DittyTV's Insights | Music Interviews

The last twelve months of Darling West’s musical career can hardly be described as anything but fantastic. Since the release of their second album, Vinyl and a Heartache, they have played concerts all over the world, been listed on the biggest radio channels in Norway and appeared on the Top 100 Country charts in the US, streamed more than three million times on Spotify, booked to the biggest fe s...

Grayson Capps is a barreling force of Delta rock and soul once he gets goin’, but as you’ll see in the interview, he’s pretty mellow when he’s not on stage. Having drawn comparisons over his last few albums to the likes of Tom Waits, Townes Van Zandt and Drive By Truckers, to name but a few. He doesn’t always paint the prettiest pictures or offer a gleamy white smile, but he does reach down deep t...

Cavanagh, born to a large Irish American family in Chicago, and living amongst the doers and dreamers of NYC — has an ebullient vocal style influenced by the singers of the forty’s and fifty’s, while maintaining a great pop sensibility. Cavanagh, an independent artist, is a published songwriter, signed to an administration deal with the boutique publishing company Danger Village Music Publishing (...

CALICO the band is a California band in the deepest, most natural sense of the term. Specifically, the moniker (all caps, please) is shorthand for California country—as if that weren’t vividly apparent from the first moments of Under Blue Skies, the group’s resonant, accomplished sophomore album, with its musical intricacy, lyrical eloquence and timeless immediacy. The thought-provoking, tightly h...

Celine Lee talks about the Ameripolitan Awards, started by Dale Watson, her place in the rockabilly world, and growing up around music of the past. Ameripolitan Awards 2018 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

World-renowned singer, songwriter and producer, Chris Robinson joins Rev Down in a conversation about life as a touring artist, his love of the band Canned Heat, and the Chris Robinson Brotherhood’s new album, Barefoot in the Head. Recorded April 2017 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Over the past few years, Dustbowl Revival has been making a name for itself with a vibrant mix of vintage Americana sounds. Critics have proclaimed that this eclectic eight-piece “would have sounded utterly at home within the hallowed confines of Preservation Hall in New Orleans' French Quarter” (Los Angeles Times) and their “upbeat, old-school, All-American sonic safaris exemplify everything show...

Born and raised in Southern Louisana, one listen and Jacob Thomas Jr. would have you figuring he spent his youth performing in cowboy bars and trucker dives. You'd only be half right. While Saturday nights were spent cavorting with sinners, Sunday mornings would find him, albeit hungover at times, entertaining saints. Recorded Dec. 2018 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn mo...

Mixing his indie-folk roots with pop hooks and sparse, airy production, Nashville-based songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer Paul Johnson shoots for the stars with Constellation, his second LP as Canyon City. The record arrives one year after Canyon City's debut, Midnight Waves, a viral hit whose soft-spoken songwriting racked up an audience of over 750,000 monthly Spotify listeners. Jus...

DittyTV host Mark Edgar Stuart goes in depth with longtime Sun Studio session drummer, J.M. Van Eaton, the man that you can thank for rippin’ rhythms on tracks like “Great Balls of Fire” and “Whole Lotta Shakin’,” by Jerry Lee Lewis. He ventured into Sun Studios around 1955, when Rock and Roll was first being invented, or discovered, if that’s the way you want to look at it. He’s a devout and dign...

Australian soul-songwriter, Emily Barker shares about her move from Australia to England, as well as her breakthrough on John Peel’s BBC radio program, and her new album Sweet Kind of Blue, which was recorded here in Memphis at Sam Phillips Recording with Matt Ross Spang. Recorded Sept. 2017 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/a...

He’s one of Canada’s most celebrated songwriters, with dozens of awards and thousands of tour dates behind him, and hopefully a lot more ahead too. He’ll be here in just a moment to fill you in on his new album he’s working on right here in Memphis, TN. Recorded April 2019 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dustin delves into his rural Oklahoma upbringing, and how that’s affected his songwriting. He got started in music around 14 years old, playing the Oklahoma bar club scene and hanging with older musicians. He discusses touring life, Horton Records, and his new self-titled album, Dustin Pittsley Band. Recorded Aug, 2017 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad c...

