The Show On The Road with Z. Lupetin Z. Lupetin

It’s not fair to say every song that roots songwriting master John Moreland puts into the world is tinged with sadness and a palpable gravity. And yet, whether or not you’re seeing his big presence in person or hearing his deep and tender voice that can somehow cut through any loud bar like a laser to the heart - fans have been coming back to join Moreland in processing whatever grief they may be going through for a decade. His newest Visitor captures our unique American windswept loneliness in a way that only he can. 
A song like “Gentle Violence” off the new LP is everything John does best - kernels of Prine-approved lyrics that seem to stick to your ears like tiny knives, reminding us that he always prefers to tour and write alone, processing pain with silence as his forever companion. And while he’s happily married now (his wife joins him on the road as his tour manager), in 2022 Moreland almost checked out and didn’t come back - stepping away from playing and displaying himself hundreds of days a year for people to sing along to cathartic heartbreakers like “You Don’t Care Enough For Me To Cry” that have become Americana hits - for a chance to recharge and clear his brain from the internet’s growing shadows. 
The time away was tough but worth it - Visitor has a renewed clear-eyed power that shines in songs like the opener “The Future Is Coming Fast” - maybe it shows remnants of his punk-rock origins too. Most country-roots artists don’t have the cajones to talk about climate change or addiction or grief but for Moreland who grew up idolizing Steve Earle - there is freedom and joy in mining the darkness. People come to Moreland’s hushed concerts to feel something - and listening to Visitor makes me grateful that Moreland is here to help us cope with whatever we happen to be feeling right about now.

This week we bring you an intimate talk with rising Cuban roots-pop singer-songwriter Daymé Arocena. Known for her honey-voiced records that honor Cuba’s joyous folk and jazz traditions, her newest Alkemi’ takes a sonic leap into the powerful pop and suave R&B music that she admired as a girl - Sade, Whitney Houston and even Beyoncé - while also paying homage to her grandmother’s lifelong practice of Santeria. 
Born to a musical family in Havana where she shared a two bedroom house with twenty-one extended family members (her mother and grandmother sang locally and dad owned a night club), she was accepted into a prestigious music conservatory at age ten and has been off to the races since, co-founding and the all-female Cuban-Canadian jazz collective Maqueque in 2014, which toured internationally and earned a GRAMMY nomination and releasing four solo albums. Cubaphonia from 2017 is a favorite of this listener. 
Like many artists caught in Cuba’s long history of repression and poverty - she was forced to leave the island to protect the safety of her husband, a photojournalist whose coworkers had been imprisoned. Canada was their only option at the time due to travel restrictions, but after three years living there, the pandemic pushed her to look for a new home again. 
She was advised to contact Grammy-winning producer Eduardo Cabra, better known as Visitante Calle 13, he invited her to come to Puerto Rico to spend a few days in his house - and a new album and a new home base was found. Sometimes you just need that island energy to make you feel whole again.
Listen to the deeply spiritual (yet still catchy as hell) “American Boy” - about her finding her happiness and power even without the love of her life being by her side. For someone who grew up as a dark-skinned girl feeling invisible, what’s clear is Daymé wants to be seen and understood more than ever before.

John Oates has been at this for a while. Ever since his family moved from New York to a small town outside of Philly in the early 1950s, he has been feverishly creating American roots music, blues, rock n roll and unabashed pop. After teaming up with his Temple college mate Daryl Hall at the dawn of the 1970s - Oates co-created a mind-melting run of funky rock-pop hits that still play on constant radio rotation: 21 albums, ten of them number one records which sold over 80 million units. It’s not a shock to see that Hall & Oates are technically the most successful duo in modern music history. 
But Oates' half a dozen solo records are quite underrated (look to the stripped back Arkansas to see what I mean ), and with the new LP Reunion dropping this week, we see him sonically rejuvenated, leaning into his love of early 20th century acoustic music and how his family history formed who he is today. 
For this listener and songwriter - getting to dive into how “Maneater”, “She’s Gone”, “You Make My Dreams” was quite a thrill, but I was also moved at how generous Oates was towards the young artists he gets to work with (Sierra Hull for one) and how he has reacted to the fractious relationship with his former co-creator Daryl Hall with a sense of zen, even as the tabloids spin yarns of their many years in the making “breakup”. 
While playing arenas may be in his past, Oates is excited to play intimate shows telling the humble stories on Reunion like “This Field Is Mine” which he teamed up with beloved mandolinist Sam Bush. 

