For nearly two decades, there was no documentation that the final work recorded by folk-rock duo Billy Pilgrim existed.
The master tapes burned in a fire in late 2000 at Nickel & Dime Studio near Decatur, Ga. One copy remained, and from it, about 500 CDs were pressed and sold at a 2001 performance at Eddie’s Attic, the Atlanta haven for acoustic music.
Following that concert, Billy Pilgrim’s Kristian Bush and Andrew Hyra went their separate ways – never disbanding, but also never speaking for the next 15 years.
This coming September, Billy Pilgrim’s lost recording, the lone copy unearthed by Bush while rummaging through his closets during the coronavirus quarantine, will finally receive its widespread due when it is released on all streaming platforms.
Billy Pilgrim – named for a character in Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse Five,” a shared favorite novel of the pair – was the first band for Bush, who would later become the soulful half of multi-platinum, Grammy Award-winning country duo Sugarland, as well a producer, playwright and solo artist.
He met Hyra in Bush’s hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., in 1990 at an open mic night hosted by Hyra and his sister, Annie. As Bush prepared to move to Atlanta to attend Emory University, he persuaded the siblings to also move to the city, where a bustling acoustic scene was unfolding.
The band released their independent debut, St. Christopher’s Crossing (as Kristian Bush and Andrew Hyra) in 1991 before morphing into Billy Pilgrim and landing a deal with Atlantic Records in March 1992.
Their first major-label effort – the critically acclaimed Billy Pilgrim – arrived in 1994 and spawned the college and Triple-A radio hits, “Get Me Out of Here” and “Insomniac.” The follow-up, 1995’s “Bloom,” hit No. 37 on Billboard’s Heatseekers chart and offered fans the melodic-yet-muscular “Sweet Louisiana Sound.”
Following their release from Atlantic Records in 1996, Billy Pilgrim began tinkering with what would eventually become In the Time Machine. Nearly five years later, the album received its only public outing at the Eddie’s Attic performance that ended with Bush and Hyra following diverging paths.
Today Glide is offering an exclusive premiere of “Tumblelane,” a standout track on the forthcoming album. Backed by a powerful percussive beat, the song definitely has a 90s sound with its embrace of alt-rock and harmonies. While the song starts in a more intimate, stripped down fashion, it blossoms into a soaring, emotionally powerful rocker complete with soulful organ, pop-infused acoustic strumming, and a catchy chorus. It’s easy to imagine this song as a hit on 90s radio, and listening to it now makes you long for a time when rock and folk groups that were actually decent could find mainstream success with simple songs that touched on universal themes and ideas.
Andrew Hyra describes the inspiration behind the song:
I don’t want to live in fear anymore. Fear of a virus, of other people’s opinions, of hatred, money, lack of where have I been? I don’t remember with any clarity if my experience was shrouded in fear. Tumblelane is a point, a coordinate where the choice is made clear. A choice to live in love, hope, faith, gratitude, abundance and to choose this over fear. We all have this choice, though most of us don’t know it, right now we are at that inflection point where the choice is clear, Tumblelane. Choose love over fear, this is the necessary evolutionary expansion we are all up against RIGHT NOW.
Kristian Bush adds his own thoughts:
When you get caught up in the wave you didn’t see coming and it spins you in the heat of fear, the loss of control shakes you awake. From that place you have a choice, stand up and breathe or hide in fear of the next invisible wind. In the standing up, as the muscles give and take to hold you steady you can ask in the humblest and mightiest of voices, as you see the horizon, “where have I been”.
This song is that to me, I can see Andrew lift off the ground as he sings and it pulls me up with it. I never question pure emotion when I hear it. It is always true, and it is ringing clear as a bell in this recording. Somehow he uses words as colors and his voice paints with them. This is Billy Pilgrim when we turn on the jet engines and open up the throttle.
LISTEN:
