Tag: Lafayette’s Music Room

Three weeks ago, the resurrected Overton Square music venue and restaurant Lafayette’s Music Room made a significant organizational change, hiring longtime Memphis music supporter John Miller as its new director of events.

Miller, a native Memphian and former lawyer, has spent the last decade or so working behind the scenes in the local music business. In 2007, he was hired by the label Archer Records to work on copyrights, publishing, and project management. He then moved to the now-defunct Memphis Music Foundation in 2010 as a coordinator for the nonprofit group’s Music Resource Center.

“I jumped at the chance to work with an even more diverse scope of local artists,” Miller says.

“There was also a good team in place there [at the Memphis Music Foundation], most of whom I still work with in some capacity from time to time.”

After four years of service that saw Miller consult and advise countless local musicians on a variety of projects, as well as represent the Memphis music scene at big-time music conference trade shows like South by Southwest and the National Association of Music Merchants, the Memphis Music Foundation was absorbed into David Porter’s Consortium MMT, and Miller was temporarily left without a steady paycheck. But rather than pack it in for another career or city, Miller hung around. He founded his own seven-inch vinyl singles label, Misspent Records, and then started working behind the counter at Shangri-La Records, where he has risen to the title of general manager.

Chris Shaw

Lafayette’s Music Room

“Having never been on the retail side of music sales, it seemed like a great opportunity to learn another side of the business, and again work with some really solid Memphis folks,” Miller says.

In that time, Miller continued to work with local musicians on everything from legal issues, to booking, to distribution, all for little or no reward. Last year, he also curated musical acts for the Indie Memphis Film Festival, creating much-needed paying gigs for many local musicians.

“Memphis is full of people who volunteer their time for causes and needs across the board,” Miller says. “You’re never promised success, financial or otherwise, and it may sound cliche, but choosing to invest yourself in something you care about and seeing it grow can be its own reward. I’ve always believed that it’s more important to put in the work and see where it can go rather than sit around and worry about the ultimate outcome. Over the years that’s served me well, allowing opportunities to learn a lot and work with a ton of extremely talented people.”

Now Miller will be devoting a great deal of his energy toward booking and promoting shows at Lafayette’s (though he will also be staying on at Shangri-La and Misspent).

Early on, patrons complained about volume levels in Lafayette’s as well as the occasionally odd/out-of-place booking, and the bands complained about sound issues and occasionally unengaged crowds. Most, if not all, of the technical issues have since been resolved, and Miller intends to address the other issues with a more focused, Memphis-centric approach to booking and event planning.

“With its location in the heart of Midtown and its history, Lafayette’s has been and should be a place where great Memphis musicians can be heard any day of the week,” he says. “That’s the goal going forward for sure. We’ll still host out-of-town touring bands that are a good fit, but we want to make sure that we feature the depth and breadth of talent that lives, works, and plays right here at home.”

Whether this new approach to talent buying clicks at Lafayette’s remains to be seen, but, regardless, Miller will continue to work for and on behalf of Memphis musicians.

“Misspent has a few things on the horizon right now,” Miller says. “I’ll still be up at Shangri-La a good amount. I really enjoy being able to work there and meet folks from around the globe who are drawn to the current and historical music scenes we have. Hearing their excitement about finally being in Memphis helps keep a perspective on how fortunate I’ve been to work with the musicians in this town.”

“Now I find myself booking for Lafayette’s. I like new opportunities, and in Memphis it seems like there is always something different to do if you’re willing to take a chance and see where it goes.”

Americana roots rock band the Dustbowl Revival play Lafayette’s Music Room this Thursday night. Formed in Venice Beach in 2007, the Dustbowl Revival came together after band leader Z. Lupetin, a transplant from the Midwest, posted a Craigslist ad seeking musicians who were interested in string-band and brass-band traditions. Since then the band has been playing on front porches and festivals and everywhere else in between.

The eight-person band recently released their fourth studio album With a Lampshade on, a record that fully showcases the band’s strength as a live act. With a Lampshade on features a mixture of live and in-studio recordings, with the live songs recorded by Alex Chaloff at the Troubadour (L.A.) and the Great American Music Hall (San Francisco), and the studio tracks recorded by Matt Marinelli at Coral Sound in Long Island City, New York.

