Nathan Zucker
String quintet Town Mountain returned to the Gulch’s infamous bluegrass homestead Station Inn for a two-night run last Wednesday and Thursday.
The Asheville, NC-based act debuted three new songs at the venue and featured a cast of Nashville music scene A-listers including 14-time Grammy-winner Jerry Douglas and flatpicking wunderkinds Billy Strings.
The 45-year-old Station Inn, which was duded up with Christmas gear, from festive garlands to holiday lights strafing across the wood-paneled front of house, is a regular haunt for Town Mountain, who have been performing there for years.
“First time we played there was with the Stringdusters on a Halloween night,” says frontman Robert Greer “10-12 years ago, probably. We were nervous! But now we drop in something like five times a year. Man, it’s nice to see people who aren’t strangers when you’re on the road. It’s a cool, funky little joint, with an immense amount of story. Like a museum.”
Nathan Zucker
The show kicked off with a cut from Town Mountain’s 2016 LP, Southern Crescent, the rockabilly-like tune, “Tick on a Dog.” Next came a brand new one, a fast-paced jaunt called “Won’t Be Satisfied,” before the title track from the band’s latest album, 2018’s New Freedom Blues, then two more from that record: “North of Cheyenne” and “Down Low.” These made way for a two-step-able tune Greer wrote with North Carolina songwriter Mark Bumgarner, “Comin’ Back to You,” followed by the slow-paced, banjo-led ballad, “House With No Windows.” Next up was the only cut from their debut 2008 long-player, Heroes & Heretics, the ostensibly joyful “Ruination Line.” “Lines in the Levee,” a choppy new one and arguably their least bluegrass song to date, stylistically — it sounds more like a heartland rock-inspired folk chantey. Then, a return to form with “Leave The Bottle,” a cut from 2012’s Leave The Bottle that couldn’t be more bluegrass.
Town Mountain then invited Douglas onstage to resonant applause, and the ambience of the small venue lifted from lighthearted to ecclesiastic as he, the quintet, and sit-in snare player Miles Miller (Sturgill Simpson) covered Flatt & Scruggs’ “Foggy Mountain Breakdown,” trading solos between them with instinctual musical economy and breakneck speed. Afterward, Douglas seemed reflective, commenting,
“Isn’t it an amazing thing, how much great bluegrass is in the world?”
Nathan Zucker
Two more covers followed: Canadian songwriter Ian Tyson’s “Summer Wages” and the Allman Brothers’ Southern rock jam, “Pony Boy,” before everyone left the stage for a 15-minute intermission.
The band returned sans Douglas but with Billy Strings, who flat-picked a vamp into Town Mountain’s 2018 single, “Life & Debt,” which was followed by the band’s swinging, danceable “One Drop in the Bottle.” The septet onstage then became nostalgic, playing three bluegrass classics: Doc Watson’s “Train That Carried My Girl from Town, Tony Rice’s “Freeborn Man,” and Bill Monroe/Kenny Baker’s “The Old Mountaineer.”
The original “Witch Trials,” came next, then a new one called “Can’t Win ‘Em All.” Another cover: Warren Zevon’s “Lawyers, Guns, and Money”; another original: the yodel-filled “Lawdog”; and, finally, a cover of Bruce Sprinsgteen’s 1984 hit “I’m on Fire” — Town Mountain’s studio version of this reworking is their highest-played release on Spotify, with just under 6.5 million spins.
The band left a slightly smaller crowd than they had welcomed, but their full-length set was more than welcomed by an audience of fans who sung along, stomped their feet to the beat, and cheered after every tune.
“That’s the beauty of three-chord music, man,” Greer says. “You know, the intuition’s all there.”
Town Mountain is currently writing for their sixth studio album, slated for release in 2020.