The Jayhawks

One of the most enduring and beloved groups of the last thirty years, The Jayhawks first emerged from Minneapolis in the mid-1980’s, though their commercial and critical breakthrough didn’t arrive until the release of their 1992 masterpiece, Hollywood Town Hall. Over the ensuing decades, the band would go on to record a series of highly influential albums and tour the world countless times over, sharing stages with everyone from Bob Dylan and Tom Petty to Lucinda Williams and Wilco along the way. Following an extended hiatus in the mid-2000’s, Louris and his long-time bandmates—bassist Marc Perlman, drummer Tim O’Reagan, and keyboardist Karen Grotberg—returned to the studio, most recently releasing the acclaimed Paging Mr. Proust and Back Roads and Abandoned Motels in 2016 and 2018, respectively.

The 11th Jayhawks studio album XOXO was released on July 10, 2020 through Sham/Thirty Tigers. Recorded in late 2019 at Pachyderm and Flowers Studios in Minnesota, XOXO represents a bold step forward. For the first time, all four members contribute writing and lead vocal duties. XOXO is the most diverse and wide-ranging in the group’s storied history. Rather than marking a sonic departure, though, the collection signals a sharpening of focus for the band, an elevation in understanding of who they are and what they do best. In classic Jayhawks fashion, the songs here mix the influence of American roots music with British invasion and jangly power-pop, but there’s a newfound vitality at play, as well, an invigoration of confidence and energy that could only come with the injection of fresh blood. The result is an album that, much like the band’s lush harmonies, brings multiple distinctive voices together into a singular whole, a collection that, ironically enough, finds unity in individuality and identity in reinvention.

Michael Oberman

Author and Photographer

Michael Oberman’s photographs are on permanent display in U.S. National Parks including Steigerwald and Modoc and in museums including the Utah Museum of Natural History and the Ontario Science Centre (Toronto).

Six photos are on a five year tour of U.S. and Canadian museums in an exhibit called “Imaginate”…under the auspices of the Ontario Science Centre in Toronto (where the same six photos are on permanent display).

Before photography, he spent his life in the “music business.” Michael started as a music columnist for the Washington Star and a six year period interviewed more than 300 major recording artists…including David Bowie, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, James Brown…the list is too long for this page. He later worked for a record company and managed artists. Now he is back to his true love: Photography.

In 2019, Oberman was signed to a publishing contract for a book about his life in the music business. He spent eight months writing “Fast Forward, Play, and Rewind.” It will be out on October 15, 2020 in the U.S. and December 1 in Great Britain. (adapted from web site)

Lisa Unger

Latest Book – Last Girl Ghosted

In development at Netflix – Confessions on the 7:45

Lisa Unger is the New York Times and internationally bestselling author of seventeen novels, including THE STRANGER INSIDE. With millions of readers worldwide and books published in twenty-six languages, Lisa Unger is widely regarded as a master of suspense. In 2019, she received two Edgar Award nominations, an honor held by only a few writers including Ruth Rendell and Agatha Christie. The Edgar-nominated UNDER MY SKIN is also a finalist for the prestigious Hammett Prize, and the Macavity Award for Best Novel. And the original short story THE SLEEP TIGHT MOTEL is a #1 bestselling single.

Unger’s critically acclaimed books have been voted “Best of the Year” or top picks by the Today show, Good Morning America, Entertainment Weekly, Amazon, IndieBound and many others. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, NPR, and Travel+Leisure. She lives on the west coast of Florida with her family.

T.C. Boyle

T.Coraghessan Boyle is the author of twenty-eight books of fiction, including, most recently, After the Plague (2001), Drop City (2003), The Inner Circle (2004), Tooth and Claw (2005), The Human Fly (2005), Talk Talk (2006), The Women (2009), Wild Child (2010), When the Killing’s Done (2011), San Miguel (2012), T.C. Boyle Stories II (2013), The Harder They Come (2015), The Terranauts (2016), The Relive Box (2017) and Outside Looking In (2019). He received a Ph.D. degree in Nineteenth Century British Literature from the University of Iowa in 1977, his M.F.A. from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop in 1974, and his B.A. in English and History from SUNY Potsdam in 1968. He has been a member of the English Department at the University of Southern California since 1978, where he is Distinguished Professor of English.

Danielle Girard

Danielle Girard is the author of Chasing Darkness, the Rookie Club series, and Exhume, Excise, Expose, and Expire featuring San Francisco medical examiner Dr. Annabelle Schwartzman. Girard’s books have won the Barry Award and the RT Reviewers’ Choice Award, and two of her titles have been optioned for movies. A graduate of Cornell University, Girard received her MFA at Queens University in Charlotte, North Carolina. She, her husband, and their two children split their time between San Francisco and the northern Rockies. White Out, book one of her new Badlands Thriller Series, is available now. Amazon

Lake Street Dive

Lake Street Dive is a multigenre band that was founded in 2004 in Boston, Massachusetts. The band’s original members are Rachael Price (lead vocals), Mike “McDuck” Olson (trumpet, guitar), Bridget Kearney (upright bass), and Mike Calabrese (drums). Akie Bermiss (keyboards) joined the band on tour in 2017 and is on their 2018 album. Lake Street Dive started at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.^[1] The band was named after a street with many dive bars in Olson’s hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota. The band tours in North America, Australia, and Europe from their base in Brooklyn.

Trigger Hippy

The group was initially formed as a casual collaboration between Govrik, Gorman and other Nashville musicians. Trigger Hippy made its live debut on February 2, 2009, at the Cox Capitol Theatre in Macon, Georgia.

The band played shows in 2011 and 2012, with a rotating cast of band members. A consistent lineup featuring Govrik and Gorman along with Joan Osborne, Jackie Greene, and Tom Bukovac came together and announced plans to record an album in the fall of 2012.

Trigger Hippy released their first EP on Record Store Day’s Back to Black Friday on November 29, 2013.[1]

Trigger Hippy released a full length album on September 30, 2014. In the summer of 2015, the band announced a lengthy break.

A new four piece lineup featuring Jurdi and Woodhouse was announced June 19, 2019.

Book Club Reads – 20 for 20

Culled from the favorites of three east coast book clubs.

Please write with your book club favorites – info@roamingthearts.com

It is time to compile a 2021 list. Tell us what you loved. #bookclub

American Dirt- Jeannine Cummins

Apeirogon-Colum McCann

Ask Again, Yes –Mary Beth Keane

Behold The Dreamers –Imbolo Mbue

Bel Canto –Ann Patchett

Born A Crime- Trevor Noah

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine – Gail Honeyman

Fates and Furfies – Lauren Groff

In The Midst of Winter – Isabel Allende

Mrs. Hemingway – Naomi Wood

Pachinko –Min Jin Lee

Tattooist Artist of Auschwitz – Heather Morris

The Extraordinary life of Sam Hell- Robert Dugoni

The Great Alone – Kristin Hannah

The Great Believers –Rebecca Makkai

The Inn At Lake Devine –Elinor Lipman

The Man with a Load of Mischief –Martha Grimes

The Snow Child – Eowyn Ivey

The Storyteller’s Secret – Sejal Badani

This Tender Land-William Kent Krueger

Bandhouse Gigs

BandHouse Gigs, founded in 2004 by local Bethesda, Maryland musicians Ronnie Newmyer and Chuck Sullivan, and later joined by David Sless, Greg Hardin, and Danny Schwartz, is the D.C. area’s premier producer of one-of-a-kind tribute concerts for iconic artists and influential musical movements. Over the past 13 years BandHouse has produced 25 sold out shows at The Warner Theater, The Music Center at Strathmore, The Fillmore Silver Spring, Wolf Trap, Rams Head On Stage, and The Hamilton Live.

They collaborate with professionals willing to donate their services, including writers, graphic artists, videographers, photographers, make-up artists, lighting designers, marketing professionals, and audio engineers. Together they are the BandHouse Team.

Bandhouse Gigs on Facebook

Eric Brace

Eric Brace (and Last Train Home)

Eric Brace runs Red Beet Records and makes music on his own, with Last Train Home and as a trio with Peter Cooper and Thomm Jutz. In 2003, he founded the label and he and his band, Last Train Home moved to East Nashville from the Washington DC area. Brace had been a journalist at the Washington Post and had run the Top Records label.

Eric returns to the DC area with some frequency, playing clubs where he built his loyal following and participating, as in the embedded video, in numerous BandhouseGigs productions, including the recent live stream “From BandHouse to Your House.”

RTA