Calendar of Events
Upcoming events and things to do in Asheville, NC. Below is a list of events for festivals, concerts, art exhibitions, group meetups and more.
Interested in adding an event to our calendar? Please click the green “Post Your Event” button below.
Keith Harkin is an Irish singer songwriter from Derry City, Ireland now residing in Los Angeles CA. Over the last 15 years, his musical talents have brought him across the world many times over. Including shows for President Obama at The White House, Sir Richard Branson on Necker Island, Secretary of State at the Pentagon, Mohamed Ali at Celebrity Fight Night and performing National Anthems at The Garden for The Boston Celtics to name but a few.
During his time touring the States, he gained recognition from Grammy Award-winning Producer, David Foster, who then went on to sign Keith as the first artists to the new Verve Records. Keith released his first solo debut album with Foster and Verve Records, where they watched it soar to the number 1 spot on the Billboard charts in Canada & the US. Keith was also the lead singer of the massive Irish sensation “Celtic Thunder” which had huge success with over fifteen #1 records world wide and over a millions in CD sales with numerous PBS specials.
Over the past 12 years since his first release, Keith has been writing all of his own material for his solo records. All four of Keith’s solo records have been ranked in the top 10 Charts in both Canada & the US. He is currently working on album #5 at his studio in Ireland.”
There are three ticket options:
VIP Tickets :: $75 -The VIP experience will include Q and A with Keith, special soundcheck performance, autographed tour poster and seating in front of the stage – VIP Tickets are available on line. If you also wish to have dinner – you must call the venue for dinner reservations. Tables for VIP must be for 2 or more and will be the closest tables to the stage (just behind VIP seating). There is a $20 minimum per person for food and beverage
Reserve Seat Dinner Tickets :: 35$ are available on the Main Floor with a Dinner Reservation. You must call the venue for reserve tickets and reservations at 828-575-273. There is a $20 minimum per person for food and beverage
General Admissions tickets :: $35 are available for the Balcony only – seating is First Come First Serve. General Admission tickets are available on line.
May 25 Use code OPWAILERS Code valid 3/24 10am – 10pm
Tickets: The Wailers at The Orange Peel on May 25, 2022 8:00 PM (etix.com)
The band play a special set featuring incredible cuts from Bob Marley’s formidable back catalogue along with a string of their greatest, classic hits. The Wailers are giving you a chance to be part of the legacy. Aston Barrett Jr, himself reggae royalty as son of the irrepressible ‘Familyman’, carries the flame for The Wailers in a show that is simply not to be missed.
In late 2020, The Wailers released their first single off the album, “One World, One Prayer”, a powerful piece focused on unity, love and inclusion beyond cultural differences. Produced and written by Emilio Estefan, “One World, One Prayer“, mixes Jamaican reggae with the sounds of the urban Latin genre. The track features international titan Farruko, Jamaican superstar Shaggy, and continues the legacy of Bob Marley alongside the great man’s daughter, Cedella Marley, and her son Skip Marley.
One World, the album that marks the Wailers’ return to the recording studios and the band’s first album for 25 years, was nominated for a 2021 Grammy® Award in the Best Reggae Album category.
The essence of 70s rebellion, the true spirit of reggae performed by the people who helped forge the era-defining sound and by those raised under their tutelage. Living Legends, Reggae Royalty carrying the flame – now you can be a part of the legacy. When The Wailers come calling, you listen.
Queer Music Exploration with Kayla Lynn – Students will explore guitar, bass, drums, singing and piano with a focus on learning music by artists from the LGBTQ+ community. Students will have the chance to interact with their peers and share their experiences through music
Cocktails, taps & menu available while you laugh the night away to some of the areas best Standup Comics
in a ridiculously fun adult environment!!
For more info contact Michele at [email protected]
3/24 Hosted by Cary Goff
Comedy Open Mic Featuring
Hilliary Begley, Cameron Davis & James Harrod
7:30p-till, 18+
Doors 6:30p: [Music before show provided by Buzz Radio Asheville]
Comedy Open Mic plus Three Professional featured performers. Open mic comics signup at door get 3-5m. [Free entry for performing comics, free pizza at comics table]
Buy tix at: https://www.ashevillebrewing.com/location/north/
Jimkata will be performing LIVE on the Indoor Stage at Salvage Station on Thursday March 24th! Doors open at 7pm and the music starts at 8pm. 18+ ONLY (no exceptions)! FREE ON-SITE PARKING! Root Down will be serving their delicious twist on Southern Soul food PLUS we will have our FULL bar open for you to enjoy!
