View Full Version : King Wilkie /Open Road ...in the life
KevinM
Aug-20-2004, 12:37pm
Just got the albums for both of these and wish to report them eminently listenable collections of fine, traditional sounding bluegrass music. KW's harmonies are interesting, and I dig the yodels. Caleb's mandolin on Open Road is as tasteful as ever, and he and Bradford Lee can harmonize with the best of them. Get 'em both soon. You can preview KW at their website, www.kingwilkie.com. How can you not like a band with such a cool name.
Yellowmandolin
Aug-20-2004, 1:59pm
They are going to be at a small festival in my town, and I had never heard of them before. It is good to know that they are a good traditional BG band. Has anyone heard them live?
mandopete
Aug-20-2004, 2:16pm
Open Road or King Wilkie? Seen Open Road twice and they were great! They have a new fiddle player and sounded great a couple of months ago here in Seattle. Anxiously awaiting King Wilkie's performance at Wintergrass 2005!
danmills
Aug-20-2004, 11:05pm
I've seen King Wilkie twice, once in Palo Alto, CA, and again at the Wolf Mt Festival in Grass Valley, CA. They put on a great live show. I enjoy their CD, but live is even better.
Open Road is great too. I saw them in Santa Cruz and also at Wolf Mt. I liked their original fiddle player better, but the new guy is no slouch. Bradford has the high tenor vocal thing down pat, and he's very expressive. They really work the single mic well.
Also, if you like Open Road and haven't already, then check out the Vern Williams Band, especially "Music From The Gold Country". They seem to have been a major influence for Open Road, both sound and repertoire.
Dan
Yellowmandolin
Aug-21-2004, 6:33am
Good! This ought to be good then. I'll let you know how it was later tonight!
KevinM
Aug-23-2004, 9:02am
yellowmandolin how's that report coming along? I spent a chunk of this weekend playing along to King Wilkie on the Flatiron and having a great time - some good tunes in there, especially the haunting "Lee & Paige".
ethanopia
Aug-23-2004, 10:00am
KW was great at the Spring Valley Bluegrass festival this weekend. I really enjoyed their sets. They tend toward the mellower side of Bluegrass, though when they want to they can do the hard drving stuff as good as any band out there. They really understand dynamics. Really nice guys too.
The festival grounds were nice as well, cool place. Kind of felt like camp...
http://www.springvalleypool.com
Darren
Aug-23-2004, 12:02pm
Anyone know who is playing bass with King Wilkie now? I believe their old bass player just left the group to go attend music school.
The guy's name on bass is Jake Hopping !
He moved from Indianapolis to Asheville this last sping, he was our bass player with The Spud Puppies in Indy....The dang guy can play anything he picks up!...But is one helluva bass
player
Now he is the old man in that band !
-----------
Boyd
mandopete
Aug-25-2004, 7:03am
Got to thinking about something last night. I've seen Open Road twice and both times they ended their show by jamming onstage with the other band from the show. Is this something they always do? If so, I think that's a pretty cool thing.
Yea i think King Wilkie are great!
KevinM
Aug-30-2004, 8:48am
FYI -there are downloads of recorded live shows of high quality available at www.bluegrassbox.com for both Open Road and King Wilkie (the latter just posted a soundboard show this past June - 2 CDs worth - and it looks like a killer - I just downloaded it and I'll let you know.) The Open Road show there is also very good. Both have "soundboard" direct to CD type recordings so they sound great. Highly recommended (And while you are downloading, grab the stellar sounding Johnson Mountain Boys show.) Ofcourse if you do this, support the bands and buy their commercial releases as well.