We’re proud to say that two of the bands who’ve played here in Billsville were on the bill at this years Newport Folk Festival. The David Wax Museum and Brown Bird both performed today for huge crowds in Newport, Rhode Island.
You can catch both sets on the NPR website.
The David Wax Museum – Click to go to the NPR page and stream the show.
Last year, Boston’s David Wax Museum couldn’t play the Newport Folk Festival without first winning a contest. But talk about making the most of an opportunity: The band was everywhere at Newport last year, passing out CDs and signing bands up to its mailing list when it wasn’t breaking spontaneously into song every chance it got. Since that breakthrough, the group has found a national audience for its recent album Everything Is Saved, which finds David Wax mixing the roots of American and Mexican folk music while Suz Slezak gives the band’s music the percussive edge that can only come from a stick dragged rhythmically against a donkey’s jawbone. Hear David Wax Museum perform live at the 2011 Newport Folk Festival in Newport, R.I.
Brown Bird – Click to go to the NPR page and stream the show.
The Newport Folk Festival isn’t just a national — or even international — showcase for the best in well-known folk music. It also gives a leg up to the best in up-and-coming roots music from around its own neighborhood. The festival helped Rhode Island’s Low Anthem make the jump from volunteer trash collection at the festival to featured artist, and it lent a big boost to Boston’s David Wax Museum last year. This time around, the Providence, R.I., duo Brown Bird looks to make a similar jump from unknown to rising star. Salt for Salt, the pair’s forthcoming album, mixes dark American folk music with the stark sounds and styles of Eastern Europe. Hear Brown Bird perform live at the 2011 Newport Folk Festival in Newport, R.I.
