Rhythm & Roots Reunion: Music for All Tastes Sept. 19-21

Rhythm and Roots may as well be called anything and everything. Well, almost.
Rhythm’s roots stretch out to include a wide array of styles of music during the 8th Annual Rhythm and Roots Reunion, scheduled for Sept. 19-21 in downtown Bristol.
Styles include bluegrass of Cherryholmes; old-time string band The Corklickers; country courtesy T.G. Sheppard; rock from The Mother Truckers; blues from Otis Taylor; and Celtic rock from Knoxville’s Cutthroat Shamrock.
Then, there’s The Tennessee Mafia Jug Band.
“There’s other old-time string bands, but there’s nobody who does what we do,” said founding member Mike Armistead. “I’ve had people come up to me and say they don’t like country music, but they like us. It’s not bluegrass or string band. It’s just good ol’ country music. It’s real.”
See the Tennessee Mafia Jug Band during Rhythm and Roots on Sept. 20 at noon at the Paramount Center for the Arts and then at 2:30 p.m. on the Country Mural Stage. They are Lester Armistead (jug); Leroy Troy (banjo); David Ferguson (bass); Dan Kelly (fiddle) and Mike Armistead (guitar).
They’re easy to spot. Look for five men in overalls, one carrying a jug, and all having one hillbilly of a blast. And the overalls, it’s not an act.
“It is our work clothes both on stage and off,” Mike Armistead said. “It’s a tip of the hat to Bashful Brother Oswald [the late legendary dobro player in Roy Acuff’s Smoky Mountain Boys], but also for comfort, and it’s just what we wear.”
Country to the core, the Jug Band started humbly and fittingly, in Lester Armistead’s country store in Goodlettesville, Tenn.
“It was Leroy Troy and the Tennessee Slickers,” Mike Armistead said. “My dad would get in there, and we’d sing Acuff tunes, and it sounded real good.”
So good that country singer Marty Stuart noticed. Mike Armistead credits Stuart with re-naming them the Tennessee Mafia Jug Band. Since then, they’ve appeared about a dozen times on the prestigious Grand Ole Opry, and they played at the wedding of actors Billy Bob Thornton and Angelina Jolie.
Maybe you’ve seen several members of the Jug Band and didn’t know it. Mike Armistead, Leroy Troy and several of their buddies appear on Country Music Television’s series “Outsiders Inn.”
The sort-of reality show stars former “Brady Bunch” star Maureen McCormick, 1980s rhythm and blues singer Bobby Brown and 1990s pop star Carnie Wilson.
“It’s just raw talent,” Mike Armistead said, pausing, then laughing. “No, they’d seen us perform; the casting director made a phone call to see if we’d be interested in doing the music.”
Now, the music of the Tennessee Mafia Jug Band entertains mightily. However, they are just flat eaten up with full bloom country characters.
“They liked what they’d seen and they wrote us into the show,” Mike Armistead said. “I talked to Maureen McCormick on a daily basis. If you told me a year ago that Marsha Brady would call me every day, I wouldn’t have believed it.”
Meanwhile, the Jug Band epitomizes pickin’ and grinnin’. Country as corn in the crib – or the corn in Lester’s jug – the Tennessee Mafia Jug Band entertains as well as any band on the road today.
“Oz [Bashful Brother Oswald] always said you have to have fun on stage for the audience to have fun,” Mike Armistead said. “I grin from ear to ear when I’m on stage. It’s a high wire act without a net.”

IF YOU GO
Who: Tennessee Mafia Jug Band
When: Sept. 20, noon and 2:30 p.m.
Where: Rhythm and Roots, noon at the Paramount Center for the Arts and 2:30 p.m. at the Country Mural Stage
Info: (423) 573-4898
Web: www.tennesseemafiajugband.com

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PICKIN’ AT MIDNIGHT
OK, Rhythm and Roots starts during the afternoon of Sept. 19. However, the real party starts at midnight – the pickin’ hour.
Set for midnight on opening night of Rhythm and Roots at the Paramount Center for the Arts, musicians extraordinaire Mike Marshall and Darol Anger lead this year’s Midnight Super Jam.
Expect the unexpected. Strings loosed from convention like sharp teeth on the prowl, otherworldly and one-time performances should bite with power.
Consider that participant pickers include The Infamous Stringdusters, Larry Keel and blues man Otis Taylor among many others, and it isn’t far-fetched at all to surmise that to miss the Midnight Super Jam equates to missing out.

