This year’s 12th annual Folkfest took place at Sterling Stage Kampitheater in Sterling over Memorial Day Weekend and brought in more than a 1,000 attendees. Featuring many great bands, vendors and artists, the location and crowd made for a fantastic weekend in the sun.
If you missed Folkfest, you can check out two more festivals that are taking place at Sterling Stage Kampitheater this year: Ameribeat Festival of Arts (June 30 to July 3) and Last Daze of Summer (Sept. 1 through 4). Get your tickets here.
Saranac Lake’s go-to spot for fresh music and cocktails is set to reopen in grand fashion. The Waterhole will reopen its doors and dance floor to host a grand opening party on April 1. It will be Lucid‘s last show at the ‘hole, one of the band’s home venues, and new owner Eric Munley’s band the Blind Owl Band will play in support.
There will also be two shows prior to the grand opening, with the Honey Smugglers on March 25 and Still Hand String Band on March 31. Munley posted on Facebook that he expects the bar to officially open on March 22.
The Blind Owl Band
After decades of hosting bands and serving drinks, the Waterhole ceased operations in August 2015. With a hope to continue building a fan base in the Adirondacks for touring bands, former booking agent and local musician Eric Munley and girlfriend Kiki Sarko took over the business and have quickly turned things around. Just in time for Saranac Lake’s Winter Carnival in February, the Waterhole temporarily opened to host a packed weekend of music, including bands such as Swampcandy, Thunder Body, Funknut, Pained Sol and the Blind Owl Band.
With more and more closings of small, locally owned music venues, comes fresh faces and fresh perspective. Munley’s decision to continue the tradition is praised by people both in and out of the Adirondacks. Bands and fans in the Northeast are thankful that another piece of music history isn’t left to close its doors and collect dust. Since the 1990s, national acts such as Soulive, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, moe. and the Del McCoury Band have graced the Waterhole’s stage, among countless others in the 20 years the venue has been hosting music.
If you’re looking to celebrate with the rest of Saranac Lake’s inhabitants, the Waterhole will open their doors at 9 p.m. on April 1. Tickets are $10 at the door and music begins at 10 p.m. This is a show not to miss and a fantastic excuse to celebrate. Long live the Waterhole!
The Blind Owl Band rode their roaring four-stringed freight train right through the Westcott Theater in Syracuse on Feb. 6, and with a full house of faithful fans, they surely got the dance floor heated. The bearded band responsible for breaking in your dancing shoes consists ofArthur Buezo (guitar, vocals), Christian Cardiello, (double bass, fretless bass), James Ford, (banjo, vocals) and Eric Munley (mandolin, vocals).
The band strummed their instruments so effortlessly, there were times I wondered if their swift fingers even touched the strings. They most definitely live up to their name the “Blind” Owl Band, if they were blindfolded I have no doubt their manic, musical mastery would be no different, as the dance floor was moving all night.
If you missed this furious fleet of string masters, you can catch them in their hometown of Saranac Lake at the Waterhole on Feb. 13, the Hanger in Troy, NY, on Feb. 18 and at Nectar’s in Burlington, VT, on Feb. 19 with Bella’s Bartok.
While we said fare thee well to our NYS Music staff picks for the best albums, festivals, venues and shows of 2015, we welcome the new music experiences that 2016 has in store, and with a new year, comes new talent on the rise.
Every year we shine a light on the music scene’s rising newcomers currently flying under the radar — but not for long. Here we note the five bands that the NYSMusic team has pegged as the emerging artists to keep an eye on in the New Year.
Some of the groups have already toured the globe, shared the stage with notable acts and appeared on national television, while others are still in heavy rotation at their local venues and surrounding regions. But you can be sure to expect new records, show announcements and other surprises from our 2015 bands on the rise.
1. THE BLIND OWL BAND
FROM: Saranac Lake, NY ALBUM:This Train We Ride is Made of Wood and Steel(2013) WHY WE DIG THEM: Formed in 2010 after meeting at Paul Smith’s College, the Blind Owl Bandhas become a household name in the jam circuit after putting on impromptu lot shows during Phish runs at SPAC, followed by heavy touring throughout the northeast and having now appeared at more than 25 festivals, including the Peach Music FestivalBackwoods Pondfest and Winter Carnival. Coining their style as Adirondack freight train string music, the North Country bearded quartet—Arthur Buezo (guitar, vocals), Christian Cardiello (double bass, fretless bass), James Ford (banjo, vocals) and Eric Munley (mandolin, vocals)—released their debut 15-track album Rabble Rousing in 2012 and have since shared the stage with Trampled by Turtles, Railroad Earth, Hot Day at the Zoo and Yonder Mountain String Band. Their raw, contemporary bluegrass style throws the genre’s traditional rules to the wind characterizing” their sound as if they stood on top of their mountain reaching out their beat up instruments grabbing various concepts of music, holding it captive ultimately for a presentation unique to the scene,” described Tabitha Clancy, and according to Laura Carbone, experienced live, they move, twist and turn, fingers a flying, bass a spinning and the audience pressing closer to the stage, dancing and feeling the joy of what is The Blind Owl Band. Hoot!
