Darren Jessee (Ben Folds Five) w/ Natalie Jane Hill
Though best known as the drummer/harmonizer for beloved piano-rockers Ben Folds Five, Darren Jessee makes more understated, textured singer/songwriter fare both as leader of Hotel Lights and as a solo artist. After releasing three albums with “the Five” in the mid to late ’90s, he made four acclaimed Hotel Lights records between 2004 and 2016 while logging time touring with Sharon Van Etten and Hiss Golden Messenger performing on Hiss’s celebrated album Hallelujah Anyhow. He also contributed to The War on Drugs 2017 Grammy winning album, a period that also saw a fourth LP from a reunited Ben Folds Five (2012’s The Sound of the Life of the Mind, their debut in the U.S. Top Ten). In 2018, Jessee issued the more delicate — and often drums-free — The Jane Room 217, his first official solo album, with which he continued to prove himself an evocative, timeless lyricist. The similarly intimate and expressive Remover and Central Bridge followed in 2020 and 2023. Darren’s anticipated new solo album is expected in the Spring of 2027. Natalie Jane Hill is a Texas native guitarist and singer-songwriter based outside of Asheville, North Carolina. She writes songs that reach for the haunted and comforting corners of the world, dressed in a gently virtuosic and singular approach to finger-style guitar. Her new record, Hopeful Woman, is composed of slender songs, life-sized, in which humans endeavor to reconcile themselves to wildernesses and cities; rearrange their rooms and open windows to be closer to the world outside and its choruses of frogs and crickets; attempt and fail to reach one another across a kitchen table; weather natural disaster. If something we might deign to call self-discovery emerges over the course of these narratives, it owes in no small part to the scale of their scenes, to the modesty of their ambitions, in which tumult and adaptation and growth are metabolized through a body’s gentle actions and reactions, its moments of quietude and observation and reflection
Beggar Weeds + the CADETS
Bigger Weeds “In the 1980s, Beggar Weeds were Jacksonville punks sleeping under trucks, opening for X, recording with Michael Stipe, and skinny-dipping with David Berman. In a new, career-defining reissue, they’re the long-missing link between R.E.M. and Uncle Tupelo.” Casey Epstein-Gross, PaSt€ Magazine “Itchy and intense… the ramshackle attitude of The Replacements with a downhome Creedence-like sense of place” MOJO Magazine In the late 1980s, the whole of the Southern alternative scene knew Beggar Weeds as the up-and-coming speed-folk outfit co-signed by Michael Stipe of R.E.M. fame and destined for an imminent break into the big time. They spent most of their time shredding at the legendary venue Einstein A Go-Go and hightailing it from the near-constant fights in Jacksonville’s “blighted area” as fast as their wingtips could take them. Nearly 40 years after the release of their first and only EP, Sure Pants Alot, Beggar Weeds has somehow found themselves poised to take back the spotlight that so cruelly evaded them by barely an inch the first time around. The CADETS As the Cadets began rumbling away in 1995, Cash Carter built his frenetic, thundering drum style around Chuck Smyth’s fast-twitch searing lead rhythms and melodies fertile with nervous energy. Inside those urgent drums and angular chords came their melodic hooks, catchy and strong, laden with unexpected twists. They released a 7”,The Search for the Edible Man (1997), and their first full-length record, The Cadets (1999). As the century drew to a close, the Cadets took on bassist Chad Matheny (Emperor X), a dynamo of creativity and sonic agitation. Also joining was Isaac Bear, brilliantly color washing in the open spaces with expertly placed keys and guitars. The result was a delicately balanced collage of daydreams and found sounds dangling on the hilt of a steel edge. This lineup toured Japan and all along the US east coast until 2007. The Cadets’ music continues to be delightfully peculiar and full of immediacy, arriving at your ear having skidded briskly across the table yet perfectly upright and nary a drop wasted. Their sonic experiments produce songs that possess a rare energy that conjures the early days of rock & roll, sci-fi adventures, and diary entries never intended for the light of day. Lyrics filter larger themes through a tilted and tinted lens of wide-eyed fantastic reverie. Brainwashed spies, mythical chimera, desperate refugees, and jilted lovers all become protagonists and truth tellers.