CDC guidelines + band requirements + our venue policies are subject to change daily, so please keep your eyes on https://salvagestation.com/covid-policy/ for updates. We do not issue refunds based on our Covid-19 policies and reserve the right to change them at any time. As always, thank you for supporting live music!
We are pleased to offer donation-based, pay-as-you-can community concerts.
Due to COVID restrictions, seating is limited and must be reserved in advance. Those planning to attend are expected to be fully vaccinated for the safety of our community. MASKS ARE STILL REQUIRED. Thank you for understanding.
Our live music resumes in late March.
Kate Steinbeck, flute • Steve Newbrough, guitar
Works by Francesco Molinao, Julián Aguirre, Oscar Alem and more
Friday, March 25, 5:30 PM • St. Philips, Brevard
Admission to all our concerts is free, but you are encouraged to reserve seats in advance.
Jon Stickley Trio is a genre-defying and cinematic instrumental trio who’s deep grooves, innovative flatpicking and sultry-spacy violin moves the listener’s head, heart, and feet. “It’s not your father’s acoustic-guitar music, Instead Stickley’s Martin churns out a mixture of bluegrass, Chuck Berry, metal, prog, grunge, and assorted other genres—all thoroughly integrated into a personal style,” -Guitar Player Magazine. Premier Guitar says, “Stickley’s trio… is not a traditional bluegrass group by any means… they are just nimble and ambitious enough to navigate EDM-style breakbeats as effortlessly as the old timey standard ‘Blackberry Blossom. With inspiration ranging from Green Day to Duran Duran, Tony Rice, Nirvana, The Dead, Grisman and beyond, the Trio is making waves with their unique sound. “In a time when a lot of instrumental music feels more like math than art, Jon Stickley Trio reminds us of the pure joy that can be created and shared through music,” -Anders Beck (Greensky BG)
After 20 years of outlier success in the music industry, The Birthday Massacre continues to grow their art and their fan base. Millions of streams attest to the legions of fans who are added to the Imaginary Monsters Army daily. From their earliest work, Nothing and Nowhere through their iconic Walking With Strangers,( which has been called the Sgt. Pepper’s of Dark Wave), and 10 other mysteriously fascinating albums, the band defies all attempts to label them. But that is because they came at their music from an Art College perspective and not as a band thing. The band was one way to express their art and it remains that way today. There is both a continuity and an exploration to the music they release. Easily recognizable as The Birthday Massacre but stretching the boundaries within their own mindset, each new release is eagerly anticipated by tens of thousands of very loyal fans. Fans as loyal to the band as the band is to them.
Now the band is poised to have their most ambitious year ever with the release of a new album, the unveiling of a website that is another “work of art” and a full slate of live shows. From clubs to festivals The Birthday Massacre will be engaging their old and new fans with a mix of the familiar and the new music that is uniquely them. Now is your chance to see and hear the band that you have heard so much about. 2022 is going to be a good year to see and to be seen. The Birthday Massacre is ready to live up to your expectations and more. That is why they continue to grow in popularity.
Born from the rich culture of the Colorado mountains, The Runaway Grooms are bringing a refreshing take on contemporary jam band music. With pocket grooves, syncopated rhythms, and expansive tones, the band captures elements of funk and psychedelic rock while simultaneously celebrating traditional songwriting roots of Americana music. Dueling guitar solos, 3-part harmonies, and a screaming lap steel guitar, combine to create a unique soundscape that takes listeners through an experiential musical journey.
The Colorado based band formed when frontman, Adam Tobin, met guitarist, Zac Cialek, at employee housing for a ski resort. The two were joined by drummer and long time friend, Justin Bissett, shortly after and formed the original lineup of the band. Bassist/vocalist, Zach Gilliam, and keyboardist, Cody Scott, joined the band in November 2019. The addition of the new members helped catalyse the evolution of the band’s sound.
The band released their debut album ‘Tied to the Sun’ in March 2020 , The release was immediately followed by the global Coronavirus pandemic during which the band continued to develop and write music together. The newly written music contributed to the Groom’s sophomore album, Violet Lane, set to be released October 2021.
