“Underscored with churning guitars and driving drums, prickly banjos and soothing dobro, Lafser’s stories come at you one after another, like the white dashes on a highway passing you by but, somehow, still remaining.” –Bluegrass Situation
Jesse Lafser Releases Second Album – Raised On The Plains
Check out the video for “Jack Hat Blues”, one of the album’s tracks:
The video and the whole of Raised On The Plains was heavily inspired by Lafser’s road travels in the US Southwest, with footage of open country landscape as seen from the window of a 1966 Thunderbird.
When asked about the video, Lafser commented, “What I love about this video is that it chronicles snippets of my life here in East Nashville and also takes the viewer with me on the road out west… it has a montage/documentary-style feel to it that makes it unique… the video definitely suits the wild, jangly, open-range feel of the song.” Lafser called on dear friends to guest in the video including Will Kimbrough, Brian Wright, Brittany Howard, Lindsay Hayes, Sarah Holbrook and Alyssa Spyridon.
Lafser was aptly named after a Thomas Hart Benton painting of a woman playing the guitar, a foreshadowing of sorts to the woman she would become. Originally from St. Louis, Missouri, her musical style is inspired by the blues and ragtime sounds native to the port city – Chuck Berry, Muddy Waters, Elizabeth Cotten, and more. There is, however, another side to her style that evokes the acoustic folk and roots music Lafser was raised on – she cites Gillian Welch, Bob Dylan, Roger Miller, Kris Kristofferson, and other great songwriting icons as influences who all were inspired at one time or another by Nashville, the city she now calls home.
She is a prolific songwriter and a talented instrumentalist – her stellar finger-picking and clear voice have landed her spots sharing the stage with artists like Steve Earle, Will Kimbrough, Robert Ellis, John Fullbright, Sarah Jarosz, Bobby Bare, Jr., and many more. American Songwriter magazine said of her 2012 debut Land in Sight, “Her ability to tell a story is remarkable.”
Raised On the Plains features some of Nashville’s favourite session players – Jeremy Fetzer (Steelism, Andrew Combs), Evan Hutchings (Brandi Carlile, Sara Watkins, Escondido), Justin Moses (Ricky Skaggs, Sierra Hull), and more – as well as special guests Will Kimbrough and SHEL.
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