The Avett Brothers: "Piedmont Stomp 'n' Roll"

The Avett Brothers came together out of various rock bands, but they make sweet backporch music that will certainly appeal to readers of Songs: Illinois or Lonesome Music, or folks who liked O Brother, Where Art Thou?. Brothers Seth and Scott Avett join with Bob Crawford to play acoustic originals on guitar, upright bass, and banjo. You can get an idea of the quirky place their music comes from if you know that their most recent studio album, Mingionette, is loosely based around the tale of a 19th century shipwreck that ended in cannibalism(!).

Many reviews (e.g., this or this) make a lot of their rock and roll affinities, drawing comparisons to Uncle Tupelo, among others. From the music available to download from their website, that seems just a bit facile -- they're much more trad than that, I think -- but their live show does get some of this energy across. Check out this movie to see what I mean. (They ask that you download it rather than stream it from their site, so be cool. It's 26.2 MB.)

These guys are actuallyfrom western North Carolina, so they're not really Triangle musicians. But this stuff is too good to let that stop me from including it.

MP3: "Swept Away"
(from Mingionette, Ramseur 2004. Buy)

MP3: "Pretty Girl from Matthews"
MP3: "A Lot of Moving"
(from Country Was, 2002. Out of print.)

MP3: "Kind of in Love"
MP3: "Let Myself Live"
(from The Avett Brothers, 2000. Out of print.)