Root Down in the Shadow

In recent years if Philly music fans hadn't seen Ron Gallo a half-dozen or so times by mid-year, they must have tried to avoid him.  But as the calendar turned to 2016, Ron Gallo packed up his talents and left for Nashville.  This summer tour, including a stop at Philly's JOHNNY BRENDA'S, is the first chance for many to catch Ron Gallo in quite a while.  Let's see what Ron has been up to, as he chatted with Root Down In The Shadow. Once upon a time you were everywhere in Philly, but then after 1 (or 2) farewell show(s) you were gone to Nashville at the end of 2015 Part of moving to Nashville and leaving Philly behind, was not being stuck in the same old stuff, doing shows with the same crew, taking a step forward. Going to Nashville however meant playing shows with old friends like Jordan Hull and Joe Fletcher . Do you have fears of getting into the same ruts? i always have a natural fear of growing stagnant. even while in philly i could never sit still. t

Somehow Sofar Sounds : Philadelphia is hitting their 4th Anniversary. The now world-wide phenomenon was a few shy of twenty cities world-wide when Philadelphia joined the ranks. These days, the shows are all over the globe and it seems like there are just shy of twenty dates in NYC alone each month. It all started in London, back in 2009, and slowly spread during the next two years to New York, Paris, DC, Los Angeles, Pune India, Houston, Brighton, Seattle, New Dehli, Sydney, Madrid, Berlin, Toronto, Dallas-Forth Worth, and Glasgow before hitting the City of Brotherly Love.  During the next 10 days I'm going to look back at four years of Sofar Sounds: Philadelphia trying to give my version of the best videos. Please comment and share what were your favorites. #6 Ali Wadsworth - Long Hours One of the most colorful artists to perform at Sofar Sounds: Philadelphia is Ms. Ali Wadsworth .  A chameleon of sorts (and not just due to her hair color) she can handle

Photo by Allie Wofarth If you read the 'XPN The Key article about Katie Frank cutting her musical teeth, you see there was a certain amount of push needed to get The Pheromones party started.  If you've been following along any of the recent festival lineup announcements, you will also see that there is no stopping this Katie Frank train from rolling.  Once you spend a little time with Katie Frank & The Pheromones or the Counting Your Curses album it's easy to see why they've been surrounded by so much buzz. See for yourself as we share Katie Frank and bandmates Josh Werblun and Joe Bisirri in an intimate take on their single "Misery" from Counting Your Curses . The recording is from their Sluice Box session in March for Cover Club when they recorded the great cover of Joan Jett & The Blackhearts "I Love Rock 'n' Roll." Cover Club / Katie Frank & The Pheromones "Misery" To see them live and see wh

Welcome back to # CoverClub .  Back in late March we ventured away from the studios and headed out into Bucks County to the Sluice Box, home of Joshua Britton (Pslamships) and Brad Hinton ( Brad Hinton Trio , Hezekiah Jones .)  Not only do Joshua & Brad make a lot of music at home at the Sluice Box, but they also bring in friends from time to time for more creativity.  Root Down In The Shadow was invited over for a #CoverClub session and together we invited Katie Frank & The Pheromones to play! Of course we did sessions with Brad & Joshua, but first let's present our guest: Katie Frank & The Pheromones: Cover Club | Katie Frank &t the Pheromones "I Love Rock n Roll" (Joan Jett) Since getting my first listen of Katie Frank & The Pheromones, I was stuck on what the "sound" was like?  There seemed to be a little country, there was a lot of Grace Potter , but I couldn't put my finger on it of what that "it" was.  

Saturday night, October 5th, something truly magical is going to happen.  The self titled  Ali Wadsworth album is going to be released in grand fashion.  We're talking G R A N D !  Cocktail hour, a secret band, a roving party, and the much anticipated release of the most #EPIC album of all time! The Ali Wadsworth band itself, is made up of members of Good Old War , the Lawsuits , Hezekiah Jones , Chris Kasper , and more! We're not talking epic as in my favorite over-used adjective, but epic as in over 50 potential writers contributing to a project!  The cross-section of the Philadelphia scene involved with this project is huge.  We're not even talking 6 degrees of separation or 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon or whatever.  The number of artists directly writing for or playing on the album is staggering.  Don't confuse things though.  This is not some weak celebrity all-star album or some vanity project.  This is a full on collaboration with Ali Wadsworth, all stemming ou