Kendall Street Company and Underground Springhouse will be performing LIVE on the Indoor Stage with Lua Flora at Salvage Station on Saturday, March 26th! Doors open at 6pm and the music starts at 7pm. 18+ ONLY (no exceptions)! FREE ON-SITE PARKING! Root Down will be serving their delicious twist on Southern Soul food PLUS we will have our FULL bar open for you to enjoy!
Violinist Jamie Laval and soprano Amber Rose make an exciting musical journey through Scotland, Ireland, and Brittany, evocatively reimagining Gaelic love songs, rustic peasant dances, and recounting mythic tales from the Celtic world.
“One of the hottest fiddlers out there” (Asheville Citizen-Times), Jamie won the U.S. National Scottish Fiddle Championship which launched him to world-wide acclaim in Celtic music. He has performed for Her Majesty the Queen, appeared on Dave Matthews’ platinum Some Devil album, and presented a TEDx Talk on the value of arts and music in our communities. Murmurs and Drones, Laval’s third album, won “Best World Traditional Album” in the 2012 Independent Music Awards. In 2019 Jamie released his latest album, Celtic Christmas: Music for the Deep Midwinter. Jamie is also a prolific composer, arranger, and educator.
With a soaring, angelic voice evoking a fairytale-like quality, Amber Rose is a rising star on the vocal horizon. Equally at home performing opera, oratorio, musical theatre, and folk music styles, Amber recently received the Encouragement Award in the venerated Camille Coloratura Awards (2021) for her performance of Verdi’s “Caro Nome.” Throughout the 2021 season, Amber was a featured artist with the New Hampshire Piccola Opera and performed and recorded regularly with Jamie Laval. She is an ongoing member of the prestigious Taylor Festival Choir (Greensboro, NC) and is a company artist with Moon River Opera (Savannah, GA).
Since its 1997 formation, Lúnasa has been one of contemporary Irish music’s leading voices. Best known for its complex arrangements and unique sound, the group has reshaped the boundaries of traditional music and energized audiences the world over. With over a quarter of a million records sold, more than 2,000 performances and members from some of Ireland’s greatest bands, the group is an “Irish music dream team,” according to Folk Roots Magazine.
The band is bassist Trevor Hutchinson; uilleann piper and whistle player Cillian Vallely (he’s played with Bruce Springsteen and Riverdance); exceptional flute, whistle and bodhran player Kevin Crawford; acoustic guitarist Ed Boyd; and award-winning and virtuosic fiddler Colin Farrell.
Old Crow Medicine Show will be joined by opening act Sierra Ferrell.
It’s been over 20 years since Old Crow Medicine Show’s humble beginnings as street buskers. The band has gone on to receive the honor of being inducted into the Grand Ole Opry, and has won two Grammy® Awards: Best Folk Album for Remedy (2014) and Best Long Form Music Video for “Big Easy Express” (2013). Additionally, their classic single “Wagon Wheel” received the RIAA’s double-platinum certification in 2019 for selling over 2 million copies, while the band’s debut album, O.C.M.S., has been certified gold (500,000 copies).
Old Crow Medicine Show has toured the world, playing renowned festivals and venues such as: Bonnaroo, Farm Aid, Red Rocks Amphitheater, Cambridge Folk Festival, Coachella, London’s Roundhouse, The Ryman Auditorium, The Barclays Center, New Orleans Jazz Fest, The Fox Theater in Atlanta, The Kennedy Center Concert Hall, Summerstage in Central Park NYC, Forecastle, the Newport Folk Festival, and several appearances on A Prairie Home Companion. They’ve toured with artists such as Willie Nelson & Family, Brandi Carlile, Mumford & Sons, The Lumineers, John Prine, The Avett Brothers, and others. The band also took part in the historic Railroad Revival Tour, traveling from California to New Orleans on a vintage train, which was captured in the Emmet Malloy-directed, Grammy Award-winning documentary Big Easy Express.
Vaylor Trucks
Vaylor grew up knowing his picture is on the cover of one of the best selling southern rock albums of all time. Rather than let that fact set his musical course, Vaylor has spent decades establishing his own voice, studying and performing jazz, progressive, experimental, and avant-garde music with greats such as Pat Martino, Dweezil Zappa, Mike Keneally, Bernard Purdie, Johnny Vidacovich, and Col. Bruce Hampton, as well as establishing The Yeti Trio, an experimental fusion powerhouse for more than 20 years. But the music his family made with The Allman Brothers Band stayed with him. Now, with Brother & Sister, Vaylor is embracing his roots.
