The SteelDrivers’ brand of bluegrass – intense, dark, poetic, and inescapably human – is a refreshing reminder of the timeless power of stringband music, and is captured perfectly on The SteelDrivers. Produced by Nashville ace Luke Wooten, The SteelDrivers was recorded mostly live on the studio floor, vocals and all. Its songs grapple with classic themes of regret, love, and redemption, from the escalating prison lament of “Midnight Train to Memphis” to the chilling murderer’s plea encapsulated in “If It Hadn’t Been for Love.” “East Kentucky Home” is a timeless traditional bluegrass lament, with its strains of homesickness, loss, and abandonment, but ingeniously reinvented with off-kilter rhythmic accents and a decidedly contemporary chord progression.
The willingness to set aside the unspoken rules that ruthlessly govern bluegrass set the SteelDrivers apart from the innumerable faceless acts vying for the bluegrass spotlight.
Nashville Sunday Night is a special presentation of Nashville’s Independent Radio, Lightning 100. Each Sunday night Lightning 100 broadcasts a concert from 3rd and Lindsley, one of Nashville’s finest live music venues. November 15, 2015 featured Jon Latham opening up for The SteelDrivers.