Deer Tick rolled through Memphis to take part in the annual Lucero Family Block Party, and Sam caught up with them before their set to talk about their two new albums, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2., as well as the importance that food plays in their band dynamic. Recorded April 2018 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tatiana Z sat with Carolynn Sills of the Carolyn Sills Combo, winner of the Best Western Swing Group award at this year’s Ameripolitan Awards. She’s as cool and calm as her Santa Cruz California home-base would suggest, and she eats almost exclusively Mexican food, especially tacos, so what’s not to love? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

When Jeremy Pinnell released OH/KY in the summer of 2015 to stunned acclaim, it felt like an entire career compressed into one knock-out album. Hailed as a “ming-blowingly good” (Greg Vandy, KEXP) “tutorial on classic country music” (Popmatters), Pinnell’s debut immediately differentiated as authentic and unflinching. His 2017 album Ties of Blood and Affection presents a canny lateral move.  Inste...

Born in rural central Illinois, Christy Hays never really aspired to be a working songwriter. Hays grew up somewhat surrounded by music, her father, a luthier and guitar player showed her the major chords on her old Gibson. After two years in Nashville the decision was made to move to Austin, TX. Hays has shared the stage with Hayes Carll, Sturgill Simpson, Bruce Robison, Kelly Willis and Jeffery...

A quick listen to the three records released by Austin, based, Jeff Plankenhorn will give you an idea of the varied styles he loves. Plankenhorn has found a way to blend the soul of the church, Motown, and funk singers that dominated his youth with the bluegrass he studied in Nashville and the lyrically driven songwriters he has performed with into an intoxicating sound that spans them all. Record...

India Ramey is a singer/songwriter from Birmingham, AL. She is the granddaughter of a Sand Mountain bluegrass and gospel musician and career piano tuner. Blasting twin barrels of Americana noire and southern-gothic songwriting, India Ramey fires on all cylinders with her national debut, Snake Handler. Pentecostal churches, broken households, crooked family trees, forgotten pockets of the Deep Sout...

Julie Lansky is the third-generation owner of Lansky Brothers, a clothing shop located in Memphis, TN. Located on Beale St., Lansky's became known as 'Clothier to the King' for dressing Elvis Presley during his Sun Records days. They have dressed countless musicians over the past 50 years! Recorded Oct. 2018 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Vis...

Dale Watson is an American country/Texas country singer, guitarist, songwriter, and self-published author based in Austin, Texas. He champions "Ameripolitan" as a new genre of original music and has positioned himself as a tattooed, stubbornly independent outsider who is interested in recording authentic country music. Dale discusses his work with the Ameripolitan Music Awards, his background as a...

Don’t try to snatch him back and hold him, he’s a man on the move. John Németh had already established himself among the very top ranks of blues musicians and modern soul singers when he decided to break the mold with his new record, FEELIN’ FREAKY. Németh fearlessly crushes all barriers of style and genre with an album of original songs that defies all the usual pigeonholes. Drawing from his stro...

Chelsea's made a name for herself as a musician in Los Angeles in a less than traditional way. Without the support of a record label, or radio play, Chelsea managed to sell nearly 100,000 copies of her independently released records the old fashioned way, by playing on the street. Chelsea became the darling of Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade and captured the hearts of locals, tourists and fa...

Janiva Magness is an artist who has received numerous awards for her music, including a GRAMMY nomination for Best Contemporary Blues Album. In this interview, she talks with DittyTV host, Sam Shansky, about her love-powered career, and about her album, Love Is An Army. Recorded Jan. 2018 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adch...

Hailing from Memphis, Tennessee, a hub of historical soul and blues that crafted much of the world’s modern music, Dirty Streets have spent years on the road and in the studio forging their own style. They’ve moved from DIY, independant recordings to ambitiously self-produced studio ventures over the course of five albums. Their fifth, and latest, LP, Distractions, is an explosively charged follow...