Cosmic American are delighted to welcome back Mary Gauthier to Nottingham for a show at the Metronome in April 2024.

As she has so eloquently accomplished over the past 25 years, acclaimed singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier has used her art once again to traverse the uncharted waters of the past few years. “I’m the kind of songwriter who writes what I see in the world right now,” she affirms. Thankfully, amid dark storms of pandemic loss, she found and followed the beacon of new love: Her gift to us, the powerful Dark Enough to See the Stars, collects ten sparkling jewels of Gauthier songcraft reflecting both love and loss.

Her eleventh album, Dark Enough to See the Stars, follows the profound antidote to trauma, Rifles & Rosary Beads, her 2018 collaborative work with wounded Iraq war veterans. It garnered a Grammy nomination for Best Folk Album, as well as a nomination for Album of the Year by the Americana Music Association. Publication of her first book, the illuminating Saved by a Song: The Art and Healing Power of Songwriting, in 2021, brought her more praise. Brandi Carlile has said, “Mary’s songwriting speaks to the tender aspects of our humanness. We need her voice in times like these more than we ever have.” The Associated Press called Gauthier “one of the best songwriters of her generation.”

Special Guest Support :JAIMEE HARRIS

Austin’s Jaimee Harris has the sort of voice that reaches into your heart and makes you feel less alone, more connected, and somehow seen. Jaimee Harris is poised to become the next queen of Americana-Folk, a slightly edgier Emmylou Harris for the younger generation. She draws comparisons to Patty Griffin, Ryan Adams, and Kathleen Edwards – all writers who know how to craft a heartbreakingly beautiful song with just enough grit to keep you enthralled. Harris writes about the basic human experience, in a way that is simple, poetic, and often painfully relatable.

NB - Due to building refurb at St Peter’s Church in Redmile, this show has now moved to The Old Cold Store in Nottingham.

Kevin Montgomery is an American singer, songwriter.

Nashville plays a big part in Montgomery's development as a songwriter. His parents got married on a Thursday night in Littlefield, Texas so they could be at the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday night. Dad wrote songs for and played with Buddy Holly. Mom sang with Elvis (suspicious minds) and their next-door neighbour was Patsy Cline.
Kevin Montgomery's recording career began with his debut album "Fear Nothing" on A&M Records in 1993. He has toured the US with acts including Sheryl Crowe, Stephen Stills and David Crosby and featured on a duet with Mary Chapin-Carpenter on the 1996 Buddy Holly Tribute album "Not Fade Away" singing his father's composition "Wishing", his father also co-producing the track.

Montgomery has written songs for Juice Newton and Martina McBride. Sang on Lee Ann Womack's "I Hope You Dance".....his debut album on A&M Records was critically acclaimed. He has released several records since independently and toured relentlessly, including four 50 States and 50 Days tours. The last visit to Nottingham was with Garry Tallent from Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band.

SPECIAL GUEST : JUDE JOHNSTONE

Jude Johnstone is an American singer-songwriter. Her songs have been covered by Laura Branigan, Trisha Yearwood, Emmylou Harris, Bonnie Raitt, Bette Midler, Johnny Cash, Stevie Nicks, Mary Black, and others. Johnstone wrote the No. 1 song "The Woman Before Me" on Yearwood's debut CD, which also won an award from Broadcast Music Incorporated. In 1997, Johnny Cash won the Country Album of the Year Grammy for American II: Unchained for which Johnstone wrote the title track. She is to Trisha Yearwood what Jimmy Webb was to Glen Campbell.

SPECIAL GUEST SUPPORT : Michael Scott Boudreaux

Michael Scott Boudreaux, born and raised in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, is a singer/songwriter and accomplished guitarist whose 2020 debut is sure to turn the heads of country music listeners. His influences of Classic Country, Classic Rock, Texas Country, Americana, and Louisiana Roots music give him a sound like no other.  Michael began playing guitar at the age of three and started singing and playing for others not long after. Over the years, he began to develop an appreciation for songwriting and has studied artists such as Robert Earl Keen, Willie Nelson, Charlie Robison, Bruce Robison, and many more. Performing live as a teenager and eventually participating in festivals such as South Louisiana Songwriters Festival as a writer, his experiences as a performer and a writer come in a broad range

Boudreaux released his debut EP in 2020, with plans to release new music in the very near future!

We are delighted to welcome back Courtney Marie Andrews to the Metronome this September, this time with a full band!
Since she was last in Nottingham, Courtney has released her album her latest album ‘Loose Future’ which has garnered stellar reviews!

“ On the honey shores of Cape Cod in a beach shack, Courtney Marie Andrews found self-love and her voice. Every morning, she’d walk 6-8 miles around the back trails of an island and meditate on her life, perusing old memories and patterns like browsing a used bookshop. That summer of introspection led her to a joyous sense of beginnings and ends. When she let love for herself in, she therein let the outside love in, too—the summer feeling, the swaying cypress, the full moon, and the possibility of healthy love. This phase came only right after one of her darkest, though, where being alone with oneself was the most terrifying thing you could do. After more than a decade on the road, the Phoenix-born songwriter, poet, and painter finally had the space to process all the highs and lows of a life of constants. She was finally ready to make a record of triumph, while not completely forgetting the years that made her.

That record is Loose Future”

SUPPORT : Jack Francis

“A mix of raw soul, honest country heart and undeniable British resolve” - Holler Country

“This whole album should be declared an area of outstanding natural beauty.” - Louder Than War

Singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Jack Francis’ heartfelt songs are rooted in the finest musical traditions of America, whilst staying true to his own British and Irish heritage. His unique voice and perspective lend authority to lyrics exploring the complicated terrain of life with passion and poetic precision.

Jack’s musical journey started at 15 years old, honing his craft performing music in pubs, clubs and venues. After more than 10 years of experience touring around the UK, a stint writing pop songs for a publishing house followed. This become the catalyst for Francis to focus his attention on recording and releasing his own music, the way he wanted it to be heard.

During a break between the Covid-19 lockdowns of 2020, his self-titled debut album started production with the help of old friends, Ferris & Sylvester, at their home studio in Wiltshire. Upon its release, the songs from his debut were championed by the likes of Janice Long, Tom Robinson, Ricky Ross, and Iain Anderson all across the BBC.

A string of tour supports, as well as festival appearances in the UK and Europe, followed in the summer of 2022, before he started work on the follow-up album in September of the same year.

"Arguably the UK's finest export" - The New Yorker
"Great songs, great voice. The real thing" - Time Out
"Utterly compelling, quite beautiful and frequently hilarious" - The Guardian

Mercury Prize-nominated singer-songwriter John Bramwell is one of the UK’s most unique and talented singer-songwriters and has been performing as a musician for over 30 years.

In the early 1990s, Bramwell formed The Mouth with friend and musician Bryan Glancy that later included members of I Am Kloot – Andy Hargreaves and Peter Jobson. The Mouth first played live at the Whisky a Go Go in Los Angeles, and on returning from America, Bramwell worked booking bands at Manchester venue Night & Day Café during the mid-to late-1990s. In 1999, he formed I Am Kloot. The band released their first album Natural History in 2001 – produced by Guy Garvey from Elbow.

In 2023 he returns showcasing new material from the forthcoming album The Light Fantastic (Townsend Records). The former I Am Kloot songwriter will also perform material from his earlier albums ( Leave Alone The Empty Spaces reached Number 1 in the iTunes songwriter chart in 2018) and some Kloot classics as well. As part of I am Kloot, John released ten albums, receiving a Mercury Music Prize nomination for the exquisite, ‘Sky at Night’.

SUPPORT : David Fidler

Canadian Double Bill : Sarah Jane Scouten and Del Barber (with full band)

Four-time Canadian Folk Music Award nominee, Sarah Jane Scouten is a songwriter of rare quality, combining sounds of early country music, ballad singing, folk rock and 60’s soul. It’s modern indie Americana that knows exactly where it comes from, with confidence and sophistication only bought by time. Surrounding herself with top-notch musicians, the live show is as dynamic as her four (soon to be five) albums: at any moment making feet move or eliciting laughter or tears. She is dry, funny, irreverent yet generous. She has a job to do and she takes it very seriously: to entertain, to inspire, and to be cathartic. An ever-expanding palette and a warbling iconic country voice – honed over many a campfire – brings a freshness to her brand of ambient indie Americana. It's as relevant today as it is rooted in the music of her forebears.

Raised in a musical family on Bowen Island, British Columbia, Sarah Jane now calls both Scotland and Canada home. The daughter of a Scottish immigrant to Canada, she was raised with ceilidh culture and fiddle music which fed directly into her passion for American old-time, country, and folk song. Her father played the 5-string banjo while her mother taught Scottish country dancing, and with that, she found her way in music through songwriting.

Like any songwriter worthy of the name, Sarah Jane explores love with a fine-toothed comb but isn't limited to romantic love. Love of a place, a time, the natural world, and all its inhabitants tug at her sleeve, which she handles with equal power to delight and break a heart. According to Tom Power of CBC q, "Stan Rogers was able to do it, Ron Hynes was able to do it, Kate McGarrigle was able to do it – and Sarah Jane Scouten is able to do it."

"An agile voice, ruminative songwriting, and love for classic country, indie pop, and everything in between."
- American Songwriter

Del Barber
With nominations for JUNO Awards, Western Canadian Music Awards, and Canadian Folk Music Awards - Del Barber has shaped the folk music canon in Canada with five critically acclaimed studio albums under his belt, as well as a myriad of fans. 'Easy Keeper’ recorded in a cabin during the pandemic, has received critical acclaim from Rolling Stone Magazine and The Bluegrass Situation.
As the follow-up to his Easy Keeper record, Stray Dogs finds Del Barber bridging his past and present. Conceived during pandemic isolation at his rural Manitoba home, the eight songs on Stray Dogs are drawn mainly from Del’s large stock of previously unfinished demos, given renewed focus and polish by his longtime band and producer Scott Franchuk. Paring things down to the bone, the acoustic-based Stray Dogs captures the essence of Del’s art, of which Rolling Stone wrote, “Like John Prine (one of his primary influences), Barber writes the types of songs his characters might listen to themselves.”

Without doubt or qualification, The Sadies are one of Canada's greatest extant rock ’n’ roll bands — just as they have been for the last quarter-century. Versatile and imaginative, they skip from astral psychedelia to shuffling bucolics and leap from puckish pop to righteous garage-rock without losing momentum or mastery. Their new albums deliver master classes on pointed songwriting, lockstep harmonies, and a devil-may-care attitude to expectations and past successes.

With their preternatural musicianship and vocal harmonies, The Sadies can blow pretty much any band off the stage—anyone who’s ever seen them live knows that. But what is sometimes overlooked is their superlative songwriting. With the new release, “Colder Streams” they’ve delivered one of their most memorable albums yet: 11 distinctively original new songs imbued with melody, mystery and that indefinable Sadies magic. It’s been said before, but it bears repeating: most bands only get worse with age—much, much worse—the Sadies continue to confound us by getting better and better.

“The Sadies' world has been shaken,” said the band in a joint statement. “While we struggle with the loss of Dallas – our brother, friend, and band mate music has been our source of comfort and coping. We are honoured to announce the release of our new album, Colder Streams. We are so proud of Dallas and the work that went into this album and look forward to sharing it with you.”

SUPPORT:TBC