Melody Trucks
Melody Trucks is a life-long student of music. Being born into a musical family, she was surrounded by incredible musicians from the start. She began studying flute at the age of 7, but expanded to all woodwinds as she progressed through high school. She switched to percussion in college, studying ethnomusicology with a focus in Balinese and Brazilian music. While she did sing occasionally with her brother, Vaylor Trucks of the Yeti Trio, it was not her main focus. After deciding to surprise her father, Butch Trucks of the Allman Brothers Band, by singing at an open jam hosted by Hub Chason at the Bradfordville Blues Club in Tallahassee, Florida, Melody was invited to tour with his latest group, Butch Trucks and the Freight Train
Eric Sanders
Eric Sanders is a drummer and classical percussionist, originally from New York. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Music Education and was awarded the prestigious Performer’s Certificate in Classical Percussion Performance from Penn State. While pursuing a Masters Degree in Jazz Performance on the drum set at NYU, Sanders studied with John Riley, Mike Clark, and JoJo Mayer.
Sanders runs the online drum program for the Atlanta Institute of Music and Media, and has been teaching privately for more than 3 decades. Along with generating a massive amount of drum educational materials, he wrote a brand new snare book and created 200 new drum videos during quarantine. Eric has been teaching, gigging, and recording in Atlanta since 1996. He’s toured throughout the U.S. and overseas, working with numerous groups and artists that run the gamut of musical styles. Sanders has released 2 solo percussion CDs of original compositions on his own label, Flam Five Records, and is currently working on a 3rd disc, as well as performing as a session player.
Garrett Dawson
Born to an extremely musical family and raised in the woods of northern New Jersey, Garrett Dawson has been playing drums and percussion since the age of three. As a young child Garrett became heavily influenced by Rock n Roll, Jazz, Reggae, and Folkloric music from Africa, the Caribbean, and South America.
Garrett Now resides in southwest Florida with his family and maintains a full schedule of touring, studio work, and teaching. Garrett has been recruited by and worked with many iconic Southern Jam Band rockers such as Butch Trucks and The Freight Train Band, Dickey Betts and Great Southern, The Artimus Pyle Band, and Dangerous Dan Toler. He was the first ”outsider” to be accepted by and work with many top Garifuna (African Carib-Arawak native people) artists, playing Reggae, Punta, and Paranda with Rolando ‘Ideal’ Castillo, Gadu Nunez, and Marcony Star. Garrett’s drumming is featured on over 50 studio recordings.
Steve Lapointe’s nine years of classical piano as a youth grounded him in music theory. Jazz studies while in Ithaca, NY, opened his ears to extemporaneous improvisation and the music of Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea, Bill Evans, Michel Petrucciani and the American songbook. Steve served as musical director of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Vero Beach, Florida, and occasionally performed at the UU Asheville congregation.
Jack of the Wood : Sunday-Irish Session
Sundays
1 till who knows when?
Traditional Irish music is kept alive at Jack of the Wood with our unplugged Sunday session.
Jack of the Wood
95 Patton ave
Asheville, NC 28801
(828) 252.5445
We are pleased to offer donation-based, pay-as-you-can community concerts.
Due to COVID restrictions, seating is limited and must be reserved in advance. Those planning to attend are expected to be fully vaccinated for the safety of our community. MASKS ARE STILL REQUIRED. Thank you for understanding.
Our live music resumes in late March.
Kate Steinbeck, flute • Steve Newbrough, guitar
Works by Francesco Molinao, Julián Aguirre, Oscar Alem and more
Sunday, March 27, 3 PM • St. Mary’s, Asheville
Admission to all our concerts is free, but you are encouraged to reserve seats in advance .
UNCA String Trio Concert
Joseph Falconer, director
Sunday, March 27
3:00 pm
Lipinsky Hall Lobby
Free and open to everyone. MASKS REQUIRED
Three years ago, the Upstate Music Awards were founded to honor local musicians and bands making original music — along with the producers, studio engineers, photographers, videographers, and visual artists that work beside them.
Now for the third annual ceremony, the UMAs move into the Peace Center’s Gunter Theatre for an evening that shines the spotlight on the creative talent found all around the 864.
