We pulled off the main road, rolled down the windows, and drove toward the music. Tune into this playlist from our 2015 Music Issue, featuring off the beaten tracks suited to summer wanderings.
Pressed into the pages of an imagined southern music scrapbook, photos and clippings tell of the hard work, heartbreaks, late nights, and bar fights behind the major movements of our shared sonic history. Flipping through, we see jazz beneath Storyville’s red lights, country music’s “Big Bang” in Bristol, southern soul and rock ’n’ roll painting Memphis in black and white, and the “Dirty South” rising tall above Atlanta’s urban sprawl.
These remarkable cultural convergences flood our collective memory, consuming the pages of this imaginary scrapbook with grand gestures and giant personalities that obscure the people, places, and sounds in between. Like too many pictures of the Grand Canyon from a family road trip, the destination eclipses the magic of the journey. In pursuit of a more rambling route through our current aural landscape, we pulled off the main road, rolled down the windows, and drove toward the music.
Follow Southern Cultures on Spotify.
Track List
1. “Hard Times Come Again No More” (3:53)
Stephen Foster, Arranged by Marisa Anderson
Traditional and Public Domain Songs, marisaandersonmusic.com
2. “Down In the Water” (3:21)
Mipso
Faces (single), mipsomusic.com
3. “Son Arribeño de la Sierra Gorda” (2:14)
Raúl Orduña y Los Trovadores
En Defensa de la Música de Vara, huapangosinfronteras.com
4. “Little Black Train” (3:38)
Anna & Elizabeth
Anna & Elizabeth, Free Dirt Records, freedirtrecords.com
5. “Car Song” (4:06)
Skylar Gudasz
car song / dream lover (single), skylargudasz.com
6. “Migration” (6:53)
Solar Halos
Solar Halos, Devouter Records, devouterrecords.co.uk, solarhalos.com
7. “Find a Way” (4:12)
Carlitta Durand
I’ll be Gorgeous When I Die, carlittadurand.bandcamp.com
8. “Karate Kicks” (2:55)
See Gulls
You Can’t See Me, PotLuck Foundation, potluckfoundation.com
9. “Keep it Kool” (2:57)
The Koolest
Nerds at the Kool Table, thekoolest.bandcamp.com
10. “BlkBoi” (2:22)
Blanket
Security, soundcloud.com/electriccactus
11. “Great Tide” (5:20)
Phil Cook
Southland Mission, Thirty Tigers & Middle West (2015), philcookmusic.com
12. “Candy Lady” (4:09)
Dave Ferrato
Later, On Decatur, daveferrato.com
13. “Magdalena” (6:20)
New Orleans Suspects
Ouroburos, Louisiana Red Hot Records, neworleanssuspects.com
14. “Nobody’s Darlin’” (5:54)
Steph Stewardt & the Boyfriends
Nobody’s Darlin’, stephstewart.net
15. “Boll Weevil” (3:10)
Alice Gerrard
Follow the Music, Tompkins Square, tompkinssquare.com, alicegerrard.com
16. “Push Boat” (5:47)
Jake Xerxes Fussell
Jake Xerxes Fussell, Paradise of Bachelors, paradiseofbachelors.com
17. “In the Pines” (9:12)
Jenks Miller & Rose Cross NC
Live Sept 6th, 2013, jenksmiller.bandcamp.com
18. “Red Land Drone” (11:36)
Ezekiel Graves
Oosawatoomie, soundcloud.com/gravaphone
Aaron Smithers is the music editor for Southern Cultures and the collections assistant for the Southern Folklife Collection at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.
Header image: Detail from Southern Cultures cover illustration by Rob Liberti.NOTES
Running time: 1:27:59.
Compiled by Aaron Smithers.
Mastered by Aaron Smithers and John Loy at the Southern Folklife Collection.
Special thanks to Steve Weiss, Curator, UNC’s Southern Folklife Collection.