Fancy Gap w/ Young Mister
Being Followed, Dai Cheri, and Stepback Jumper
TeleVolt w/ Le Smoking
John R. Miller w/ Lou Hazel
As John R. Miller began work on his fifth album, The Great Unknowing, he set out to challenge himself both creatively and geographically. Born in the Washington, DC area and raised in West Virginia, Miller has built a reputation as a thoughtful, boundary-pushing voice in alt-country and Americana, drawing from punk, traditional Appalachian music,and less conventional rock influences. For this record, he left his comfort zone behind and traveled to Tulsa to record at the legendary Church Studio, drawn by the city’s deep musical legacy and its ties to artists like J.J. Cale. Co-produced with longtime collaborator Adam Meisterhans, the album was tracked live with a band of Tulsa-based musicians, including Grammy-nominated John Fullbright, under the steady hand of veteran engineers Gary Laney and Mike Prado. The result is Miller’s most ambitious work to date — aspacious, textured collection that expands on the critically praised Depreciated and Heat Comes Down, blending road-worn storytelling, fuzzy atmospheres, and reflections onmovement, memory, and change. Rooted in his West Virginia past yet shaped by constant travel and new collaborations, The Great Unknowing captures an artist trusting the process, embracing risk, and letting the groove lead the way.
Tyler Ramsey (full band) w/ Alan Peterson
Tyler Ramsey is a fingerstyle guitarist and a captivating voice in modern indie folk, based outside of Asheville, North Carolina. Ramsey gained recognition as a key member of Band of Horses contributing to their soaring sound across three studio albums. As a songwriter and guitarist, his intricate playing and introspective lyricism became a defining element of the band’s music. With masterful guitar work and a gift for storytelling, Tyler Ramsey continues to carve out his own space in the world of modern folk and indie rock. He has released a series of critically acclaimed albums, including “For the Morning” (2019), which showcased his signature blend of fingerpicked guitar, pedal steel, and atmospheric rock textures, and “New Lost Ages” (2024), produced by Phil Ek (Fleet Foxes, The Shins), hailed by Americana UK as “a gentle indie-folk gem”. The project captured Ramsey’s evolution as both a songwriter and musician, balancing moments of quiet introspection with grand, sweeping arrangements. Most recently, Tyler Ramsey and My Morning Jacket guitarist Carl Broemel released their full-length recorded debut “Celestun” in January 2026. A marvel of interwoven musicianship and testament to the duo’s singular camaraderie, the album encapsulates the two veteran guitarist-songwriters’ mutual admiration and effortless compatibility as they swap and share nine new songs of dazzling dexterity and grace recorded almost entirely on acoustic guitars No stranger to wanderlust, singer/songwriter Alan Peterson infuses the weight and wonder of longitudes and latitudes into his lyrics and strings. Sincere words parallel the cadence of original music crafting a sound that doesn’t live in one genre. Whether you experience his music in a full-band or duo or solo setting, every song builds on the foundation of one dynamic voice and accompanying guitar.
Wolves x4, Killerantz, and Oort Patrol
Stepback Jumper, Sugar Meat, and Max Lane
Hank Sinatra w/ Jeffrey Dean Foster and the Arrows
Raleigh, NC – After a few years on hiatus, Hank Sinatra—the high-octane rock-n-roll racehorse of the North Carolina music scene is officially back in the stable and ready to run. The band has announced a string of upcoming performances featuring a refreshed lineup of Triangle music veterans and a gritty, reinvigorated sound. Fixtures of the “twang-core” scene, Hank Sinatra has spent years blending hard Southern rock with a signature double shot of sarcasm. This return to the stage isn’t just a reunion; it’s a rebirth. On the heels of recent collaborations with the likes of Lenny Kaye and Tan and Sober Gentlemen, the band is set to debut music that fuses their classic edge with an exciting new energy. “There’s a different kind of fire in the room these days,” says founding member Jeff Holshouser. “We’ve taken the time to sharpen the sound, and we’re ready to bring that electricityback.” The current iteration of Hank Sinatra comes fully loaded with a number of the Carolinas top players, bringing together members of some of the region’s most influential acts. Jeffrey Dean Foster is a rugged individualist whose music speaks to the soul and comes from the heart. He’s got a knack for crafting emphatic songs with emotion and steadfast tenacity. It’s a riveting work, and in spite of its brevity, it rings with a rugged resilience that drives the emotions to full flourish. Recorded in lockdown, Foster plays practically all the instruments with production and engineering assistance from Don Dixon and Mitch Easter, among others. So too, with its steady stream of unrepentant rockers, it’s a sturdy reminder of the wealth of reasons why Foster is so deserving of wider recognition.