The Gone Ghosts, Crenshaw Pentecostal, and Charles Latham & The Borrowed Band
Underground Springhouse w/ Jacoozy
“More of the good, less of the bad.” That’s the motto upon which Underground Springhouse have built their sound and style. Exploring reggae, country, and funk influences within a rock ‘n roll context, Springhouse has crafted a genre-bending catalog that takes listeners from beaches to back roads with ear-worm hooks and head-bobbing grooves.
Sunday Matinee w/ Rev. Billy C. Wirtz
The ‘Boro Sessions presents Rev. Billy C. Wirtz in a seated show at The Flat Iron. Limited seating, so purchase your tickets early! JOIN US for “Sunday Afternoon with ‘Wild Man’ Rev. Billy C. Wirtz!”Reverend Billy C. Wirtz is an iconic American blues musician, known forhis one-of-a-kind comedy routines set to music. His music is acombination of classic boogie woogie and off-the-deep-end originals.He began playing guitar at the age of 10. In 1979 he joined his friend andmentor, blues pianist Sunnyland Slim, in Chicago, where he masteredBoogie piano, Gospel & Blues. Following the advice of his mentor, Billy C.Wirtz, the son of a police officer and a government official, burst on thescene in polyester attire, dyed red hair, patent leather boots and two armsfull of ink.After recording his first album in 1982, Hightone Records released tenclassic albums. Rev. Billy became a nationally known touring act withcoast-to-coast appearances on morning radio shows. He toured with BozScaggs and played in all the big festivals. Somewhere in the middle of allthis he fulfilled a lifetime dream and became a professional wrestlingmanager. If that weren’t enough, he began writing, publishing over 75articles and two books.Still, he needed more! The Rev. began to host radio programs.Since 2014,he hosts “The Rhythm Revival” on WMNF radio in Tampa, Florida, whichbroadcasts on stations from California to Iowa to Florida.Thanks to thisarticle The Florida Humanities Council plans to develop this article(Traveling Down the Chitlin’ Circuit – Florida Humanities) into the pilot for adocumentary!All these projects are fine but in his own words “I need the buzz of the liveshow.” So, he continues to tour, performing solo concerts and guestappearances with The Nighthawks. His live performances are stillconstantly evolving one-of-a- kind shows filled with music, humor andhistory by the 6’4” former Special teacher and boogie master. Whetherhe’s writing, playing’ or pontificating, Rev. Billy C. Wirtz is still rockin’ onthe Ivories, and the crowds are still rollin’ in the aisles.
Mellow Swells + Bedrumor
Mellow Swells is a band from Durham, NC that blends atmospheric soundscapes with soulful melodies and airtight grooves. Known for their captivating live performances, the group fuses elements of indie, r&b, electronic, rock and ambient music. Mellow Swells aims to bring depth and serenity to every listeners musical journey. “Mellow Swells’ music wildly unfurls into dance-ready rhythms, distorted guitars, and passionate vocals.” – CLTure Magazine bedrumor is a Greensboro based band led by Lazuli Ortiz and Ryan Mole. Their music could be described broadly as indie rock, but with inspirations from jazz. In order to convey their music in a live setting, they bring in other musicians to help perform and arrange their music. Currently the group has Tyler Monroe (drums) and Nick Vanbuskirk (saxophone). They take inspiration from artists like Herbie Hancock, King Krule, Duster, Ichiko Aoba and Hiatus Koyote. Lazuli is the main producer of all of bedrumor’s music, which is recorded in her bedroom (hence the name). With a large online following from doing mostly covers, bedrumor continues to write, record, and perform original music regularly with plans to release an EP in the near future.
The Dirty Secrets
Covers of your favorite pop-punk, rock, metal, 90’s and 00’s!
IRATA, JPHONO1, and LIMN
Flamy Grant, Jennifer Knapp, and Crys Matthews
Award-winning and Billboard-charting artist Flamy Grant is a shame-slaying, hip-swaying, singing-songwriting drag queen from western North Carolina. Her 2022 debut record, Bible Belt Baby, reached the #1 spot on the iTunes Christian Charts, and she is a winner of the 2023 Kerrville Folk Festival New Folk Competition. A powerhouse vocalist, intrepid songwriter, and irreverent comedy queen, Flamy drags you into a therapeutic, theatrical mix of music and storytelling. Armed with a bold lip and a blistering voice, Flamy is proof positive that nothing is sacred (but everything is holy); shame belongs in the closet; and you are a brilliant, resilient badass ready to take on the world. Jennifer Knapp, a Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter, author, speaker, and advocate, has spent over two decades leaving an indelible mark on the music industry. Selling over one million albums with her first three releases, including the Gold-certified “Kansas” (1998), she’s a four-time Dove Award winner and two-time Grammy nominee. Already being hailed as “the next Woody Guthrie,” Nashville resident Crys Matthews is among the brightest stars of the new generation of social justice music-makers. A powerful lyricist whose songs of compassionate dissent reflect her lived experience as what she lightheartedly calls “the poster-child for intersectionality,” Justin Hiltner of Bluegrass Situation called Matthews’s gift “a reminder of what beauty can occur when we bridge those divides.” She is made for these times and, with the release of her new album Reclamation and her 2021, hope-fueled, love-filled social justice album Changemakers, Matthews hopes to take her place alongside some of her heroes in the world of social-justice music like Sweet Honey in the Rock and Holly Near. Of Matthews, ASCAP VP & Creative Director Eric Philbrook says, “By wrapping honest emotions around her socially conscious messages and dynamically delivering them with a warm heart and a strong voice, she lifts our spirits just when we need it most in these troubled times.”
