from the Americana star. Speaking about her decision to go ahead with the EP, Ozell said that she had thought that she was done with a vast majority of the songs from her album, but was glad to be proved wrong as she felt reinvigorated going back over them in the way that she did. “When I’d finished making ‘Overnight Lows’, I’d thought I was done probing these particular songs, but in taking another swing at some of my already completed tunes I was reminded that we’re never really ‘done’, and that it can be a total pleasure to keep exploring and expanding,” Ozell said. It was such a joy to return to The Village recording studios in Santa Monica late last summer to track some acoustic versions of a select group of my songs. “I’d thought I would come away with some stripped down ‘coffee house’ kinda takes on the material; ‘acoustic’ has often meant to me ‘soft’ or ‘delicate’. “But what these two days of tracking produced was something of a surprise:  genuine re-imaginings of the songs themselves, albeit performed by all-acoustic instrumentation.” Last year, Sunny Ozell toured the UK and was also a standout performer at The Long Road Festival in September.

The second edition of Dixie Fields festival will be taking place online, with a number of exciting artists booked in for live streams. The now virtual festival will take place on July 11 and tickets are available here. Jackson Michelson will be returning to the festival after excelling last year, while there will also be streams from the likes of Kezia Gill, Stevie O’Connor and Gareth Nugent in addition to local Essex artists such as Hannah Paris, Lucy Blu and The Jackson Line. As well as that, Two Ways Home, Jessica Lynn, Royal South, Kevin McGuire, Ryan Robinette, Brittany McLamb, Emma & Jolie, Gary Quinn, Scott Nicholls, Honey County and Poppy Fardell will also be performing. Speaking about the news, Operations Director Georgie Thorogood explained that while she was devastated to be cancelling the festival in its normal form as a result of the pandemic, she is ecstatic that the wonders of technology have allowed people to still enjoy the fun. “We were devastated to have to cancel the real Dixie Fields festival for this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, but we are thrilled to be able to still engage with our audience and compile a simply stunning line up of real country music, which can be streamed directly to you, wherever you are,” Thorogood said. “Although a virtual festival is hugely different to the amazing live event held last year, we are so excited to be able to offer this to fans across the World, not only the UK. “Our friends and followers have already been discussing how best to decorate their gardens and homes for the event and we can’t wait to see the pictures.” After springing up last year, Dixie Fields was considered a success and there was much anticipation as to how their second year would live up to the expectations they set.