Carted to Alabama under the cloud of dark politics, a band drew a glistening straight line from punk to country to soul to grand theater. On November 8th, the day after the 2016 election, Welsh-bred, Chicago-based musician and visual artist Jon Langford and a crew of merry-makers and alchemists filed into the NuttHouse studio, a one-story former bank building in Sheffield, Ala. (population 9,039). The musicians from Chicago, Nashville, Los Angeles, and just over the Tennessee River bridge made the pilgrimage to a place of legend and myth, where music runs as deep as the river’s current, to see what might come of it all.

Four Lost Souls, recorded over four days, originated in 2015, 100 miles north in Nashville where Langford produced artwork for Dylan, Cash, and the Nashville Cats: A New Music City, the long-running exhibit at the Country Music Hall of Fame. Fate had it that one of those Nashville Cats, bassist and producer Norbert Putnam, was so enamored with Langford’s paintings and piratey singing, he invited the stranger to come record in the Shoals.

A year later Langford is in that studio with many of the musicians who put the region, as well as renowned FAME Studios4 and Muscle Shoals Sound Studios5, on the musical map. Among them, members of the Swampers, David Hood6 and Randy McCormick—world famous players who have performed on all the songs you ever loved—and next-generation, in-the-right-pocket local drummer Justin Holder. Along for the ride were Nashville’s in-demand pedal steel guitarist Pete Finney and guitarist Grant Johnson. Together they dutifully crafted a project brimming with images of killing and hope, Faulkner, the Natchez Trace, and the sea.

As word got out around town, the musicians of the Shoals stopped by to see what Putnam was up to with these Chicagoans — Jon, guitarist John Szymanski, and the electrifying singers Bethany Thomas10 and now-LA-based Tawny Newsome. Tomi Lunsford, a mountain soprano from Nashville, slipped into the vocal booth to duet with Langford. The morning after his gig at Champy’s, a local watering hole, Will McFarlane parked his Harley at the front door to say hello. Five minutes later he was behind studio glass with his guitar. And five minutes after that, he was back on his bike turning the corner in a cloud of dust and exhaust.

Thus was the strange weather in the Shoals during that week in American history. Crammed between arrival and departure at the NuttHouse was a fever heat of creativity that crossed musical generations, racial lines, and the invisible barrier separating the flatlands of the upper Midwest and rolling hills of the deepest South. Even the ocean between the Delta and the dingy port city of Newport, South Wales, Jon’s hometown, evaporated out of sight.

The South is full of ghosts and they all ask unresolved questions. Nothing is settled and the music won’t sleep. Muscle Shoals itself personifies a place where America’s great cultural explosion transcends the murderous politics of race and class that stain this country from slavery and civil war to today. To tomorrow. The music speaks to the best in us, while reflecting, at times, the worst of us.

Four Lost Souls is pure Americana, not just because of where it was recorded or who played on what track, but because it is beyond the news of the day. It is a travelogue of sorts; it goes to a place where the differences between country, soul, blues, and rock-and-roll are blown aside by the warm languid breezes. The music had no time for such petty details, because in the moment, in that place, was the sound of sweet agreement.

08/19/2017 St. Louis Missouri US Off Broadway

09/15/2017 Nashville Tennessee US The High Watt, AmericanaFest

Jon Langford, Cory Branan, Sarah Shook & the Disarmers, Ruby Boots 09/15/2017 Nashville Tennessee US Backyard Bash Presented by Bloodshot Records and Pandora at 5PM to 8PM (Official AmericanaFest party – FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC / ALL AGES / NO BADGE OR WRISTBAND REQUIRED, Beer by Lagunitas Brewing Co. Instrument giveaways by Recording King Guitars)

09/15/2017 Nashville Tennessee US The Groove, Backyard Bash Presented by Bloodshot Records and Pandora

10/01/2017 Santa Monica California US McCabes, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/05/2017 San Francisco California US Makeout Room, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/07/2017 San Francisco California US Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/08/2017 San Francisco California US Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/10/2017 Madison Wisconsin US Kiki’s House of Righteous Music, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/11/2017 Chicago Illinois US The Hideout, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls release party

10/12/2017 Cleveland Ohio US Music Box Supper Club, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/13/2017 Columbus Ohio US The Hogan House, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/14/2017 Nashville Tennessee US City Winery, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/16/2017 Memphis Tennessee US The STAX Museum, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/17/2017 Carbondale Illinois US PK’s, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/19/2017 New Haven Connecticut US Cafe Nine, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/20/2017 Jersey City New Jersey US Monty Hall, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/21/2017 Brooklyn New York US Union Pool, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/22/2017 Peacedale Rhode Island US Roots Hoot House Concert, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/23/2017 Portland Maine US Blue, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/24/2017 Cambridge Massachusetts US Atwood’s Tavern, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/26/2017 Milwaukee Wisconsin US Anodyne, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/28/2017 Austin Texas US Yard Dog Folk Art, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

10/28/2017 Austin Texas US ABGB, Jon Langford’s Four Lost Souls

Sat 7th Sept – 3pm – JL & Skull Orchard HIDEOUT BLOCK PARTY –

Sat. Sept 14th – Festival Hall, Calgary CANADA – Jon Langford & Sally Timms – http://www.calgaryfolkfest.com/events/special/view/80#.UifSSX-1fms

Sun, September 22, 2013,  The Hideout Chicago, IL Freakons
Doors: 5:00 pm / Show: 6:00 pm, $10.00

Sat. October 5th – JL & Skull Orchard with FREAKONS – Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco – http://www.hardlystrictlybluegrass.com/2013/

Sat. October 5th (evening) – Great American Music Hall, San Francisco – KL & Skull Orchard w. Billy Bragg – http://www.slimspresents.com/events/2013-10-05/billy-bragg/

Sun. Oct 6th – JL & Skull Orchard/FREAKONS – Davis CA (venue TBA)

Thursday Oct 10th – CITY WINERY CHICAGO – with Wesley Stace’s Cabinet of Wonders – http://www.citywinery.com/chicago/tickets/wesley-stace-s-cabinet-of-wonders-10-10.html

Sat. Oct 12th – Englert Theater, IOWA CITY with Wesley Stace’s Cabinet of Wonders – http://englert.org/event_details.php?id=1026

A fine report on the Three Johns Reunion Tour of 2012:

JL, Sadies, Deano, Skullies, Waco, Choir weekend in Toronto April 15th & 16th

Horseshoe Tavern

370 Queen Street West
Downtown Toronto
Ontario, Canada
M5V 2A2

Booking

This will be a realease party for the Skull Orchard book as well.

Jon Langford ART SHOW at the drinking man’s art gallery DELILAH’S on Friday 18th