Welcome to the world of Bluegrass, a blend of Country and Scotch/Irish traditional music born in the hills of Appalachia. The "small guitar" is called a mandolin. This video is from early in Billy's career and Dust in a Baggie was one of the first songs that he wrote. Since then he has added a fiddle player to his band and his skills at both playing and song writing have grown immensely. Billy and the boys play around 200 live shows per year with no two shows being the same. Their set lists are drawn from about 80 original works and almost 700 covers of everyone from Johnny Cash to Black Sabbath. Billy's music can be very genre bending, adding elements of heavy metal and psychedelic jam band sounds. His use of effects pedals with his customized acoustic is unique. There's a huge rabbit hole well worth diving into here. For more check out Turmoil and Tinfoil live from Music City Roots, and Away from the Mire from Lollapalooza '22 where they opened for Metallica. Also try anything from Billy Strings Live Vol. 1 which is up for another Grammy.
Another great bluegrass flat picker is Molly Tuttle and her band Golden Highway. Crooked Tree is the best song to check out. She's a good friend of Billy Strings and there are some great videos of them on stage together, worth a looksee.
Billy is a master of his instrument, as the comments below mentioned, Turmoil and Tinfoil is maybe your next reaction from him. I've seen him do a night of just Grateful Dead songs, he's been on stage with Bob Weir, which was fire and also with GD drummer Bill Kreutzmann in Hawaii, also awesome. He's a real find bro.
Thank you Barbara for bringing Sohum up to speed on Billy Strings🎶🫶. Billy is immensely talented and exceptionally versatile with his music. And for all that has done so far, Tinfoil & Turmoil remains the favorite of my favorites. I think Sohum would really like that one💯
Sohum I've been planning on sending a request for Billy Strings for Tin Foil & Turmoil one of these days as I know you would really love it. So I hope someone else might request it. He is an artist with deep talent, Grammy award winner for best Bluegrass album, but when younger played in a heavy metal band and some of his work, like the one I named, is a fusion of both. He excels on traditional finger picking style but mixes it up! You will be impressed🎶
OK so you're missing some context. This song is about the economically oppressed people of the Appalachians being harassed and imprisoned in for-profit privately-owned publicly-funded prisons. These areas have been left behind as the cost of coal mining & coal energy rise while natural gas and green energy get cheaper and cheaper, pushing coal out of the market. That leaves hard working folks little options to support themselves and families so they resort to drug dealing and drug abuse. Dust in a baggie is about getting tossed in prison for 20 years for compounding charges of meth possession and paraphernalia. Meth, like crack, is charged at much steeper sentencing than drugs favored by the wealthy.
If you want more banjo, I would highly suggest Bela Fleck either by himself, or with his band The Flecktones, or with his wife Abigail Washburn (who plays banjo in an entirely different style from her husband). There's also a great duet out there with Billy Strings.
The lack of explicit percussion instruments is typical for bluegrass. All the other instruments have to help with keeping the rhythm going. For instance, the Mandolin often provides a rather continuous 'chopping' sound, strumming on the up beats if you're counting in cut time, or beats 2 and 4 if you're rapidly counting in 4:4 time. The banjo is typically playing 1/8 notes, but often execute 3 note arpeggios due to the 3 fingers that have picks on the right hand. This overlay of 3 and 8 creates lots of syncopated rhythms. When the Banjo takes it's solos, it typically will maintain the 3 finger roll, but adjust the fingering and accents so that the melody is highlighted. When the Mandolin takes it's solo, the banjo often switches up from the 3 fingered roll and fills in the 'chop' so you don't lose the beat. You can't go wrong with almost any of Billy's recorded songs, but here are a few more Billy Strings songs to check out: "Away from the mire" at Lollapalooza "Watch it fall" (official video, or one of the live versions.) If you're interested in further exploring this 'new wave' of young Bluegrass artists, Check out Molly Tuttle. "Crooked tree" is a fairly popular recent song of hers.
Welcome to the world of Bluegrass, a blend of Country and Scotch/Irish traditional music born in the hills of Appalachia. The "small guitar" is called a mandolin.
This video is from early in Billy's career and Dust in a Baggie was one of the first songs that he wrote. Since then he has added a fiddle player to his band and his skills at both playing and song writing have grown immensely. Billy and the boys play around 200 live shows per year with no two shows being the same. Their set lists are drawn from about 80 original works and almost 700 covers of everyone from Johnny Cash to Black Sabbath. Billy's music can be very genre bending, adding elements of heavy metal and psychedelic jam band sounds. His use of effects pedals with his customized acoustic is unique. There's a huge rabbit hole well worth diving into here. For more check out Turmoil and Tinfoil live from Music City Roots, and Away from the Mire from Lollapalooza '22 where they opened for Metallica. Also try anything from Billy Strings Live Vol. 1 which is up for another Grammy.
