Nothing sounds fairly like Chris Stapleton at sundown.
Listening to “Beginning Over” — his stressed and road-traveled tune about new beginnings — because the day slowly surrenders to a breezy fall night time?
Sure, please.
On Sunday, Stapleton closed down the 2022 version of Pilgrimage Music & Cultural Pageant with a night set that drew sunburnt households, 20-something beer-drinkers holding tight to the final hours of the weekend — and everybody in-between. They gathered inside The Park at Harlinsdale Farm in Franklin for the primary Pilgrimage in years not shadowed by rainout restoration of COVID-19 situations.
And for onlookers standing shoulder-to-shoulder close to the stage or sitting in foldable chairs on the sprawling pageant garden, Stapleton placed on a present worthy of shutting down one other 12 months at Pilgrimage.
“I do know everyone’s most likely gotta work tomorrow,” Stapleton mentioned early within the present, “however that does not imply we will not have a very good time tonight.”
The Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter belted his model of bearded, big-voiced country-rock for the two-hour present. He and the band — together with harmonica participant Mickey Raphael (a longtime member of Willie Nelson’s band), lap metal guitarist Paul Franklin (a go-to Nashville session participant) and bedrock vocalist-wife Morganne Stapleton — ripped by way of a can’t-miss listing of his rising catalog: the Southern rock curler “Arkansas,” daring ballad “Chilly,” fan-favorite “Parachute” and tender-hearted “Millionaire,” to call just a few.
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At instances, he and the band performed lots loud — like on riff-heavy rocker “Midnight Prepare To Memphis” and barn-burning jam “I Was Mistaken.”
“[We’re] gonna carry on goin’ now, ’til they make us cease,” Stapleton mentioned between songs, a refined nod to the 8:30 p.m. curfew. “Which is not too far off. However we’re gonna hold goin’ ’til they make us cease.”
And the present glowed brightest after the sundown when Stapleton “fired his band” for a three-song solo set. Or in his phrases, “How I used to do it … and I nonetheless love to do it generally.”
The stripped-down intermission took listeners by way of Stapleton’s childhood: His debut single “What Are You Listening To?,” breakout album title monitor “Traveller” and the so-called “saddest tune we’re gonna play all night time,” in Stapleton’s phrases: “Whiskey and You.”
After “Fireplace Away, “Outlaw State Of Thoughts” and “Damaged Halos,” Stapleton closed the night time with the duvet that helped propel him to pageant headliner after years in Nashville: “Tennessee Whiskey.” He took lead vocals, however a refrain of 1000’s singing alongside helped carry the tune house.
Learn on for extra highlights from Sunday at Pilgrimage (so as of look).
Molly Tuttle & The Golden Freeway
Think about the grass in Franklin sufficiently reduce.
Molly Tuttle and her ace band Golden Freeway took the stage Sunday for a set of blazing bluegrass tunes underneath the mid-afternoon solar.
“It’s so nice to be again right here,” mentioned Tuttle, a 29-year-old Nashville musician. She continued, “It is good to really feel like a hometown present for us.”
The 2019 Pilgrimage alum pulled largely from her 2022 album “Crooked Tree” for the set, dishing her return-to-roots bluegrass sound with progressive storytelling on songs like “She’ll Change” — a celebration of freewheelin’ womanhood — and “Dooley’s Farm,” a marijuana-farming reimagining of a basic folks story.
Arguably recognized greatest in roots music for her award-winning choosing, Tuttle and her band pushed by way of minor audio hiccups to swap riffs and lengthen songs into breezy, crowd-pleasing jams — together with a standout cowl of Jefferson Airplane’s psychedelic rock staple “White Rabbit” (that was briefly disrupted by a close-by marching band efficiency, of all issues).
Previous to Tuttle’s set, fast-rising nation singer Brittney Spencer closed her set with a rowdy romp of Nancy Sinatra’s “These Boots Are Made for Walkin'” that set the bar notably excessive for Sunday performances.
Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives
Just a little September warmth cannot gradual Marty Stuart down.
Wearing head-to-toe black and wrapped in a signature scarf, Stuart took the Pilgrimage stage smiling and dancing to a surf jam delivered by his well-oiled touring band.
After two songs, he howled into the center-stage microphone, “That is all, goodnight!”
He was kidding, in fact. Stuart and firm schooled Pilgrimage throughout an hour-long set that spanned Nineteen Sixties pop-rock affect, laid-back surf riffs, Nashville classics and Stuart’s personal Nation Music Corridor of Fame catalog.
Stuart performed rollicking 2012 quantity “Tear The Woodpile Down” and 1991 hit “Tempted” earlier than opening his songbook to share just a few basic nation tales.
“On the best way over right here this morning, we handed the road the place Waylon Jennings used to dwell,” Stuart mentioned on stage. “On Outdated Hickory Boulevard. … We additionally handed by actually shut the place a fantastic nation singer [lived] that my mom named me after, his title was Marty Robbins.
“A few cool cats from this place.”
Stuart and band proceeded to cowl Robbins’ nation epic “El Paso” and paid tribute to Jennings with the Seventies tune “I’ve All the time Been Loopy .”
Elle King
Like a liquor-soaked pre-party, Elle King took the mainstage forward of headliner Chris Stapleton to ship a robust pour of her whiskey-soaked soul singing.
King combined rock ‘n’ roll riffs with a touch of nation and splash of blues affect as she embraced Pilgrimage as a “hometown” present. For King, the efficiency comes throughout a wave of success rooted in close by Nashville: She inked a deal final 12 months with Sony Music Nashville, topped nation charts with boozy Miranda Lambert duet “Drunk (And Do not Wanna Go Dwelling)” and launched earlier this 12 months a duet with Music Row mainstay Dierks Bentley.
However Sunday afternoon belonged solely to King. Holding a drink within the air, she took the stage to a beefy Southern rock riff earlier than diving into no-nonsense anthem “Good For Nothing Lady.” The set adopted with a line-straddling assortment of rock hits (“Ex’s and Oh’s”) country-pop (the aforementioned “Drunk”) and the sonic world in-between (2022 single “Out Yonder”).
An alum of the 2018 Pilgrimage rainout, she soaked up Sunday’s solar with a drink in her hand.
“I am glad that we have been requested to come back again,” King mentioned. “I am nonetheless having a really fantastic day. I am pleased to be right here.”
Avett Brothers
If Elle King gave Pilgrimage a day shot of musical whiskey, then Avett Brothers supplied the chaser.
The household folk-rock outfit closed down the pageant’s Gold Document Street stage with a carefree set kicking off with the likes of fan-favorite songs “Laundry Room” and “Dwell and Die,” amongst others.
A shoulder-to-shoulder viewers stuffed a lot of the shaded subject for Avett tunes “SSS” and “Devil Pulls The Strings.” A seaside ball jumped between festival-goers watching the band bounce alongside to Americana tunes anchored by fiddle enjoying and banjo choosing – a high-energy near one in every of two premier levels for the weekend.