What if you said the darkest thing you ever thought…or actually sang it out loud in a packed room of cheerful many-tattooed like-minded fans? You might find yourself at an Amigo The Devil concert - an experience that longtime self-professed “murder-folk” master Danny Kiranos has dutifully worked on for a decade and a half - bringing the banjo and acoustic guitar into a world once only populated by hardcore or death metal listeners. 
Murder ballads were first documented in 1840s Scandinavia, England, Ireland and Scotland - but what Amigo The Devil has done with a squirmy, personal new LP Yours Until The War Is Over is to take them to a new level - probing with his deft fingerpicking and at turns tender and then ferocious vocals - his own sicknesses, his own dark family secrets and our national plunge into addiction, murder and hate. And yet, it’s still fun to listen to? Quite a balancing act.
Why does it feel so good to shout “I Hope Your Husband Dies!” in a packed auditorium - or to discover our own “Cannibal Within”? There must a reason why true crime podcasts and novels and horror films continue to obsesses us. Danny takes these obsessions a step further of course - he collects skulls, serial killer art, letters from jail from men who have done the unspeakable…and yet, after hearing him talk on his songwriting process, you see he is among the most thoughtful and underrated writers and performers on the road today. 
To see the whole uncut nearly two hour talk - go to the Show On The Road Youtube channel!

This week we dive into the many lives and evolving music of much-respected singer and troubadour Peter One. Coming from humble beginnings in his native Ivory Coast, One became a folk hero for creating a new type of African roots music that was the backdrop for Nelson Mandela’s fight against apartheid and gained him a following around the globe. 
His partnership with longtime friend Jess Sah Bi created the 1985 classic (and newly reissued) Our Garden Needs Its Flowers and at their height, saw them playing stadiums across West Africa. The two mates from Abidjan were equally inspired by Ivorian village songs as Simon and Garfunkel, Dolly Parton and American soul titans like Otis Redding - creating a unique fusion while singing in French, English and Gouro (a Mande language). Escaping the unrest of his home country where he was a history teacher, One finally came to the United States and worked as a nurse for years before diving back into his original passion for music. 
At the age of 67, last year One put out his heralded return LP Come Back To Me on Verve Forecast, featuring the golden-voiced harmonies and Ivorian country-folk songs he does best, with new forays into blues, French love songs and more - featuring his old partner Jess Sah Bi and new collaborators like Allison Russell. Co-produced by Matt Ross-Spang (Jason Isbell, John Prine) with contributions from members of Wilco and Calexico, the record shows that even as he nears seventy, One is only just getting started. Last year he even made his debut at the Grand Ole’ Opry. 

We’re back for season six with a special conversation with a true blues and world music legend, Taj Mahal. Touring in his seventh decade behind nearly fifty albums and counting (including fourteen Grammy nominations) we dive into his new LP Swingin’ Live At The Church In Tulsa, how he toured with the Rolling Stones Rock n Roll Circus in the 1970s, and how classics like “Statesboro Blues” from his iconic 1968 self-titled record inspired groups like the Allman Brothers to bring the blues to a new generation of listeners.
Born Henry St. Claire Fredericks Jr to a renown jazz arranger and gospel singer, Taj Mahal is one of the first mainstream artists to champion world music - sharing his passion for the music of Mali, Jamaica and especially Hawaii with his rowdy audiences around the world.