Join us at 6 pm on Sunday, March 27th, as we reveal the winners for Artist of the Year, Best Live Act, Best Single, Best Music Video, and ten other categories. You’ll also catch live performances from Ill Intentions, Darby Wilcox & The Peep Show, Lo Indigo, Perfect Suit, Quality Time, and Curfue. Reserve your seat now and come dressed to impress!
Ben Phantom is a songwriter, videographer, multi instrumentalist, music producer, traveler, and long distance hiker. His path, carved by music, has taken him from the North American wilderness to Vietnam, Cambodia, Israel, Central America, and finally to his mountain home in Asheville, North Carolina. Phantom is a passionate and captivating performer who writes from the heart , speaks to the soul, and never forgets to find the humor in life. He believes that we heal each other through building community, developing deep relationships, and being of service.
His father’s family escaped the Vietnam War, and his mother’s family survived the Holocaust.
As a Vietnamese Jewish American, Phantom uses his music to bridge cultural barriers, honor the past, and create a better future. He carries a strong message of hope and resilience; his mission is to tell stories that heal and create sustainable community.
In 2014, Phantom walked from Mexico to Canada with a guitar and all his belongings on his back. The 2,668 mile journey transformed his relationship with music; he began writing songs drawn from his experiences on the trail as well as his struggles with depression, addiction, loss and love. The music offered hope and solace, to him and to his audiences. By sharing his music, videos, and personal story, he has inspired and connected with people all over the world.
One of the definitions of “phantom” is “a figment of the imagination.” Typically this has a negative connotation, but Phantom (from his birth name, Phan) sees it instead as an opportunity to create a better reality by using our imagination creatively and positively, in every area of our lives. His commitment to creative risk taking led to confronting his fear of technology and taking ownership of his artistic process. Embracing risk, he asked for help (a vital and often overlooked part of the creative process) and established a home studio, where he records, edits, and films much of his own work.
Phantom has a rich and diverse history of musical experience. After studying jazz and classical music in college, Phantom began his professional career as a founding member of the Richmond Afrobeat Movement, a blend of jazz, funk and African dance music . He then joined a bluegrass and folk band, the Rusty Strings, and discovered the joy in sitting on a porch and singing together with others, simply for the love of music.
After recording his first solo EP, “Hold On, Let Go,” he assembled a band, the Soul Symphony, made up of some of the best musicians in Asheville. The band’s debut album, “Dreams in Modern Folk,” premiered to a sold – out crowd at the Altamont Theatre, one of Asheville’s finest listening rooms. The popularity of the band ’s high energy sound, which combines fiery improvisation with rich composition, led to a successful kickstarter campaign to fund their next album, “Fear is the Teacher,” which the band recorded with three- time Grammy Award- winning producer Matt Williams.
Phantom is a prolific poet, songwriter, and instrumentalist, with the soul of an improviser. He crafts his songs to give room for improvisation, presence, and self-expression in the moment.
He believes that the best live music is when everyone playing is co-creating – which means that every one of his concerts offers audiences a different sound and a unique experience. He performs both as a solo artist and in collaboration with a wide variety of other musicians, videographers, and producers, including Gypsy Grass, a group of virtuoso musician which Phantom founded out of a desire to play a variety of fun genres with one band–bluegrass, jazz, pop and rap.
Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, and now calling Colorado home, horticulturist-turned-musician Gregory Alan Isakov has cast an impressive presence on the indie-rock and folk worlds with his five full-length studio albums: That Sea, The Gambler; This Empty Northern Hemisphere; The Weatherman; Gregory Alan Isakov with the Colorado Symphony; and Evening Machines (nominated for a Grammy award for Best Folk Album). Isakov tours internationally with his band, and has performed with several national symphony orchestras across the United States. In addition to owning his independent record label, Suitcase Town Music, he also manages a small farm in Boulder County, which provides produce to the farm’s CSA members and to local restaurants.
$1 from each ticket sold for this show will support Real Farmer Care @realfarmercare. Founded by farmer Clara Coleman @farmerclara and in collaboration with National Young Farmers Coalition @youngfarmers, Real Farmer Care’s founding mission is to support farmers’ self-care needs, while centering BIPOC farmers (Black, Indigenous, People of Color), in light of the rising suicide, mental illness, and financial challenges facing farmers today. http://fourseasonfarm.com/real-farmer-care
New Ways is a new album by Montreal’s Leif Vollebekk, his hotly anticipated follow-up to the Polaris Prize finalist Twin Solitude. It’s a record that lives between the kick and the snare, in that instant of feeling before the backbeat.