Faust (Live film score by Modern Robot)
You may not know the name “Faust”, but you do know the story. Something between a doctor, scientist, and alchemist, Dr. Faustus thirsts for what he believes is the ultimate power — knowledge. Reaching his own limits, he makes a bargain — the Faustian bargain — and sells his soul to the Devil. “Every notable historical era will have its own Faust.”—Kierkegaard In 1587, a small chapbook called “Historia von D. Johann Fausten” told stories of an actual Johann Georg Faust, who traveled around Germany in the early 1500‘s performing magic tricks, telling horoscopes, and committing various kinds of fraud. He may have died in his own alchemical experiment. Since then, his story has been superimposed with legends of a pact with the Devil and then retold in innumerable ballads, plays, novels, operas — any kind of adaptation you can imagine, including an episode of The Simpsons. In 1947, Thomas Mann re-cast the story as a talented composer reaching for greatness. By intentionally contracting syphilis, he created music of extraordinary inspiration, but also caused his own madness and demise. You may also recognize this as the story of the Mississippi bluesman Robert Johnson, who meets the Devil at the crossroads to be given mastery of the guitar, a reason I called this show “At the Crossroads” when I performed it on the Fringe circuit in 2016. Which brings us back to this show. “One of the most astonishing visual experiences the silent film has to offer.”—Dave Kehr, The New York Times Like all Modern Robot shows, this performance is a film with a live musical score, in this case the first major adaptation of Faust, released in 1926. German production company UFA hired F.W. Murnau to direct the film. Lavish sets, complicated shots, and Murnau‘s many, many takes made this a massively expensive production as well as a financial flop. But it also makes for a fantastic movie filled with effects and compositions that seem more painted than filmed. After a premier in Greensboro, Ben Singer performed the show at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe (five-star review by Broadway Baby), the Orlando Fringe, the San Francisco Fringe Festival (Best of the Fringe award), and the New York International Fringe Festival (Overall Excellence Award for Music Composition). The score will be performed by Ben on guitar and Tyler Monroe on drum set.
Wednesday (solo) + Cryogeyser (solo)
A Wednesday song is a quilt. A short story collection, a half-memory, a patchwork of portraits of the American south, disparate moments that somehow make sense as a whole. Karly Hartzman, the songwriter/vocalist/guitarist at the helm of the project, is a story collector as much as she is a storyteller: a scholar of people and one-liners. Rat Saw God, the Asheville band’s acclaimed record, is ekphrastic but autobiographical and above all, deeply empathetic. Across the album’s ten tracks Hartzman builds a shrine to minutiae. Half-funny, half-tragic dispatches from North Carolina unfurling somewhere between the wailing skuzz of Nineties shoegaze and classic country twang, that distorted lap steel and Hartzman’s voice slicing through the din.The songs on Rat Saw God don’t recount epics, just the everyday. They’re true, they’re real life, blurry and chaotic and strange – which is in-line with Hartzman’s own ethos: “Everyone’s story is worthy,” she says, plainly. “Literally every life story is worth writing down, because people are so fascinating.”But the thing about Rat Saw God – and about any Wednesday song, really – is you don’t necessarily even need all the references to get it, the weirdly specific elation of a song that really hits. Yeah, it’s all in the details – how fucked up you got or get, how you break a heart, how you fall in love, how you make yourself and others feel seen – but it’s mostly the way those tiny moments add up into a song or album or a person.
The Wes Collins Band with Jeffrey Dean Foster and Sam Frazier
Wes Collins’ songs dig deep and go to uncertain, sometimes scary places. On his new album “Jabberwockies” (available June 3) you meet a woman who fears her power over men, and eavesdrop on both a precious friendship destroyed by unrequited romantic feelings and an addict in full-fledged panic. A lyric suggesting you “look out for the people who love you” takes a nasty twist in the last verse: “You got a scar on your spirit? / Somebody who loved you was probably holding the knife.” “Wes Collins has a wonderful gift for telling stories from truly unique points of view. Every narrator in Jabberwockies reveals thoughts I’ve had, but would certainly be terrified to express. Wes is a courageous songwriter. Wes also has that magical musical sensibility that makes me hit “repeat” on his songs. He makes my favorite records and he’s one of my ultimate favorite musical artists.”Jaimee Harris “(Collins) is one of the best songwriters in the (North Carolina) Triangle’s vital Americana quadrant.Author and critic David Menconi “Wes Collins’ songs have a way of circling around my mood and elevating it. His music makes me feel better, no matter how my day is going. I congratulate him on his new record Jabberwockies, a stellar collection of new songs, beautiful vocals, and glorious harmonies by Jaimee Harris and Crystal Hariu-Damore. I can’t stop listening to it, I love it!”Mary Gauthier
