$8 in advance / $10 at the door
5pm doors / 8pm showtime
21+
sponsored by Indeed Brewing & Radio K
We are the Willows:
We Are The Willows is an orchestral indie rock band based out of South Minneapolis. The 6-piece ensemble features songwriter/frontman Peter Miller’s unique countertenor voice and guitar, supported by Jeremiah Satterthwaite (guitar/banjo), Leah Ottman (violin/voice/keys), Hilary James (cello/voice/keys), Travis Collins (bass), and Josh McKay (drums). We Are The Willows craft dynamic, intimate songs with instruments and voices combining to create energetic rhythms and intricate melodies. Their heartfelt arrangements evoke shared nostalgic feelings of love and loss.
For We Are The Willows, the 4 years between 2013 and 2017 were busy. The sort of busy that makes memory a blur of impressions, half thoughts and whatever our internet feeds tell us had been happening. We Are The Willows endeavored to make a splash in the music world with a dense, two part, 20 song concept album entitled, Picture (Portrait), released in 2014 and 2016 respectively. The album garnered praise from NPR, the BBC, Buzzfeed, PASTE magazine, Noisey, The Brooklyn Vegan and offered the band an on ramp to showcasing at SXSW, Treefort Music Fest, along with opening for the likes of Blitzen Trapper, S. Carey, PHOX and Matt Pond PA. On top of all of this, the band toured rigorously throughout the greater midwest playing clubs, colleges, bars, theaters, coffee shops, and people’s homes.
In the Summer of 2017, Mike Noyce (Bon Iver, Tallest Man on Earth, S. Carey) offered his engineering and production services to the band. They met Mike at April Base Studio, built by Justin Vernon and co. in Fall Creek, WI to record The Prettiest Please. The weekend in the studio was one of rejuvenation. Before this, the band had only recorded in basements, living rooms and church sanctuaries on shoestring-budget-recording-gear, with engineering and production duties handled by singer and principal songwriter Peter M and guitar player Jeremiah Satterthwaite. Noyce gave the band an opportunity to focus, feel and perform. April Base provided satiation for every creative compulsion. When the weekend was over, We Are The Willows was a new band and the song might just be proof of that.
Con Davison:
(of Bad Bad Hats)
By the time he’d moved to Minneapolis at 20 years old, you’d have thought Con Davison was just a wandering music school drop out. He moved into a house with too many people, and got random jobs at mediocre places. Music had subsided to no more than a quiet hobby to cope with the woes of being young and away from home. But, almost accidentally, musical favors turned into consistent involvement, and Davison slowly stumbled his way into the Twin Cities music scene, first lending his drumming to numerous projects (most recently Bad Bad Hats and Dreamspook) and now onto his debut solo EP, Far Off Distant Plans.
Holed up in a studio within a long forgotten King Coil mattress factory in Saint Paul, Davison put together a collection of songs about the future: songs about longing and songs about fear. And somewhere within those feelings of trepidation, a little bit of hopefulness shines through.
Jangly melodies and self-assured rhythms give a nod to the past, while making room for Davison’s rumination about tomorrow. Written and recorded entirely by Con Davison, with post production help from Brett Bullion (Bad Bad Hats, Now,Now) and Huntley Miller (Sylvan Esso, Bon Iver), Far Off Distant Plans is swirling with sincerity and realism; it is a surprising debut from a college drop out, turned hired gun drummer, turned exactly what he’s always wanted to be: completely himself.