“The way that it was is the way it should be,” Vollebekk sings on “Phaedrus”—a line that’s a memory and a wish. New Ways is that too: the sound of desire in its unfolding. Two years ago, things were changing so fast, and the songwriter didn’t want to forget. “I often think of Leonard Cohen’s line, ‘I hope you’re keeping some kind of record,’” he says. “So I did.” It was like he was pretending you can compose a soundtrack to your own life (which perhaps you can).
In the end, New Ways is a document of everything Vollebekk felt, the way each moment arrived and moved through him. Whereas Twin Solitude was about self-reflection, New Ways is about engaging and changing, touching and being touched. It’s a physical record, with louder and tighter grooves, and the rawest lyrics the musician has ever recorded. A portrait of beauty, desire, longing, risk, remembrance—without an instant of regret. “She’s my woman and she loved me so fine,” goes the chorus to one tune. “She’ll never be back.”
“Anything that I wouldn’t ever want to tell anyone—I just put it on the record,” Vollebekk says: tenderness and violence, sex and rebirth, Plato and Julie Delpy. A story told through details—“the sun through my eyelids,” “a sign on the highway covered in rain.” The songs came fast—recorded a week here, a week there, initially just Leif and a drummer. “After each take, we’d go into the control room and listen back and see how it felt,” he says. “If it didn’t feel right we’d do it again, or switch from piano to guitar, or change the drum sound, or the microphones.” Once they got it, he’d move on. Never at rest, always in movement: 10 different tracks for 10 states of motion—each with its own pulse, drawing the listener in.
There’s the heat of the night and the cool blue of morning, hints of Prince and Bill Withers, the limbo of a lover’s transatlantic flight. “Hot Tears” is all hot-blooded memory. “Apalachee Plain” is a clamorous goodbye. “I’m Not Your Lover” would be a perfect love-song were it not for its chorus—a song that lets two opposites be true at once. “That last record I made for me,” Vollebekk admits. “This one is for someone else.”
Imagine the singer at the end of last September, performing at midnight in one of Montreal’s rarest and most intimate venues—a century-old porno theatre called Cinema L’Amour, a temple to the true and the carnal. He was sitting at a piano. The chords were moving like shadows on a wall. “She’s my woman and she loved me so fine!” Leif cried, singing to the rafters. “She’ll never be back.”
When everything was finally over—when the mixes were perfect and the masters cued up—Leif says listening to the album was like re-watching a film. “Now I knew what was going to happen,” he remembers. “Now the moments didn’t feel fleeting—they felt eternal, almost fated. The songs spoke to me differently, but they hadn’t changed. I just heard them in New Ways.”
Martin Dosh has been making independent music out of his basement in Minneapolis, and around the world, for 20 years. He first came to acclaim with his self titled debut on Anticon in 2003. As he continued making Dosh records, of which there are many, he also joined forces with Andrew Bird, whom he played and recorded with from 2005-2014. His live performances are often solo, combining drums, samplers, synths and Rhodes. One of the earliest pioneers of live looping, he continues to record and perform, layering melodies and drones over acoustic and electronic beats. His latest LP, Tomorrow 1972, features Jeff Parker, and Dan Bitney (Tortoise), Bird, Mike Lewis (Bon Iver), Tobacco, and many others. He has opened shows for the likes of Sylvan Esso, Tune-Yards, Black Moth Super Rainbow, to name just a few. HIs music is hard to pin down: a genre-less, percussive hybrid of electronic, hip-hop and jazz.
ON SALE FRIDAY, 10/1 @ 10:00 AM
Parcels are on a lifelong journey through the endless realm of popular music. The Australian quintet have literally grown up together while developing their unique and expressively melodic musical language, which continues to elevate their sound and career to new heights. With their forthcoming sophomore effort underway, Parcels are set to chart new territory for themselves and their listeners, cementing the band as true aesthetes channeling their influences and lived experiences into music that’s wholly transportative.
Parcels’ five members-keyboardist Louie Swain, keyboardist/guitarist Patrick Hetherington, bassist Noah Hill, drummer Anatole “Toto” Serret, and guitarist Jules Crommelin-all grew up in the Australian town of Byron Bay before properly forming as Parcels during their final year of high school: “We were producing and writing music by ourselves, and we found something in that process that felt new and exciting,” Hetherington explains.