2. CASTLE CREEK
FROM: Syracuse, NY ALBUM:The Only Life(2014) WHY WE DIG THEM: Winner of the 2015 SAMMY Award for best blues recording, the Central New York-based band Castle Creek, comprised of Kim Monroe (vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass) and Chris Eves (vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass, drums), debuted their first full-length—and self-produced/engineered—album in 2014. Since then the alternative blues rock duo has extensively toured regionally and nationally from Maine to Texas to California and played at international festivals in Ireland and Japan. Most recently Castle Creek performed as guest vocalists with the Zac Brown Band for three east coast shows during their “Jekyll and Hyde” tour, landed a main stage spot at the winter NAMM show in Anaheim, toured with Tony Lucca from season two of The Voiceand last March Phish drummer Jon Fishman sat in with the group for a surprise four-song jam at Dinosaur Bar-B-Que in Syracuse. After seeing the band open for Tyler Farr, Kathy Stockbridge recalled how the duo’s vocals complement rather than overshadow each other, noting that “they both display such very strong vocals and instrumentation. The fact that they can play and sing the same instruments simultaneously without becoming one sound and over powering the other is what makes their sound so unique, so soulful, so bluesy.” Castle Creek has also opened for artists like Cabinet, Johnny Lang, Floodwood and John Popper and the Duskray Troubadours. Up next the band will release an EP recorded at Abbey Road Studios while touring abroad.
FROM: Buffalo, NY ALBUM: Let It Settle(2015) WHY WE DIG THEM: Founded in 2010, Buffalo-based funk, rock, reggae quintet Funktional Flow has risen in the music community’s ranks in the past few years, playing at Night Lights Music Festival and Buffalove Music Festival and sharing the stage with the likes of Warren Haynes, Railroad Earth, New Riders of the Purple Sage and notable local groups Twiddle and Aqueous. Comprised of Jeffrey Kuebler (guitar, vocals), Ben Whelan (bass), Joey Lewis (guitar, vocals), Jim Edgar (drums) and Matthew Lester (keys, saxophone, vocals), Funktional Flow released their self-titled album in 2011 and recorded their third studio effort Time Will Tell at Sonic Farm Studios this fall. The band recently gave fans a sneak listen of the album’s first single “Back Door” from the forthcoming 12-track record to be debuted in March 2016. While the band did face a departure of members this year, it surely did not stop the group from evolving into a tighter sound with two new bandmates in tow. And after witnessing this seamlessness at Buffalove 2015, Jen Foster and Thomas Sgroi noted that Funktional Flow “definitely earned their three sets, and stood on par with the headliners.”
4. VULFPECK
FROM: Ann Arbor, MI ALBUM:Thrill of the Arts(2015) WHY WE DIG THEM: It’s been a big year for Los Angeles funk group Vulfpeck. Since arriving on the scene in 2011, the band has released four EPs and made international news in 2014 after sneaking the silent album Sleepify on Spotify to fund an admission-free mini tour; they raised $20,000 in two months. The four-man rhythm section formed at the University of Michigan—Jack Stratton (keyboards, drums, guitar), Theo Katzman (guitar, drums, vocals), Woody Goss (keyboards) and Joe Dart (bass)—self-produced their first full-length release Thrill of the Arts through a 59-day Kickstarter campaign in October, and the album landed a number 16 spot on the R&B Albums chart and earned a review in the Wall Street Journal. The multi-instrumental quartet made their Brooklyn Bowl debut this fall with two nights of sold-out crowds. Pete Mason recalled the band’s showmanship, noting that the way the band was “moving around on stage and switching instruments, with two keyboardists at times, added a degree of difficulty not seen by many acts.” From a YouTube video to the Big What Festival in North Carolina to appearing on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Vulfpeck is proving that independent musicians in the 21st century can provide much more than studio session backtracks.