Ive seen Billy Strings live 3 times. Fucking insane
How I would love that!
Australia is still waiting
@alimac1469 I hope he comes over for you mate! I saw him twice in Manchester and once in Birmingham in the UK.
Let's not forget the facial expressions. I love seeing that in an improviser.
That pace is typical of old school Bluegrass. Billy grew up with that music and has taken it into the modern era.
Saw Billy 2 summers ago at the Outlaw Festival...awesome set. He combined bluegrass with some trippy progressive stuff....it was killer!!🎸🎸
Check out Molly Tuttle. and AJ Lee & Blue Summit . The mandolin is the drum primarily .
Another great bluegrass flat picker is Molly Tuttle and her band Golden Highway. Crooked Tree is the best song to check out. She's a good friend of Billy Strings and there are some great videos of them on stage together, worth a looksee.
Billy is a master of his instrument, as the comments below mentioned, Turmoil and Tinfoil is maybe your next reaction from him. I've seen him do a night of just Grateful Dead songs, he's been on stage with Bob Weir, which was fire and also with GD drummer Bill Kreutzmann in Hawaii, also awesome. He's a real find bro.
He should check out Summertime with Billy Strings and Marcus King … an awesome slower paced live performance
Thank you Barbara for bringing Sohum up to speed on Billy Strings🎶🫶. Billy is immensely talented and exceptionally versatile with his music. And for all that has done so far, Tinfoil & Turmoil remains the favorite of my favorites. I think Sohum would really like that one💯
Sohum I've been planning on sending a request for Billy Strings for Tin Foil & Turmoil one of these days as I know you would really love it. So I hope someone else might request it. He is an artist with deep talent, Grammy award winner for best Bluegrass album, but when younger played in a heavy metal band and some of his work, like the one I named, is a fusion of both. He excels on traditional finger picking style but mixes it up! You will be impressed🎶
OK so you're missing some context. This song is about the economically oppressed people of the Appalachians being harassed and imprisoned in for-profit privately-owned publicly-funded prisons. These areas have been left behind as the cost of coal mining & coal energy rise while natural gas and green energy get cheaper and cheaper, pushing coal out of the market. That leaves hard working folks little options to support themselves and families so they resort to drug dealing and drug abuse. Dust in a baggie is about getting tossed in prison for 20 years for compounding charges of meth possession and paraphernalia. Meth, like crack, is charged at much steeper sentencing than drugs favored by the wealthy.
Billy and band ❤
There is now Alex on fiddle too.
Awesome reaction! Awesome song 🎵
For more picking, try Billy with Tommy Emmanuel doing Guitar Boogie / Working Man Blues - unrehearsed and brilliant.
Yes‼️
If you want more banjo, I would highly suggest Bela Fleck either by himself, or with his band The Flecktones, or with his wife Abigail Washburn (who plays banjo in an entirely different style from her husband). There's also a great duet out there with Billy Strings.
Yes!
The lack of explicit percussion instruments is typical for bluegrass. All the other instruments have to help with keeping the rhythm going. For instance, the Mandolin often provides a rather continuous 'chopping' sound, strumming on the up beats if you're counting in cut time, or beats 2 and 4 if you're rapidly counting in 4:4 time.
The banjo is typically playing 1/8 notes, but often execute 3 note arpeggios due to the 3 fingers that have picks on the right hand. This overlay of 3 and 8 creates lots of syncopated rhythms. When the Banjo takes it's solos, it typically will maintain the 3 finger roll, but adjust the fingering and accents so that the melody is highlighted. When the Mandolin takes it's solo, the banjo often switches up from the 3 fingered roll and fills in the 'chop' so you don't lose the beat.
You can't go wrong with almost any of Billy's recorded songs, but here are a few more Billy Strings songs to check out:
"Away from the mire" at Lollapalooza
"Watch it fall" (official video, or one of the live versions.)
If you're interested in further exploring this 'new wave' of young Bluegrass artists, Check out Molly Tuttle. "Crooked tree" is a fairly popular recent song of hers.
8 string mini guitar = Mandolin
Shout out to Josiah for this‼️🫶
cant be billy strings an not bring the heat
Billy Strings is the heir-apparent to the flat-picking legend Doc Watson.
I know one banjo player who plays VERY slowly. Me.
This is sped up 2x, right? RIGHT?
Nope, Just that Talented. I thought the same thing when i found the song
Pickers.
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