WYOmericana Caravan Tour rolls into the Hole

I've been apart of many tours over the years, but nothing as cool as The WYOmericana Caravan Tour. The comradeship has been as inspiring as the music itself. Don't take my word for it, though, come out and support roots music in the homeland! WYOmericana Caravan Tour, 9 p.m. Friday June 7 at the Pink Garter Theatre. $12/advance, $15/day-of-show at The Rose, Pinky G's and PinkGarterTheatre.comThe WYOmericana Caravan – a traveling concert circus of sorts – is a unique, Americana-focused music tour featuring three award-winning Wyoming acts. The tour will hit the road with runner-up National Fingerstyle Guitarist & Wyoming’s quirky banjo icon Jalan Crossland, quartet Screen Door Porch which was named to 7 different “Best of” Lists in 2011-12, and the ramshackle ramblings of famed professor and songwriter, JShogren Shanghai’d. Three sets of Wyoming Americana with a heap of ad-libbed collaborations.

Jalan Crossland – Ten Sleep, WY

In a blue collar, John Hartford, van-down-by-the-river, porch-pickin’ sort of way, Jalan Crossland’s down-home style makes you wonder what’s in the water in Tensleep. Crossland is one of the very few alt-country artists his age who still claims the “country” as home. Maybe this explains the lyrical, “truth is stranger than fiction” wobble to his songs about 21st century rural life. Despite becoming a roots music virtuoso spanning six studio albums, he managed to revert to his true slacker past by placing a mere second in the Winfield National Guitar Fingerpicking Competition. Crossland was recently awarded the 2012 Governor’s Arts Award and released his sixth studio album, Portrait of a Fish.

Screen Door Porch – Jackson, WY

Screen Door Porch delivers a Wyoming-grown fusion of soulful Americana, Roots-Rock and Country-Blues that has been likened to “Gillian Welch meets The Band, with Ryan Adams and Bonnie Raitt hanging out backstage” (605 Magazine). The core female/male singer-songwriter combo of Seadar Rose & Aaron Davis thrive in a space that houses colorable harmonies, a diverse bag of acoustic & electric instrumentation, and “a sort of Lennon/McCartney arrangement and get it right every time” (Americana UK). SDP’s two studio albums—Screen Door Porch (2010) and The Fate & The Fruit (2012)—were internationally recognized in seven “Best Albums of the Year” lists and hovered in the Top 25 of the Euro-Americana Chart and Top 30 of the Roots Music Report Roots-Rock Chart. Performing as a QUARTET, Screen Door Porch leaves little behind with the kitchen sink—three part vocal harmony is supported by acoustic/electric/slide guitars, banjo, mandolin, fretless bass, drums, Wyoming kazoogle, and harmonica.

J Shogren & Shanghai’D – Centennial, WY

J Shogren & Shanghai’D play original hard acoustic music from lives lived in loud proportions. Their style of WYOmericana is a modern interpretation of traditional roots music; an amalgamation of blues, old timey, country/western, jazz, vaudeville, rockabilly roll, ballads, and polka. Their varied sound has a rawness and vitality reminiscent of 1920-40s blues and dancehall music filtered through a contemporary dissonant transmitter. They have fun too. Shogren just got back from representing Wyoming at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis, and his new album was named to House of Mercy Radio’s Top 50 Albums of 2012.