After years of hosting The Gay Ole Opry and the Queer Country Quarterly, Pittelman decided it was time to put together a festival to showcase all of the queer, trans, and POC talent in Country music—and what better time to do so than the weekend before July 4th?
NYC’s Karen & the Sorrows, pioneers of the Queer Country movement and hosts/organizers of Another Country Festival (buy tickets), an LGBTQ and POC focused Americana/Country music festival to be held in Brooklyn on July 2nd. The band, comprised of singer-songwriter Karen Pittelman, pedal-steel guitarist Elana Redfield, and drummer Tami Johnson, has previously been featured at Vice, Bust, No Depression, Bandcamp & more.
In Pittelman’s words, “There has always been a relationship between what country music stands for and what this country stands for, and, as musicians, I think part of our job is to question both. So I wanted to bring together some of my favourite queer, trans, and/or POC musicians to think about all this, about how Country and Americana music get positioned politically, about racism and the construction of genre, and about what it means to claim the music you love for your own lives and communities.”
In addition to organising Another Country, Karen & the Sorrows are also gearing up to release their new LP, The Narrow Place, on August 25. There’s a strain of ghostly prettiness running through the new LP that calls to mind David Lynch’s Twin Peaks muse Julee Cruise. But that softness is paired with a dark twang and a strong beat that roots the band in the tradition of the 1970s country rock—from Pure Prairie League to Neil Young—that Redfield and Pittelman grew up with, creating an aesthetic that is both unexpected and entirely country.
I’ve been one of the lucky one’s, that has had the chance to listen to Karen & the Sorrows new album The Narrow Place and you have real music treat to look forward to – just mark your calendar right now on August 25.
Another Country Festival (buy tickets) in Brooklyn – July 2nd – 2017.