IF YOU GO
What: Rhythm and Roots Reunion Midnight Super Jam
When: Sept. 19, midnight
Where: Paramount Center for the Arts, 518 State St., Bristol, Tenn.
Admission: $10 in advance, $15 at the door
Info: (423) 573-4898

E.W. KING HOUSE
Grand majestic best describes the E. W. King House.
See for yourself on Sept. 20 when doors to the historic mansion in Bristol, Tenn. swing open during a fundraising open house.
Tour the house. Meet renowned local author V.N. “Bud” Phillips, who will be on hand to sign and sell books. Tap a toe or shake a leg to Tennessee High School’s bluegrass band Slim Pickins and gospel group Hart Creek.
Hosted by the Bristol Historical Association, which hopes to restore the Victorian mansion into a museum, the event includes an antiques and collectibles sale.
Apropos given the significance of the mansion once owned by local businessman Edward Washington King. Built on the site of an 18th century fort built by Gen. Evan Shelby, history lives on the site as surely as music resounds in Bristol.

IF YOU GO
What: E.W. King House open house
When: Sept. 20, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Where: E.W. King House, 1223 Anderson St., Bristol, Tenn.
Admission: Free
Info: (276) 494-9925
Web: www.bristolhistoricalassociation.com

OTIS TAYLOR’S BLACK BANJO PROJECT
White folks did not invent the banjo. It comes from Africa. Black folks do not simply hip and hop. Country music includes them, too.
Proof lives in the music of Otis Taylor and his Black Banjo Project. Set to appear on Sept. 20 during Rhythm and Roots on the State Street Stage, Taylor’s stereotype-shaking outfit recalls eras long past when black hillbilly bands played throughout the south.
Ignited by Taylor’s album “Recapturing the Banjo,” the Black Banjo Project includes material with nods to jazz, blues, folk and old-time country. They even rework rock guitar god Jimi Hendrix’s “Hey Joe.”
Music that’s as raw and naked as a repentant sinner’s soul, Taylor captures beauty in a banjo while reclaiming it as his own.

IF YOU GO
Who: Otis Taylor
When: Sept. 20, 8 p.m.
Where: Rhythm and Roots Reunion, State Street Stage, Bristol
Info: (423) 573-4898
Web: www.otistaylor.com

ROCKIN’ THE ROOTS
Big wheels roll with rock when the Mother Truckers hit town.
Rockin’ Bristol’s Rhythm and Roots Reunion during late afternoon and then late into the night of Sept. 20 – first on the State Line Bar & Grille Stage and then on the O’Mainnin’s Patio Stage – the pavement pummeling, y’all rock band does not evoke Bristol’s country roots.
However, these gents and one lady do include harder elements of country and blues into their sizzling sound.
Based in Austin, Texas, the Truckers’ second album “Broke, Not Broken” vaulted the foursome to critical acclaim. From there, they landed spots on such prestigious festivals as Willie Nelson’s annual Fourth of July picnic.
With a catchy new album in tow, “Let’s All Go to Bed,” the Mother Truckers rumble into Bristol armed with rhythm aplenty and roots in rock that widen the appeal of Rhythm and Roots.

IF YOU GO
Who: The Mother Truckers
When: Sept. 20, 5 p.m. (State Line Bar & Grille Stage) and 11:45 p.m. (O’Mainnin’s Patio Stage)
Where: Rhythm and Roots Reunion, Bristol
Info: (423) 573-4898
Web: www.themothertruckers.com

TOM NETHERLAND is a freelance writer. He can be reached at features@bristolnews.com.

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More Festival Music

BRISTOL, Tenn. – The Rhythm and Roots Reunion scheduled Sept. 19-21 includes The Two Gentleman Band, a New York City vaudevillian duo that gives away free kazoos.
The two bands join many others in downtown Bristol for the annual festival.
Banjoist Andy Bean and bassist Fuller Condon perform with plectrum banjo, string bass, kazoos and foot percussion.
They perform on Sept. 20, 4 p.m. at O’Mannin’s and Sept. 21, 4:30 p.m., on Settler’s J Stage.
The New Familiars, recently named “Best Local Band of 2008” by Creative Loafing in Charlotte, N.C., plays Americana and folk music infused with a good bit of rock ethic and rhythms. From the foothills of Appalachia, this group has played in Bristol many times. The five members combine a passion for harmony with unusual storytelling abilities.
The New Familiars will be performing on Sept. 19-21 at the Rhythm and Roots Reunion and Sept. 22 at O’Mainnin’s Pub & Grille at 10 p.m.