After relocating to Berlin, Parcels released their alluring debut EP Clockscared in 2015, which featured the spellbinding slow-burn of its title track. The EP led to signing with the attention of legendary French label Kitsuné in 2016, who released an excellent series of singles from the band in 2016 and 2017, including the gorgeous and moonlit “Gamesofluck.”
In 2016, Parcels also played their first gig at Paris venue Les Bains, where Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo happened to be in the audience. The two groups struck up an artistic kinship, and Parcels spent considerable studio time with Daft Punk to craft the elegant, airy 2017 single “Overnight,” which followed the Kitsuné-produced EP Hideoutand would be performed on Conan later that year for Parcels’ U.S. television debut.
Parcels’ proper debut LP was released in 2018, launching the group to new levels of critical and commercial visibility. A lush, exquisitely produced trip through the many intersections between pop and dance music, Parcelsshowcases just how tight and inventive the group’s songwriting had become, with snapping rhythms and tricky basslines accompanying the group’s feathery, flesh-and-blood vocals.
With over 300 million streams on Spotify, appearances at festivals like Glastonbury and Coachella, and sold-out headline shows across the world, Parcels have already found great success on their winning approach to dance and pop music. And as the group currently puts the finishing touches on their ambitious second album, Parcels are focusing on what it means to be in tune with the world around us, as well as ourselves means being in tune with ourselves—a reflection of the creative process that brought them to this point.
‘We came into this album process with an intention of growth, as individuals and as a band,” Crommelin states while talking about the band’s creative aims as they prepare for this next chapter in their career. “We saw it as a place to really deepen our understanding of ourselves and the environment around us, and to try and make space for each other to be truly vulnerable. We really look after each other and want the best for each other.” That sense of vulnerability is key to what’s coming next from Parcels, and listeners will surely feel it deeply as well.
The Harrah’s Cherokee Center – Asheville is proud to announce The Glass Animals’ “Dreamland” Tour in the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium on March 28, 2022. Tickets for the event will go on publicly via ONLINE ONLY on Thursday, May 6 at 10:00am via Ticketmaster.com. Adding to an already incredible year, Glass Animals have announced their North American “Dreamland Tour.” The run kicks off August 30th in Lewiston, NY and takes the band across North America well into 2022. The shows add to their already sold out UK tour dates, previously announced Red Rocks shows and confirmed festival performances at Bonnaroo, Life Is Beautiful, and Outside Lands. For more information about this event, please click here.
In addition, last week the band was selected as 2021 Billboard Music Awards finalists for Top Rock Song “Heat Waves” and Top Rock Album Dreamland. This is the first time the band has been recognized by the BBMAs. The Billboard Music Awards LIVE will take place Sunday, May 23rd at 3pm EST/5pm PT on NBC.
Earlier this month, Glass Animals performed “Heat Waves” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where the band took over Margate’s Dreamland Theme Park and brought it back to life with an electrifying performance—watch HERE. In addition, they performed on The Ellen Degeneres Show where they took over a skate rink and used fan submitted footage to fill the television screens behind their performance—watch HERE.
Intro to Guitar with Melissa McKinney – Students will receive a solid foundation in beginner rhythm guitar for vocalists. Chords, Rhythm patterns, and basic theory will be introduced while learning songs with an uplifting message. Students will also learn to play the song that the Songwriting Class will be writing and will record it in the One Mic Studio.
Tuesdays from 4pm-5pm at LEAF Global Experience (19 Eagle St, Asheville, NC, 28801)
*Dates/times subject to change – interested in attending this class but unsure if it works with your schedule, or if it suits your student’s skill level? Reach out to us at [email protected]! We are always looking to adapt and expand our class schedules to accommodate new students!
Intro to Ukulele with Melissa McKinney – Students will receive a solid foundation in beginner Ukulele skills for vocalists. Chords, Rhythm patterns, and basic theory will be introduced through songs with an uplifting message. Students will also learn to play the song that the Songwriting Class will be writing and get to record it in the One Mic Studio.
*Dates/times subject to change – interested in attending this class but unsure if it works with your schedule, or if it suits your student’s skill level? Reach out to us at [email protected]! We are always looking to adapt and expand our class schedules to accommodate new students!