ATO Records is proud to announce the October 12, 2004 release of the North Mississippi Allstars first-ever live album, entitled Hill Country Revue. This amazing live set was recorded at this year’s Bonnaroo Music Festival on June 11th, and features guest appearances from R.L. Burnside, Jim Dickinson, Chris Robinson, JoJo Hermann, Otha Turner’s Rising Star Fife and Drum Band and others. To support the new album the boys will head out on the road for a fall tour beginning September 16th. The “Shake, Holla & March” Tour, which includes stops in New York, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, will have opening acts The Dirty Dozen Brass Band and The Rising Star Fife and Drum Band.
What occurred that late afternoon in Tennessee defies description but is plain to hear in the grooves of this once in a lifetime set. Onstage with Jim Dickinson, R.L. Burnside, Duwayne Burnside, Garry Burnside, Cody Burnside, Otha Turner’s Rising Star Fife and Drum Band as well as Widespread Panic’s JoJo Herman and ex-Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson, the Allstars played host to history as they connected the dots between the past and future of the mighty sounds of the Mississippi hills. From the opening track “Shake ‘Em On down” to the closer “Going Down South,” the show was full of genuflections to past hill country legends like Burnside and Fred McDowell, yet also contained nods to the endless possibilities of the future as when Allstars guitarist/singer Luther Dickinson introduced Chris Robinson to sing on Ry Cooder’s “Boomer’s Story” (a song produced in 1972 by Jim Dickinson). By the time Otha Turner’s Rising Star Fife and Drum band joined the foray, two-dozen musicians were onstage invoking the spirit of the hill country as never before. Imagine two generations of two regional blues families grooving together, proving this music’s vitality will be assured for generations to come.
The North Mississippi Allstars built their reputation as the most intriguing act to emerge from the loam of Southern blues and roots rock before they had even started on their first album. Formed in 1996 by brother’s Luther and Cody Dickinson (Drums, Vocals) and Chris Chew (Bass), the band has released four critically acclaimed albums and one ep – 2000’s Shake Hands With Shorty, 2001’s Phantom 51, 2003’s Polaris, 2003’s Tate County Hill Country Blues and the 2004 ep Instores & Outtakes – and have a pair of Grammy nominations, thousands of miles racked up on their tour bus and a legion of dedicated fans to show forit. Nick Tosches hailed the band as “a formidable and mesmerizing force,” while Rolling Stone’s David Fricke described them as “pureeing historical precedent into exuberant modernism – manic cotton field psychedelia.”
The “Shake, Holla and March” tour dates are as follows:
September
16 Baton Rouge, LA Varsity Theatre17 Houston, TX Meridian18 Austin, TX Antone’s19 Austin, TX Austin City Limits Festival21 Ruston, LA Rabb’s22 Jackson, MS Hal’s and Mal’sv23 Oxford, MS The Library24,25 Athens, GA Georgia Theater
October
5 Greenville, SC The Handlebar6 Winston Salem, NC Ziggy’s7 Asheville, NC Orange Peel8 Richmond, VA The Canal Club9 New York, NY Irving Plaza10 Northampton, MA Pearl Street12 Providence, RI Lupo’s at The Strand with Ratdog*14 Boston, MA Paradise15 Washington, DC 9:30 Club16 Philadelphia, PA TLA17 Pittsburgh, PA Mister Smalls19 Morgantown, WV The Pulse20 Columbus, OH Newport Music Hall21 Ann Arbor, MI Blind Pig22 Madison, WI Barrymore Theatre23 Minneapolis, MNCabooze 26 Missoula, MT TBD28 Seattle, WA Showbox29 Portland, OR Crystal Ballroom30 Eugene, OR WOW Hall31 Aracata, CA Kate Buchanan Hall
November
3,4 San Francisco, CA The Independent5 Los Angeles, CA House of Blues6 San Diego, CA Belly Up7 Tuscon, AZ City Limits9 Durango, CO The Abbey Theatre *10 Colorado Springs, CO 32 Bleu11 Denver, CO Cervantes12,13 Boulder, CO Fox Theatre
* Without Dirty Dozen Brass Band
