East Nashville Underground WINTER 2013 [Review]

Review & photo coverage by: Amber Davis
Main top title image appears courtesy of East Nashville Underground.

Live Twitter feeds, free beer, an energetic crowd and a man walked on stage stripping down to his suspenders and pants during Moon Taxi were just a portion of what happened during East Nashville Underground.

East Nashville Underground :: Winter 2013 was a festival of many surprises and firsts on Feb. 15 and 16. This winter season was the third season in The East Room outside from Co-CEO of ENU, Jared Corder’s basement. The ENU festival had 20 bands and two DJs playing Friday night, Saturday day and Saturday night with headliners Colorfeels and Moon Taxi. Each night’s show was the festival’s first-ever sold out shows. The festival was filmed by a documentarian that is featuring ENU and the Starry Nights Festival.

Kickstarting Land of the Living

Lots of bands and artists have discovered the website Kickstarter as a means to fund recording projects, semi tours etc.
Matthew Perryman Jones can be counted among the recent success campaigns by raising $26,000 in 1 month which actually exceeded his goal by 30%.

Land of the Living is Matthew's fourth album release and is being called "songs of delicate poetic craft and visceral emotion" by iTunes.

Getting his start in 1997, Matthew debuted at Eddie's Attic in Decatur, GA which isn't the worst place to cut your teeth as a songwriter considering the likes of John Mayer also spent his early career testing his sound at Eddie's.

Soon after Mr. Jones made his way to Nashville and decided to call it home. In 2000 he released "Nowhere Else But Here" with the follow-up EP "For the Road" in 2003.

His most critical love came in 2006 with the release of "Throwing Punches in the Dark" which was produced by Neilson Hubbard [Glen Phillips, Garrison Star].

Fresh off album release parties in both Birmingham and ATL, you can catch Matthew back in Nashville at The Bluebird Cafe' on post Independence day, July 5th. Then it's onto Virginia, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts before his Rockwood Music Hall performance in New York City on Sept. 22nd.

Watch a live performance of "I Won't Let You Down Again" which was filmed at the Lightning 100 studios apart of their 615 Day Sessions segment back on June 14th.

Enjoy the 11+ Year Ride

An original product of Milwaukee, WI - Zach Broocke first made this way to Nashville in 2001 by way of Boston.

Listening to Willie, Merle, Jones and Don Williams growing up makes for a good fit as a transplant but Zach was also into the songwriter styles like Jim Croce, Harry Chapin and Cat Stevens which helps explain the Americana/Folk/Rock/Country vibe from his latest release "Enjoy the Ride - Solo Writes 2001-2012"
Chad Brown, a Nashville engineer/producer, introduced Zach to Warner Chappell songwriter Troy Johnson which started a writing partnership between them that still continues today.
In 2005 Zach left Nashville for Los Angeles and formed a new band of L.A. players which spawned the "Last Call EP" followed by live shows at various L.A. hotspots like The Troubadour, The Viper Room and The Roxy to name a few. 
Lakeshore Records released "Enjoy the Ride" May 22nd which all together was recorded across three different states -  TN, Mass and California.
Lightning 100 in Nashville featured Zach two weeks ago apart of the "Local Lightning Spotlight" and you can check out his in-studio performance here...