WE BANJO 3
Roots to Rise Live
With
David Howley: Lead Vocals, Guitar
Fergal Skahill: Fiddle, Percussion, Vocals
Martin Howley; Mandolin, Banjo, Vocals
Enda Skahill: Banjo, Vocals
July 19th will see the release of We Banjo 3's sixth album, Roots to Rise LIVE, which was recorded over two sold out nights at world famous folk music venue, The Ark in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Featuring many of the band's best-loved tunes and songs, plus a couple of previously unreleased tracks (and a surprise Stevie Wonder cameo!), Roots to Rise LIVE captures the magic atmosphere of what has become a legendary live show.
The album was recorded by Mike Monseur (Nashville), mixed by Frank Marchand (Baltimore) and mastered by The Bakery (Los Angeles), with graphic design by Jesse Smith (Arranmore Island).
The last few years have seen a huge surge in the band's popularity propelling them to the headlining slot at all the major Irish festivals in the US and featuring widely on the Bluegrass and Folk music circuits. We Banjo 3 have also garnered some major international awards including RTE Folk Awards Album of the Year, and they are the first Irish band ever to top the Billboard Bluegrass Album Chart in the US. 2019 will see the band touring widely across the USA and Canada, an Irish tour in September including concerts in Dublin, Cork, Derry and of course, Galway, and rounding out the year touring Japan with Talisk and Sharon Shannon.
Roots To Rise LIVE will be officially launched on July 19th at GreyFox Bluegrass Music Festival in upstate New York, and subsequently launched every weekend thereafter until at least January! Find out more at www.webanjo3.com
"Adopting a world ethos, you can't call these lads just Irish music types and you can call them world beaters either. Organic in the best way at every turn. this is how modern folk music should sound. Hot stuff by a crew of great instrumentalists." - Midwest Record
Audio Samples.
Track 1: Puncheon Floor
Track 2: Wynne's
Track 3: Trying To Love
Track Listing
- Shine On
- Puncheon Floor
- Haven
- Marry Me Monday
- Little Liza Jane
- Tell Me Why
- Annabelle's Cannon
- This Is Home
- John Brown's
- Hold On To Your Soul
- Wynne's
- Prettiest Little Girl
- Trying To Love
- Good Time Old Time
Watch We Banjo Live on You Tube
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/...]
Also available from Copperplate Mail Order
We Banjo 3: Roots to Rise Live
We Banjo 3: Gather The Good
We Banjo 3: Live in Galway
We Banjo 3: String Theory
We Banjo 3: Haven
Press Reviews
R’n’R Magazine 11/12/19 ***
Despite the name, We Banjo 3 is a quartet comprising two sets of Irish brothers who have found their niche in playing to the Irish diaspora in the U.S.A., gaining awards across the boards there as well as in their native isle.
Playing what they call Celtgrass, a combination of bluegrass, Celtic music and folk sounds, there's no doubt that they're tailor-made for energetic live shows and they've attempted to capture that energy on this live disc.
Recorded over two nights in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Roots To Rise Live catches the band in full flight, playing traditional and self-penned songs and tunes to an ecstatic audience which is heard plainly, as the disc includes the sounds of the crowd hooting and clapping along to the band.
Thankfully, the band's more-considered numbers are heard in silence allowing the likes of the plaintive 'Marry Me Monday' j and the stirring 'Hold On To Your Soul' (one of their songs about positive mental health) to ring out.
The album does capture their exuberance — hear the audience go apeshit at the mention of Ann Arbor on 'Little Liza Jane' — and would go down well as a soundtrack if you decide to hold a hooley in your house. Paul Kerr
Songlines Dec/19 ****
Capturing the rip-roaring live performances they're known for !
Caught live in the hallowed acoustics of Michigan's fabled The Ark in Ann Arbor, this album by Celtgrass pioneers We Banjo 3 scorches its way through a rollercoaster set, colliding their native Galway heritage with liberal helpings of blistering bluegrass and a telling nod to pop music. Stevie Wonder's 'Superstition' flows seamlessly. cheekily out of old-timer Smokey Joe Miller's 'Prettiest Little Girl' with all the crowd-pleasing audacity and aplomb that have made the quartet a firm favourite on the US touring circuit. There is audience noise aplenty here, before, after and during the signature high-octane performances that have become We Banjo 3's trademark.
The opening. self-, penned 'Shine On' - a live favourite making its first appearance on disc here - is greeted with delighted abandon. 'Puncheon Floor has all the infectious excitability of a hoe-downfull. hooch-powered flow and 'Marry Me Monday' is a joyfully baleful amalgam of Irish and American influences. The ebullient 'Little Liza Jane boasts an irresistible singalong chorus. Completists will want to know that 'John Brown's'. an atmospheric traditional American tune led by Enda Scahill's feisty banjo and Martin Howley's combustible mandolin. is also a new addition to the band's discography. Their siblings - Fergal Scahill (fiddle, percussion, vocals) and David Howley (vocals. guitar) - make similarly high-octane contributions.
Michael Quinn
www.folking.com web site
We’ve been through this before but… We Banjo 3 are two pairs of brothers, the Howleys and the Seahills who play a sort of Irish-Americana. They mix traditional songs and tunes with original compositions which they rely on more heavily these days. Roots To Rise Live was recorded in front of enthusiastic audiences over two nights in Ann Arbor, Michigan earlier this year. This isn’t their first live album but it’s the first one I’ve heard and it came as something of surprise. For their studio albums We Banjo 3 employ guest musicians and everything that a studio can offer and I’ve sometimes found their arrangements rather too dense although tightly controlled. I was expecting, therefore, that the volume and speed would be cranked up. How wrong I was. Stripped back to just what the four of them can do, I’d venture to say that Roots To Rise Live is the best We Banjo 3 album I‘ve heard.
The album opens with ‘Shine On’ which exhibits just the right level of freedom to set the album on its way. That’s followed by the instrumental set, ‘Puncheon Floor’, the title track from their most recent album, Haven, and the waltz, ‘Marry Me Monday’ from the same set. ‘Little Liza Jane’ is a real crowd pleaser and so is ‘Wynne’s’ as the pace builds up but, before that, ‘This Is Home’ settles things down a little. The set, as it’s presented here, is beautifully constructed so that by the time we get to ‘Prettiest Little Girl’ the guys are really rocking. ‘Trying To Love’ doesn’t let up and the traditional instrumental set, ‘Good Time Old Time’ sends the crowd home in a very happy mood.
If you weren’t in Ann Arbor back in February, and it’s probable that you weren’t, this is a perfect record of what you missed. Dai Jeffries
‘Prettiest Little Girl’ – live:
