Folk Alliance Day 3, Rakish, Charm of Finches, and Aoife Scott

Andy Meaney and Aoife Scott

My usual Folk Alliance running partner Mike Warren couldn’t be here this year, and he is sorely missed. He has what seems an encyclopedic memory for music he’s encountered (especially that he loves), and his presence at the conference inevitably leads me to see many remarkable acts I wouldn’t have found on my own. With my much narrower bandwidth, I occasionally find something he hasn’t heard too. We come together like Folk Alliance itself, a dizzying spiral of intersecting communities falling for one another’s passions. All of this is to say, when Mike told me he hated to miss the act Rakish, 40% of a wonderful band his nephew was in, (Pumpkin Bread), I knew I had to go. 

 Fiddler and banjo player Maura Shawn Scanlin and guitarist Connor Hearn make up the act, a duo that seems to delight in smashing boundaries between musical genres. To do so, though they may explain that one song “Bilateral Craziness” (an autocorrect mistake that Scanlin decided to keep) has no time signature, and “Courante” is a piece by Debussy, they repeatedly work their way back to swinging spirals of sound just next door,  if not in fact, their beloved Irish or Scottish reels. 

 They trade vocals and feed off each other’s banter. Last night they noted it was Bandcamp Friday, which meant it was the one-year anniversary of their first self-titled EP, while also encouraging us all to take advantage of the day’s deals and buy all our favorite Folk Alliance music before midnight (so the artists can receive 100% of their profits from each sale). They also joked about their influences—Connor Hearn, an English major, wrote the first song they played inspired by James Joyce. The classically trained Scanlin introduces a piece by Robert de Visee noting, “We like to justify our degrees.” 

 And such good-natured self-deprecation is part and parcel with their down-to-Earth charm. Scanlin soon turned and introduced “No Such Thing as Luck” as a number “for the Star Wars fans!” But the humor only helped bridge the music’s wide range of emotions. A “Scottish” instrumental Scanlin said wasn’t really Scottish (because she wrote it) offered a plaintive note to bring tears to the eyes, for a minute. Shining eyes seemed to be everywhere as heads all around the room began to nod and bob, once again, as they had done throughout the set (yes, even to the one without the time signature). 

Rakish playing “Courante/The Sunny Hills of Beara/The North Star” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uraqJj6DlV8

“Do you all know the TV show 6 Feet Under?” Ivy Windred-Womes of the Melbourne sister act Charm of Finches asked the room to scattered applause and murmurs of approval. The sisters nodded and agreed that they love the show, explaining that the song they were about to play, the title track to their most recent album, Wonderful Oblivion, is inspired by the show. 

 

Then, with a dry, sly comic timing that recurred throughout the set, Ivy added, “Also, our dad is an undertaker.” They launched into the song. Not to say that explained anything, but, boy, it solidified the poignant distinction of these two haunted young women in bright blue and pink bell dresses, singing brilliant, vertigo-inducing meditations on the fragile nature of our existence. 

 The song titles told their own story—“Concentrate on Breathing” followed by “Canyon” (a song about being thrown into that space), “Clean Cut,” “The Bridge,” “Gravity,” and, finally, “Wonderful Oblivion.” The sounds range from the sharp crunch of “Clean Cut” to a variety of ethereal textures provided by a mix of keys, violin, and tambourine coloring the air around the notes from Mabel’s acoustic guitar. 

 Mabel offered a quiet deliberative quality that played as a comedic counterpoint to sister Ivy’s quick jabs. Mabel recalled a recent four-month tour through Europe that had been…she hesitated…” great fun but a long time.” 

Immediately, Ivy’s eyes cut across her keyboards to her sister, “a long time with the one person.” 

They both laughed at that one. 

But Mabel could then turn around and add an earnest thoughtfulness to the banter. She told a story from years before, recalling a group of young people they encountered on the road to the Woodford Folk Festival. They were gathered at a bridge where a friend of theirs had recently fallen and died. “It was sad,” Mabel said, adding that they could relate to these other kids because they too had lost a friend, far too young, in a similar way. This was, of course, the set up to the song, “The Bridge,” which seemed a love letter to their long-lost friend. It was a lump-of-the-throat moment in a set filled with enough quiet beauty, pain, fear, and wonder to have listeners gripping their seats. 

Charm of Finches’ video for “Canyon” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG-1SZE72Vw

Dublin’s Aoife Scott and her partner, guitarist Andy Meaney placed the perfect final touches on such an emotional evening. Scott began by telling the story behind her 2020 song “Sweet October.” In that terrible pandemic spring, they’d written the song dreaming of a time when they could go to the coast again. The unassuming gentle melody and Scott’s wistful vocal provided a kind of climax to the evening, everyone well aware of how lucky we were to be together again. 

But Scott was just getting started. She talked frankly of trying to break with her family’s musical heritage, which she grew up perceiving as a hard life for very little pay. (Her mother, Francis Black, is a member of the Black family, a renowned Celtic group who inherited their trade from their own parents.) However, Scott found herself miserable in the corporate job she’d landed, losing her voice, and struggling with depression. 

One day, Meany wanted to play her a Bruce Cockburn song he’d just heard, “Wondering Where the Lions Are.” At first, she resisted, but the song almost magically began to lift her from her depression and restore her voice. Scott sang the Cockburn song, leading the room in call and response around the refrain. 

At the end of her set, Scott sang a song “The Growing Years” (written by Don Mescall) off her 2016 debut Carry the Day. The song told the story of a father’s death, and a child plagued by the unfairness of it all, fearful for what might happen next. Meaney’s propulsive guitar pushed Scott’s vocal to face down the pain and fear, asking “please, please, please,  please, please, tell me now, where’s the justice in this, there’s no justice in this world.”

The conviction in Scott’s vocals comes to a particularly fine point in that lyric, which makes sense. It was the fight for justice in the Cockburn song that restored Scott's voice. It's also her work with the singers she presents at Folk Alliance (and at Tradfest Temple Bar back home) as “Women of Note” that stands as one of the finest statements in pursuit of justice the conference makes each year. 

 Aoife Scott’s “The Growing Years” from her first album, Carry the Day https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2llNDsNPZE

Websites:

Rakish— https://rakishmusic.bandcamp.com/album/rakish

Charm of Finches— https://charmoffinchesband.com/

Aoife Scott— https://www.aoifescott.com/

Folk Alliance Day 2, One Step Makes Many: Valerie June, Cary Morin Duo, Genevieve Racette, Iona Fyfe, and Joy Clark

 

Joy Clark and Tiffany Morris

Echoing Janis Ian’ sentiment from the day before, New Orleans singer-songwriter Joy Clark said, “I don’t know about you, but I always feel that I’m behind.” She used the comment to introduce her song “One Step in the Right Direction,” a beautiful meditation on perspective.

In the midst of one of many intricate guitar tapestries, Clark returned to a refrain that worked like a mantra-- “I know this road is not a race, so I keep going my own pace, until I find my place.”

 Fellow New Orleans musicians Tiffany Morris on bass and Bradley Bourgeois on drums complemented her search with solid, unobtrusive backing, both lockstep and free.

Joy Clark, singing “One Step in the Right Direction” solo a few months back: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYfKov8XylQ

I found myself thinking about Valerie June’s keynote speech earlier in the day.

Valerie June Delivering the Keynote

June took us on a rough but necessary journey to find hope. She recalled leaving Memphis on icy roads the same day police murder victim Tyre Nichols was laid to rest and then ticked off the many threats we face—from a global climate crisis to technology that “hacks our mind and body,” and the “daily threat of nuclear war.” She called to mind the many disagreements that keep us pitted against each other, and asked, “What will these battles mean when we are all made equal by unfortunate circumstances?” 

She sang a cover of Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” before focusing on reasons for some hard won hope.

Valerie June singing “What a Wonderful World” on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=265677271129168

Someone will post this talk soon, and I’ll repost it here.

Meanwhile, I want to emphasize the vision she offered.

June asked, “What if it’s as simple as starting where we are?”

And she meant, specifically, at that moment, Folk Alliance. June noted, after all, there’s “wizards and fairies everywhere,”  gesturing toward the packed darkness of the room. She added, “We begin with the revolutionary act of making art.”

June called for “a language of joy” to combat language that “elevates fears.” She pointed out that our entire money system is simply based upon our belief in it, so she wanted us to think about our potential  to shift such beliefs, to live without fear, to build “a more loving world.” She followed that with a performance of her song, “Astral Plane.”

Valerie June, “Astral Plane”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rN35g4eLQgg

Her talk was a perfect complement to the introductory remarks by Cary Morin and his partner and life and music, Celeste Di Iorio. Morin has been working as an artist in residence to raise awareness, alongside the Friends of the Kaw, regarding our river system. Morin sang as the Kaw, part of this great river system that allowed us to settle here in the first place, continues to give us life and suffer our neglect. Asking on behalf of the river for our care, Morin sang, “You’re helping me help you.”

Cary Morin and Celeste Di Iorio

More about the Cary Morin duo here: https://carymorin.com/cary-morin-duo

I found myself thinking a lot about the ways people were working together throughout the day. At Genevieve Racette’s showcase, Folquebec's Gilles Garand thanked the army of volunteers that make Folk Alliance happen. As the set closed, Racette acknowledged she was, in fact, dating a volunteer and offered another word of thanks. 

I thought about all the people building off this music—the photographers, others like me scribbling notes in pads, club owners and festival owners making plans. As June had pointed out earlier, we all understand what it means to hustle for a job, but there’s something else going on here too--a collective energy and vision fed and inspired by the music.

The echoing sentiments in the artist's voices suggest how that energy moves full circle, inspiring the art. Racette’s pledge to try some new things this year, including playing a song she’d never played live in front of anyone before, particularly considering the song, reminds me again of Clark’s “One Step in the Right Direction."

Eleanore Pitre, Genevieve Racette, and Judith Little D

Racette sang a new song I would presume is called “Same Old Me,” a song about wanting to overcome one’s anxiety and what seem lifelong traps. Her entire set seemed more relaxed and powerful this year though I was seeing it on a much larger stage than before (in the Century C ballroom where June spoke earlier in the day). Racette included more banter, hilariously confessing, “I’m not really a go with the flow person. I’ll gladly go with the flow, but I need to know when does it start and when does it end, and, also, is there a snack?”

Though it was largely the same songs as last year, Racette seemed to have grown more self-assured. A quiet grandeur seemed to come naturally. Racette’s deeply touching vocals were bolstered by dark counterpoints from Eleanore Pitre (of the band Rosier) on guitar and Judith Little D on drums.

Genevieve Racette’s opener, “Hostage”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpnV9LpqftQ&list=OLAK5uy_mku9n0UQIwFHlb3lFhX4PMjew86xAS810

Similarly, Scottish singer Iona Fyfe seemed ready to take on any challenge that may come her way. Quick and funny, in her banter alone she managed to take on the American health care system, teach us about the Scots language, and declare her unabashed belief in Scottish self-determination. Before singing a cover of Taylor Swift’s “Love Story,” translated into Scots, Fyfe noted it’s a pain to try to sort the legal clearances between here and there, “so if anyone knows Tay Tay,” she said, holding an invisible phone to her ear.

Guitarist Adam Hendy lent solid acoustic backing to her bright clear vocals which shone, flexed, and punched as needed. She sang a song of the “Northern Lights of Old Aberdeen” although she noted the writer Mary Webb had never been there, and Fyfe had lived there for 17 years without seeing any sign of these things. She also sang of Lady Finella, who killed King Kenneth II of Scotland to avenge her son’s death. 

Iona Fyfe, “Lady Finella”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzsbJtg9gFE  

My evening really ended with Joy Clark’s set. She finished with the song, “Good Thing.” The refrain offered assured gratitude and hope: “You know we got a good thing/And a good thing is not so easy to find/Yeah, you know we got a good thing/Take my hand and it will be all right.”

In such moments, the more loving world in June's dream felt like a living reality.

Joy Clark’s video for “Good Thing”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bc_ZL1djWOQ

 

 Websites:

Cary Morin Duo: https://carymorin.com/cary-morin-duo

Valerie June: https://valeriejune.com/

Genevieve Racette: https://genevieveracette.com/

Rosier: https://rosierband.com/

Iona Fyfe: https://ionafyfe.com/

Joy Clark: https://joyclark.bandcamp.com/

Folk Alliance Day 1,, "Imagination Is a Discipline," the 2023 Folk Music Awards' Vision of Change

 

Sara Curruchich

“They say women hold up half the sky,” NPR's Ann Powers began at last night’s Folk Alliance International awards. She added, “They’re holding up more than half the sky tonight,” the comment met with exuberant cheers and applause.

The Alliance’s infrastructure has seemingly always been women. But with Board president Ashley Shabankareh replacing Amy Reitnouer Jacobs, and the Alliance’s new executive director Neeta Ragoowansi replacing Aengus Finnan, the women at the top of the organization are clearly holding their own.

Guatemalan singer Sara Curruchich opened the evening with an all-woman band—marimba, acoustic guitar, drums, and bass—performing the spirited, march-like, anthem, “Mujer Indigena.” Mujer Indigena video Janis Ian received two awards, one for lifetime achievement and one as artist of the year for her 2022 album The Light at the End of the Line. Most of the award recipients—including Leyla McCalla, Molly Tuttle, Anais Mitchell, Aoife O’Donovan, Marcy Marxer and Cathy Fink—were all women, and the evening closed with a tribute to John Prine that featured a surprise appearance by Iris DeMent.

Josh White, Jr. Sings "One Meatball"

But the award Powers gave was a posthumous lifetime achievement award for singer Josh White, given to his son Josh White Jr. After a touching tribute to his father—cast out on the road as a child by the de facto lynching of White’s own father into a rough and tumble youth witnessing “more violence than any child should see”—Josh White Jr. led the room in a sing along of his father’s biggest hit, the tragicomic “One Meatball.” Josh White Jr. Playing "One Meatball" a few years ago This was immediately followed by Leyla McCalla alone with her cello singing White’s “The Riddle Song.”  

Even Jimmy Lee Beason II, the representative of the Osage Nation who gave the land acknowledgment, cited a woman, Buffy Sainte-Marie, as the first artist who came to mind when he thought about his connection to folk music. He added that he thought of what he was doing as, “Not so much a land acknowledgment as a native people acknowledgement,” reminding those in attendance that “we’re still here, and still resisting” and recalling the crucial role played by folk in the 60s and 70s. He said the music “gave Native voices a platform that is still sorely needed.” 

Leyla McCalla Sings "The Riddle Song"

In her lifetime achievement award speech, Janis Ian echoed Beason’s call by stating how she’d always hoped to give “voice to the voiceless.” Ironically, 2022 was a year in which the “Seventeen” and “Society’s Child” singer both released what she feels is the best album she ever made, The Light at the End of the Line, and permanently lost her singing voice.

Ian reflected on the loss. “I don’t know what to say yet to be honest. It’s been less than six months,” but she added, “I came to a realization of how much time I wasted.”

Of course, she noted this is a feeling common to artists. “Artists are born looking at the hourglass and watching it run out. We measure time by how much we’ve accomplished of what we plan to accomplish.”

To help, Ian advised the artists in the room to, first, “Trust your talent”—to steer them to the uncomfortable places they need to go and to steer clear of business dealings that don’t feel right.

She also underscored the spirit of the evening with a call to “Be brave.” Recognizing, she had not always been particularly courageous herself, she had some thoughts about how to go about it. “If you pretend to be brave long enough,” Ian said, “You will be brave.” Adding that heroic people have to act the part first. With a self-deprecating smile and an implied wink, she confided, “There’s more sleight of hand to this business of being a ‘legendary’ and ‘heroic’ person than you might think.”

Then, Providence, Rhode Island’s Jake Blount sang “Seventeen” before a performance by Irish singer Wallis Bird. With a gregarious laugh, Bird joked about the pressure she felt singing in front of Ian. She then moved the crowd to sing along with Ian’s 2022 “Better Times Will Come.” Janis Ian's "Better Times Will Come"

Wallis Bird sings "Better Times Will Come"

Tying themes together, People’s Voice Award winner Leyla McCalla quoted prison abolitionist Mariame Kaba with “Hope is a discipline.” McCalla then added “I believe that imagination is also a discipline.” She acknowledged that, though we live in a capitalist, colonized society that works to keep people from realizing their own power, “The work that we do as artists is the active undoing of this conditioning.” Furthering such connections, Dan Rafferty of the Shambala Festival (which received a sustainability award) said that the environmental solutions “are inseparable from the fight for social justice,” calling once again on the crowd “to bring about the change that’s sorely needed.”

Award shows are problematic events, honoring a handful of “stars” in their field while the breadth and the depth of the real community around any organization, certainly Folk Alliance, isn’t really made up of stars and is so much larger than any such show can convey. At their worst, such events tend to celebrate the wrong people. But what’s remarkable about the Folk Alliance awards each year is how it recognizes itself as setting the tone for a community bent on, sure, selling their work, but more generally striving to change the world.

The night ended with a tribute to perhaps the most unassuming practitioner of that vision, John Prine. The award went to Oh Boy, which reportedly is the second oldest indie label in the business. That took this writer back to both my delight and puzzlement finding a new John Prine album, Aimless Love, at a Stillwater, Oklahoma grocery store back in 1984. I thought maybe Prine lost his record deal. I was worried about him. Little did I know, Oh Boy would not only keep the rest of Prine’s career going but provide a venue for everyone from Todd Snider and Kelsey Waldon to Kris Kristofferson.

Iris DeMent, the Milk Carton Kids, and Company

Fiona Whelan Prine and Prine’s adopted son Jody Whelan accepted the award, Fiona declaring, “If John wasn’t folk, I don’t know what is.”  And Jody once again reminded the Folk Alliance of its power and potential.

“[Oh Boy] started with faith in the community, the fan community,” Whelan said. Then he added that the label would come to realize how much it needed “the larger community” to survive. To be clear, Whelan said, “The only place you could hear Oh Boy’s music was folk DJs.”

With that, the Milk Carton Kids played a cover of Prine’s “That’s the way that the world goes round” before backing Iris DeMent as she sang “Mexican Home.” Delight united the room as we celebrated “that sacred core that burns” inside us all.

The whole show is broadcast here: 2023 Folk Music Awards

"All Genres Are Part of the Vision," DJ NONAME at Tulsa's Mercury Lounge

dj noname debut, "Who Else But Me?"

At the end of December, we went to the Mercury Lounge in Tulsa to check out a hip hop set by DJ NONAME (from here out dj noname) featuring several special guests. So many hooks drew me in. First, the event was a fundraiser for an organization called the Center for Public Secrets, which seemed to be focused on raising awareness about the details of the 1921 Greenwood Massacre, specifically a new film called Oaklawn about the public fight to find the mass graves from that horrific chapter in our history. 

The evening also promised three sets, one by the metal band Blind Oath  https://blindoath.bandcamp.com/ and a final set by a band I knew fairly well, the great Tulsa Sound rockers, the Paul Benjamin Band https://www.paulbenjamanband.com/

Blind Oath due March 2023

Just the mix of styles would have been enough to draw me in, but the kicker was that they were all there to build cultural unity out of tragic divisions. 

2015 Horton Records Release

Right away, I was impressed by the mix of people and the energy gathering in this small space. Hip hoppers, head bangers, and cowboy longhairs greeting each other with warm hugs and huddling in the chill air on the outside deck as well as around the bars and booths inside. A woman with a pet skunk made her way through the crowd, people taking pictures and petting the docile, curious creature as she passed by.

Despite the noise of a crowded, excited room, I had a nice conversation with the folks running the Center for Public Secrets table. They told me about Lee Roy Chapman, the character they credited with starting the organization who dedicated his life to raising awareness about what had happened in 1921. More about Chapman here: https://www.centerforpublicsecrets.org/about 

The people at the table were, not surprisingly, musicians themselves [by the way, if you all see this, can you send your names and the band’s name again?], and they made sure I had a copy of ASLUT zine, which focused on the Greenwood Massacre, diving into the politics of the violence, including the class politics that rarely get discussed in the national shorthand: https://aslutzine.com/

With an early start the next day, we only stayed for the hip hop, but what a set that was. The crowd gathered around the stage, some rapping along with pieces of the rhyme, others responding with smiles and hands up, everyone rocking in their heels with increasing intensity. The final MC had a green and black scarf covering the bottom of his face but managed to spit rhymes with a clarity and intensity that captivated the room.

I now know that last MC was Earl Hazard, who worked with noname as Lou Purch https://djnoname.bandcamp.com/album/home-furniture-nothing-older-than-1977 He’s also been featured in the ongoing Tulsa hip hop podcast Fire in Little Africa https://anchor.fm/fire-in-little-africa/episodes/Episode-32-m-E-em96j6

Anyway, I downloaded the Lou Purch mix and a few other things, including the new solo work Three https://djno.name/ and hit this eclectic, connected DJ up with a few questions. I knew what was happening in Tulsa was, in some ways, singular in my experience and, in others, very much like the best of what I’ve experienced all across America over the past three decades. In my years as a writer, I’ve never felt a greater need for the vision I saw in Tulsa’s Mercury Lounge in December.  

Q: That night at the Mercury Lounge, I was impressed to see so many different kinds of groups coming together with community activists, Is that unusual for Tulsa? If not, how did that night come about? If so, why do you think that's happening in general?

dj noname: It’s not unusual around these parts. Tulsa’s been getting better at that, especially during the past year. Center for Public Secrets reached out to me to be part of their Benefit Concert (we raised a nice amount). Once we followed-up and confirmed, I had a “noname. & friends.” set in mind. Outside of the 3 MCs you watched perform: Joey Organic, Keezy Kuts and Earl Hazard… I had even more artists I wanted to put together and perform and then decided to peel back.

It’s happening in general because Tulsa is (finally) realizing how much talent we have outside of the usual suspects, and there are more facilitators giving platforms. The only way it happens at this rate is by continuing to have different genres and acts on the bill and being consistent about it.

Q: You have at least a dozen albums on Bandcamp, but the oldest date is 2020? How did your work develop so quickly over such a short amount of time?

dj noname: The way I started was funny because my original idea for my first solo album was going to have nothing with me doing any beats. I was going to put producers together to make stuff, and make it have a mixtape feel like how it was during my high school days (ca. ‘04). I was connected with artists in the Town so I knew I could turn into DJ Khaled and put some songs together.

Fast forward, I was working with another artist and producer MaliMotives, and when I told him what I was trying to do with my solo album, he told me I can make beats with my phone (I had an iPhone). Ever since he told me, I kept trying with GarageBand and couldn’t get it down. One morning, I told myself I wasn’t doing anything else until I got it down. The very next moment, I started making joints off GarageBand, and there was no going back, I was going at it day and night. This was before “Halftime” (2019) and “Snackin’ with Flavor” (4/3/2020).

Snackin’ with Flavor (Photo by nosamyrag)

I dropped my solo debut a month after “Snackin’ with Flavor” on 4/20/20 which is in connection to the first night I ever DJ’d, which was the year before at The Soundpony Lounge. Once I dropped my solo debut, I convinced myself to go on a run to just drop material at high volume. I did it to gain traction along with competing with myself to catch-up with everyone else as far as discographies go (I have over 40 projects). 2020 and 2021 were great years. I slowed down last year, which I called my “Cook Up Year” to where I was being more direct and intentional with what I was doing. I’m about to put it back in gear again.

Q: I'm pretty obsessed with the solo EP No Days of Christmas: Three. I'm intrigued by what you're doing with that--the opening George Benson stroll, the Maze stuff in the middle that's evocative of the two sides of a relationship, and then Joe Bataan's version of "I'll Be Sweeter Tomorrow," which seems to have moved the opening search to a new resolve. It's a little symphony that—though the music comes from 1969 to 1982 maybe—fits together as a coherent piece.

 

dj noname: I do everything in threes, and the two from the series before that give the same feel. I listen to George Benson heavy. The first beat that gave me a spark to start on my first solo album was a George Benson song that was chopped up by MaliMotives.

dj noname. presents Tra3Qwan (Artwork by Blake Brown)

Q: This seems like a new approach to me. Is it different than the way you've approached your previous solo work or with MCs?

dj noname: My approach with each MC is both the same and different. The same because once I hear it, I already have someone in mind and want that artist to have it. Different because I won’t send the same type of beat to Artist A I’d send to Artist B; I don’t shop it around to see who gets first dibs. I know the artists sense that; that’s what makes the projects even better.

Pie In The Sky (Artwork by Elizabeth “Feahther” Henley)

The approach for my solo work, it depends if I’m doing a studio album or just all instrumentals. When it comes to my solo studio albums, I just have to know, it’s a feeling. Once I get a direction, the wheels start spinning. I have two solo albums out and want to drop my third this year. It’s something I want to consider my magnum opus.

Q: In February, you have a month-long residency at the Mercury Lounge. What is your hope and plan for this residency?

dj noname: The more shows I do and the more people I connect with, I vow to showcase talent whenever I’m given the opportunity. That’s the purpose of my residency. I know where I stand in Tulsa, and I’m starting to plant seeds and share the wealth.

GTR, COMBSY & dj noname

The homie Costa, an artist and producer who also does work at Mercury Lounge, put me on. Super unexpected, I got right on it once everything was confirmed. At this very moment I have three shows lined-up for the first three Mondays of February while plotting on the last Monday of the month to cap it off.

Q: What’s next?

dj noname: I see myself at festivals more. Each year I get bigger opportunities, and it’s fun, I love what I do. I also see myself branching out to more artists outside of Tulsa along with producer placements on other projects that aren’t mine. All genres are part of the vision; I’m very open to that. Community is something I’m big on, and I show that in things I do. With more experience and opportunities, I know we can make a bigger impact.