The Record Exchange (1105 W. Idaho St. in Downtown Boise) is proud to host the Hillfolk Noir Album Release/SXSW Sendoff Party at 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 6. As always, this Record Exchange in-store event is free and all ages.
The band’s new album Hillfolk Noir Radio Hour will be available for purchase at the party. Please join us for an evening of live music and a sendoff for the band, which is leaving on March 9 for a two-week national tour that includes an official showcase appearance at SXSW on March 14! Hillfolk Noir also is performing at Boise’s inaugural Treefort Music Fest on Saturday, March 24.
Archie’s Place will be here from 5 to 7 p.m. serving delicious soup and joes (vegan sloppy joe = awesome). There’s an Archie’s reference on the new Hillfolk record, so it’s a natural fit.
ABOUT HILLFOLK NOIR AND HILLFOLK NOIR RADIO HOUR
Fronted by singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Travis Ward, Hillfolk Noir‘s peculiar take on traditional acoustic mountain music is filtered through a half-century of folk, country and rock ‘n’ roll and fed by an affinity for medicine show culture and Depression-era string-band blues. The band calls it Junkerdash, which has multiple definitions up to and including “psychedelic swamp-shack rags.” However, if you’re looking for something neat and tidy to place in print or casual conversation, feel free to use current music-journalism parlance and call it “indie folk.”
Hillfolk Noir Radio Hour is a full-length studio recording sequenced like an old-timey radio program straight out of O Brother, Where Art Thou?, complete with commercial breaks plugging a bunch of fake products they made up. The album is available on CD, MP3 and limited-edition 10-inch vinyl packaged to resemble a 1920s-era 78 (but sounding much better).
Hillfolk’s performance lineup usually but not always consists of:
Travis Ward: Resonator guitar, vocals, harmonica, kazoo, words
Mike Waite: Stand-up bass
Jared Goodpastor: Snare, washboard, tambourine, harmonies
Alison Ward: Singing saw, washboard, banjo, harmonies
Shaun King: Banjo
Hillfolk Noir has performed with Built to Spill, James McMurtry, Neko Case, Justin Townes Earle, Deer Tick, Gourds, Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band, Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Gerald Collier, Heroes and Villains, Train, Jesse Dayton, The Dusty 45s, Neva Dinova and tons of other great acts that you may or may not have heard of. The good Junkerdash word also has been spread on countless American street corners because the Hillfolkers hold the busking tradition in high regard and, well, sometimes they need the gas money.