The Dustbowl Revival

By mixing up the album with live and studio tracks, With a Lampshade on perfectly captures the band’s strength as a live act, but the studio tracks hold their own as well. This latest album sees the band blazing through original songs and folk traditions alike, and their take on “Old Joe Clark” sums up the band’s take on Americana swing perfectly. While the band’s other albums had more of an old-time feel, With a Lampshade on finds the Dustbowl Revival hitting a much more soulful vibe while they sing stories about preachers, drinkers, lovers, and everything in between.

Since her debut album 1835 Madison was released in 2013, Faith Evans Ruch has been one of the most distinct voices in the Memphis music scene, teaming up with big-name players like Rick Steff, Roy Berry, and Luther Dickinson to create her soulful brand of folk rock. I sat down with Ruch to find out more about the two singles she’s releasing on Tuesday, February 23rd, at Lafayette’s Music Room, how recording at Royal Studios influenced her as a songwriter, and how getting your heart broken might be a blessing in disguise.

– Chris Shaw

Memphis Flyer: Your new song “Sugar” is a lot more soulful than some of your earlier work. Was that an intentional transition?

Faith Evans Ruch: Yes, it was. My first couple of albums were very much on the folk side of Americana music, and I really wanted to venture out and explore some other areas. I started focusing more on soul music and Memphis music. I set out to write a song that wasn’t “folk-y,” and I sat down and wrote the chorus first. I was listening to a lot of Nina Simone and Etta James, and I think I captured that pretty well. I was trying to channel Memphis.

This was the first time you’ve worked at Royal Studios. What was that experience like?

It was awesome. I’m kind of a creature of habit, and I did my first two albums at Music+Arts over on Nelson and Barksdale. When I played the stuff for producer Kevin Houston, he said the songs were really soulful and suggested that we go to Royal. You can really feel the soulful spirit in that room, and I think these are some of the best vocal performances I’ve ever recorded.

Lyrically, “Sugar” is a pretty classic love song. Can you explain the inspiration behind it?

When I started writing the hook, I was honestly just thinking about how all my other love songs are really sad, and I just wanted to make something more positive. I came up with the chorus, and then I got stuck because I didn’t have a lot of positive experience from my personal life. Once I got into the relationship I’m in now, things changed, and I found inspiration for the song.

Both of the singles that you’ll be releasing on Tuesday were recorded in one day. Was it intimidating to try and have them completed in one recording session?

I’m a nurse, so I’m used to working strict, regimented days. We did “Sugar” and “Thank You” in about 10 to 12 hours, but I wasn’t worried about the time. I’ve never had any issues with getting things done in the studio. The creative process can take longer sometimes, though. At times the songs just flow, but other times there are cases of serious writer’s block. These two singles got written at different times. I had “Thank You” done for over a year, but “Sugar” had most of the parts written in one day.

I really liked the horns throughout “Thank You.” It definitely has a soul vibe to it, but there are also some elements of classic country. Is that how you’d describe it?

I’m from the South, and I grew up listening to soul music, but, as I said earlier, I’m also very inspired by folk music. There are times when I have to tell myself, “OK, we are not writing a folk song today!” But I think you’re right, there are elements of soul, but it also has some classic country going on, which is why I think it sounds so unique.

There’s a line in “Thank You” that says “Thank you for breaking my heart.” That’s kind of an interesting line in the sense that most people wouldn’t be thankful for something like that.

I wrote that song after the last Folk Alliance, and it was a very personal experience. I started to play the first song I ever wrote at the Alliance, and started explaining that I had my heart broken and I loved music and it just wasn’t enough to listen to it anymore. For a while, I was so heartbroken, it was all could I write about. I had to meet someone and have my heart broken to experience all the cool things I’ve done with my music, and I started to think I ought to say thank you to the person that broke my heart, because what I’ve been able to do with my music is way cooler than that relationship could have ever been.