TimaLikesMusic Presents: That 90’s Love

– ALL AGES- STANDING/DANCING ROOM ONLYTIMALIKESMUSIC’S:  THAT 90’S LOVE“Yo, tonight we are all family. So, at the count of three, everyone yell out your favorite curse word.”So starts a typical show by R&B/Funk keyboardist, vocalist and band leader TimaLikesMusic. Backed by drums, bass, trumpet, guitar, and a second keyboardist, TimaLikesMusic shows are full of James Brown-style energy and musical comedy.“When I say ‘I like’ you say ‘Music’… I Like – Music, I Like – Music…”Tima’s big break came during Covid when she appeared on The Kelly Clarkson Show to talk about her viral series of humorous jingles posted on Instagram’s Reels platform. Since then, Tima has composed music for companies & brands including Iliza Shlesinger’s 2022 Netflix special Hot Forever, Ralph Lauren’s short film, A Portrait of the American Dream, National Public Media podcast sponsorships, and more. Her work on a podcast created in conjunction with YouTube and National Public Media, The Upload: Rise of the Creator Economy, won Best Branded Podcast at the 2022 PR Daily Content Marketing Awards.”Fans adore her relatable content — she’s sung about everything from the awkwardness of social interactions, to how to properly wear a face mask, to the frustration of getting only one sauce packet with her fast food meal.” – NY PostTima’s summer 2023 EP, Love, Daddy Princess, is a nod to the smooth 80’s and 90’s R&B era. Listen carefully and you can hear the influences of Luther Vandross, Whitney Houston, and Sade.Tima also produces and performs TimaLikesMusic Presents: That 90’s Love – old-school R&B dance parties in which she hosts and DJs, accompanied by a live drummer. Most of her live shows start with the live band set, leading into the TimaLikesMusic Presents: That 90’s Love after party.After selling out venues in Brooklyn, NY and Washington D.C., Tima signed with Wasserman super agent Andrea Johnson. More tours have since been booked, more music has been recorded, and more plans have been made. You should probably jump on this train before it leaves you behind at the station.The beginning piano notes of “A Thousand Miles” by Vanessa Carlton ring out. The audience roars. “You want some funk on it?” The audience becomes a crowd, and the roar grows. “We gonna put some funk on it. Ready?!”They are.

**CANCELED** OUTPOST: Don Merckle

– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLY- RAIN OR SHINE Don MerckleA darkly honest and wry singer/songwriter out of Charleston, South Carolina, Don Merckle’s songs are firmly planted among the fertile mixed traditions of American music. He is a workman’s poet, capable of delivering a rock and roll growl or a quiet dose of smoky barroom introspection with equal passion. He has led the popular Appalachian/Irish outfit Loch Ness Johnny, co-fronted the rambunctious Alt-Country American Gun, and founded the lively Don Merckle & the Blacksmiths. In his current solo work he is leaning into more stately and thoughtful singing which highlights the darkly emotional lyrical contours that are the hallmark of his best material.   Don has shared stages with acts like Drivin’ N Cryin’, Lucero, Shooter Jennings, The Avett Brothers, Cracker, and more. He has a sound and feel that ably captures the ineffable blend of roots music and rock and roll at the heart of his songs.    

Odie Leigh

– ALL AGES – STANDING ROOM ONLYODIE LEIGH Beginning with a bet between friends to see who could go viral, Odie Leigh’s musical journey has always been a bit unconventional. Hailing from suburban South Louisiana, where Lil Wayne and Tim McGraw carry equal reverence, Leigh’s musical influences are as contradictory as the area she grew up in. Singing in school choirs and church praise bands as a child, Leigh didn’t find her voice until 2020 gave her the solitude to create her own sound, free from the judgment and influence of the New Orleans music scene. Once described as “folk-misfit,” Odie Leigh’s songwriting reflects an earnest and fervent search for identity through the confusion of growing up culturally-adjacent in an area with so much history, tradition, and faults. Guided by the classic folk, blues, and country music that floods the southern soundscape, and shaped by her self-taught finger-picking style, Leigh’s music is an eclectic glimpse into feeling stuck in all of life’s in-betweens.KING STRANGKing Strang is the ragpunk, old-timey, and always fun one man band project of Michael Sinner, proudly represented by Portland’s Flail Records. Using influences of traditional folk music as well as 40’s jazz sounds, King Strang blends the old with the new in all of his music. Often playing a resonator guitar, stomp box, and kazoo, King Strang upholds a consistently jazzy barroom sound that remains unique from his work in incredible projects such as the Bridge City Sinners and Clyde and the Milltailers. King Strang’s music is nothing if not music to have a good time to. On his recent record “The Second Coming”, Michael Sinner is joined by Lightnin Luke on the fiddle, bringing even more old time vibes. With lyrics about religious folklore, love and longing, and apathy, King Strang brings a little something for everybody with a love for old time music and incredible jazz vocals.

Pretty Little Goat + The Wilder Flower

– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYPRETTY LITTLE GOAT You’ve never “herd” anything like them. Grassroots music at its finest, Pretty Little Goat formed in 2013 through their common grounding in the deep well of tradition found in the mountains of Western North Carolina. As young lovers of old-time music, Pretty Little Goat began winning string band competitions right away with their hard driving style. Since then, they have been drawing inspiration from a diverse array of sources, coupled with a lifestyle close to the land, to create a unique collection of timeless original music. Pretty Little Goat sees traditional music is a living art form – vibrant and evolving – and their energy and creativity on stage reflect that. They will get you dancing with a diverse array of old-time fiddle tunes, swingy country two-step numbers, and rollicking mountain hoedowns, while in turn offering heartfelt ballads and sweet harmonies. Pushing out a sound unidentifiable by time, their music is “as close as we will ever be to our past while being as current as we need it to be” (Mike Ashworth, Steep Canyon Rangers). Don’t miss the Goats! THE WILDER FLOWERThe Wilder Flower hails from Pickens SC & Brevard NC. We grew up in the thick of Appalachian bluegrass and old time music, fiddling and picking in the Y/JAM programs and with friends. As young musicians, we worked our ways onto stages at IBMA, MerleFest, and America’s Got Talent, and won blue ribbons at the South Carolina Old Time Fiddler’s Convention and beyond. We finally met in 2020 at Hagood Mill, where Madeline won the South Carolina State Fiddler’s Championship. Grounded in the language of our instrumental training, our collaboration flexes between folk, Americana, bluegrass, and Old-time tunes. Vocally, we thrive on three-part harmonies, whether a two-chord old-time ballad, or a modern, minor-filled melody, and instrumentally, we feature bluegrass banjo tunes, fiddle and clawhammer string-band songs, flat-picking guitar tunes, and everything in between. The Wilder Flower continues to write and tour throughout Appalachia and around the south eastern United States.

OUTPOST: Karma Dogs

– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLY- RAIN OR SHINEKarma Dogs Asheville’s classic rock band covering some of the greatest decades of music ensuring you catch an FM buzz! Get ready to rock and dance!!  

Lydia Loveless

– ALL AGES – STANDING ROOM ONLY LYDIA LOVELESSEndings are messy. Falling in love is messy. Change is messy. Perhaps, change is the messiest of them all. Especially when eyes are on you; when you blast out of adolescence onto stages across the country, then into your twenties, onto more stages and, finally, into your thirties—all on those same stages. The stages that Lydia Loveless has sung her heart out on, has collapsed on, and laughed on, all mirror the stages of her life thus far for the world to see. When Loveless released her first album over a decade ago, she was still a teenager whose songs of debauchery, guzzling alcohol and doing cocaine were an audio wet dream for a certain type of listener who not only wear their music tastes on their (tattooed) sleeve, but in the lifestyle that they emulate: “outlaw” music with brains – akin to Steve Earle, Drive-By Truckers and Lucinda Williams, vintage country heart with a heartland rock soul.   In the end, the music industry is still sadly a man’s world and, as such, Loveless grew up in the spotlight (or perhaps, more accurately, the bar lights) while she was placed on a pedestal. Her voicemail greeting is a tongue-in-cheek ode to this: “Hi, this is Lydia Loveless, savior of cowpunk. Please leave a message and I will get back to you.”  The time between their late adolescence to now is defined by a shelf full of records, hundreds of thousands of miles on the road, and a ribbon of heartbreaks pockmarking their trail. Loveless is a fiercely brave writer who bluntly assesses their life in song: their struggles with alcohol and depression, and the uncertainty of not only the future, but what piecing together the past will mean for the present.  In 2020, they put out their excellent fourth full-length Daughter on their own label, Honey, You’re Gonna Be Late Records, with encouragement from their friend Jason Isbell, but could not tour behind it; the one consistent throughline in Loveless’ life was impossible due to the pandemic. They were living in North Carolina with their boyfriend at the time, stuck, away from the stages they grew up on, isolated from their family, and going stir-crazy. As the world came undone and then back together again, Loveless returned to Columbus, where their career first began. Starting anew, Loveless found part-time work at a recording studio (Secret Studios) and began processing the last two years of their life. The title of their new album, Nothing’s Gonna Stand In My Way Again, came easy—like a mantra from the heavens. REESE McHENRY

