Railroad Earth

Railroad Earth

This week’s band is one of my all-time favorites. I chose to write about them this week because they are playing a show at the Barrymore Theatre in Madison, WI this Friday night. I debated whether to wait and write about them next week so I could talk about the show, but decided against it for two reasons:
1)There shows are always great.
2)I wanted to give anyone in the area a chance to check them out
while they are in town.

Heres some mood music before you continue reading....



I have seen Railroad Earth many times and they always put on an outstanding show. In fact they put on one of my favorite concerts of all time. It was about six years ago, they played the Memorial Union Terrace on a beautiful summer night, they really put on a top notch performance. In the end, it was a combination of their song "Seven Story Mountain" along with a little help from mother nature that really made this show a cut above the rest. During Seven Story Mountain (their encore), the northern lights lit up over Lake Mendota and provided the perfect backdrop to a perfect encore. For those of you that don’t know, the Memorial Union Terrace is set on the shore of Lake Mendota, right at the intersection of UW Madison campus and State St., and is one of my favorite places to hang out or listen to live music.

Railroad Earth falls into the “progressive bluegrass” or “jam-grass” category, and in general I’d say that there music makes you feel good about life. All the guys in the band are friendly, humble people. They will always take the time to hang out with the crowd after a show is done, and I think that these personalities really shine through in the down-home, friendly tone of their music.

RRE just put out a recent album, Amen Corner, which is a great one. But my favorite of their albums is the two disc live album “Elko”. If you get a chance, check them out! And if you’re in town and want to go, let me know.

Be advised though, If you listen to “long way to go” a few times, it will be stuck in your head.
;-)

- ben


check out free live music from RRE here!