Southern Culture on the Skids

– ALL AGES- STANDING ROOM ONLYSOUTHERN CULTURE ON THE SKIDS Southern Culture On The Skids has been consistently recording and touring around the world since 1983. The band (Rick Miller – guitar and vocals, Mary Huff – bass and vocals, Dave Hartman – drums) has been playing together for over 30 years. Their musical journey has taken them from all-night North Carolina house parties to late night TV talk shows (Conan O’Brien, The Tonight Show), from performing at the base of Mt. Fuji in Japan to rockin’ out for the inmates at North Carolina correctional facilities. They’ve shared a stage with many musical luminaries including Link Wray, Loretta Lynn, Hasil Adkins and Patti Smith. Their music has been featured in movies and TV, parodied by Weird Al, and used to sell everything from diamonds to pork sausage. In 2014 the band was honored by the Southern Folklife Collection at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill with an exhibition featuring their music and cultural contributions. Their legendary live shows are a testament to the therapeutic powers of foot-stomping, butt-shaking rock and roll and what Rolling Stone dubbed “a hell raising rock and roll party.” At Home with Southern Culture on the Skids is the latest full length album from the band and was released in March of 2021. It was recorded during the stay at home period of the pandemic when the band was at home and not touring. The album consists of 11 tracks recorded and mixed in Rick Miller’s living room with some additional tracks recorded at his studio, The Kudzu Ranch. The first radio single off the album is “Run Baby Run”—a rocking number with deep garage roots. SCOTS bassist Mary Huff provides an urgent vocal while the band pulls back the throttle on a full race fuzz fest—cause she’s gotta to go fast! Run Baby Run! The other songs on the album are a combination of the band’s unique mix of musical genres: rock and roll, surf, folk and country—all a bit off-center, what Rick proudly calls “our wobbly Americana”. Rick goes on, “We put a few more acoustic guitars on this one, as you would expect if you recorded in your living room, but it still rocks like SCOTS. So put your headphones on, get in your favorite chair/sofa/recliner, put on “At Home With” and let’s hang out for a while.”PLEASURE CHESTPleasure Chest is a high energy Blues, Soul, Rock and Roll band hailing from Asheville NC. With the humor of Bo Diddley and Screamin’ Jay Hawkins to the swampy, dirty grit of Slim Harpo and Elmore James they’re guaranteed to please and get your booty shaking!

Big Richard

– ALL AGES- SEATED SHOW- LIMIITED NUMBER OF PREMIUM SEATING TICKETS AVAILABLEBIG RICHARD What began as an all-female festival collab quickly morphed into a serious passion project driven by sisterhood, harmony and humor…along with the shared desire to rage fiddle tunes and smash the patriarchy. Big Richard is a neo-acoustic super group made up of four well established Colorado musicians: Bonnie Sims on mandolin (Bonnie & Taylor Sims/Everybody Loves An Outlaw/Bonnie & the Clydes), Joy Adams on cello (Nathaniel Rateliff/Darol Anger/Half Pelican), Emma Rose on bass + guitar (Sound of Honey/Daniel Rodriguez/Whippoorwill) and Eve Panning on fiddle (Lonesome Days). Formed in late 2021, the band gained immediate notoriety for their charismatic stage presence and their vocal/instrumental prowess. After selling out all of their club shows Big Richard quickly started confirming festival appearances across America.CODY HALECody Hale is a singer/songwriter from Penrose, North Carolina.  He began writing music in 2010 after a career ending injury kept him off the basketball court.  He currently travels and performs with his wife, Jonlyn Linville, who plays fiddle and sings.  The duo has crafted their own sound through years of performing live music.  You will hear popular, classic songs mixed in with clever and capturing original tunes if you attend one of their shows.

Western Carolina Writers

– ALL AGES       – SEATED SHOW- LIMITED NUMBER OF PREMIUM SEATING TICKETS AVAILABLEWESTERN CAROLINA WRITERS Western Carolina Writers was established in 2019 by Nick McMahon, along with Jesse Frizsell and Thomas Yon, as a traveling “Songwriters-In-The-Round” style show.  The idea was to take turns performing original songs with fun moments of collaboration at venues all over Western North Carolina.   After about a dozen increasingly successful shows, McMahon started inviting other area songwriters to participate.  And now, after around 150 shows featuring close to 80 different local artists, the concept has become even more popular, fun and diverse.   Last year, Mcmahon and current project partner, Stephen Evans, decided to take this show into the listening rooms and out of the noisy bars and breweries so the songs could really be heard and appreciated.  With three recent magical & successful songwriter showcases at The Grey Eagle and at Ayurprana Listening Room in Asheville, NC, this decision has proven to be the right move.   This show will be another stellar display of wonderful local songwriters while featuring Amanda Platt, Morgan Geer of Drunken Prayer, Laura Blackley, Kate Thomas of Dirty French Broads, Kevin Smith of Planefolk, Keith Minguez, Thomas Yon, Mike Hollon, and Ryan Price!