Kathryn Claire (US) & Margot Merah (Netherlands) w/ Sierra Cistone
Friday, July 28 // Doors at 7:30 PM // Show at 8 PM // $10 // $15 Artist Supporter Ticket Music can bring people together in unexpected ways. That’s certainly the case for Kathryn Claire and Margot Merah. Growing up on opposite sides of the world, you can expect them to never have met. And yet they did, in the fall of 2013, in a small Irish pub in Amsterdam. The musical connection was instant. Their love of songwriting, traditional music, folk and harmony singing not only brought them together: it took them all over the world. After 2 and a half years apart, the two reunited last summer in the Pacific Northwest for a tour featuring original and traditional songs and instrumentals along with their favorite covers. They began writing together on the road, and when they toured again in Europe this past spring, they decided the time had come to create an album of music together. In their live shows and on their upcoming album, Come Close, Come In, these two multi-instrumentalists feature guitar, fiddle, ukulele, bodhran, harmonica, and breathtaking vocal harmonies. Kathryn Claire is based in Portland, OR. She plays violin, guitar and ukulele, has a crystal clear voice and writes songs that are honest, poetic and profound. She weaves together stories and melodies rooted in her classical and traditional musical background. Each song is imbued with an energy and electricity that you can feel, and she has the ability to move seamlessly between genres. Margot Merah is based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. She is a real ‘storyteller’, exactly what the folk tradition is all about. Margot’s music is comforting, hopeful and melancholic. Her songs tell about life, simple and small, with an eye for detail and the bigger picture. She regularly performs as a solo artist, but prefers to collaborate with other musicians in various projects. Her musicality and sense of harmony and rhythm are perfect for this. Kathryn and Margot are thrilled to be playing the The Show Room at the ZACC for their first time and for Margot to see Montana and the big sky and mountains for her first time! For further information, accessibility, and inquiries please visit https://www.zootownarts.org/meet-the-zacc/about/.
Sera Cahoone + Margo Cilker w/ Night Palace
Thursday, July 28 // Doors at 7 PM // 7:30 PM // $15 (Advance tix recommended)w/ opener Night Palace Americana singer-songwriter Sera Cahoone grew up in the Colorado foothills. The daughter of a dynamite salesman, she played her first gigs on drums in a dive bar’s open blues jams at 12. As a young adult, she moved to Seattle where she played drums with the adored indie rock group, Carissa’s Wierd, and later Band of Horses. She then went on to release four solo records, two with Sub Pop. In 2019, Cahoone received a Gold Record for her work with Band of Horses. Cahoone has earned great praise from KEXP, NPR series Tiny Desk Concert, First Listen and Songs We Love. Her work has been featured on UPROXX, ELLE and KEXP. But not only do her songs ring out in rooms of mile-high castles and the edges of sprawling forests, Cahoone is beloved by her fans. Her audiences are filled with the curious, the seekers, and those who just want to hear sing once more, “I wanna be your sidewalk / I’ll take you everywhere/ We’ll travel ‘round this world a million times.” Margo Cilker is a woman who drinks deeply of life, and her debut record Pohorylle, released in November 2021 on Portland label Fluff and Gravy, is brimming with it. For the last seven years, the Eastern Oregon songwriter, who NPR calls one of “11 Oregon Artists to Watch in 2021,” has split her time between the road and various outposts across the world, from Enterprise, OR to the Basque Country of Spain, forging a path that is at once deeply rooted and ever-changing. Night Palace’s (ATHENS, GA / NYC) debut album Diving Rings is a shocking alchemy: aching nostalgia meets frothy anticipation of what’s beyond the garden wall. Tantalizing pop melodies take wing with lush instrumentation, weaving a reedy bed for songwriter Avery Draut’s shimmering vocals. It’s hard to believe the album is not a soundtrack to . . . something. You find yourself picturing it: a moonlit-gilded diorama of Draut’s dreams and memories. Spanning eleven songs and interludes, Diving Rings ebbs and flows through tracks like “Enjoy the Moon!” dubbed by AllMusic Editor’s Choice, “a song that sounds like a lost Pet Sounds track played by Broadcast;” grounded indie-rock songs “Into the Wake, Mystified” and “Stranger Powers;” and the celeste-gilded folk song “Titania.” Paste Magazine encapsulates the now Athens, Georgia and NYC-based act’s sound: “Diving Rings wraps freak-folk energy in a lush psych-pop package.” The album was released on April 1 via Park the Van. For further information, accessibility, and inquiries please visit https://www.zootownarts.org/meet-the-zacc/about/.
AJJ / WHY?
Thursday, August 18 // Doors at 7 PM // Show at 8 PM // $20 Comprising core members Sean Bonnette (acoustic guitar) and Ben Gallaty (upright bass), AJJ is a folk-punk outfit from Phoenix, Arizona. They formed as Andrew Jackson Jihad in 2004, when frontman Bonnette was still a teenager, and the duo quickly began writing humorously explicit music with macabre themes. In 2016, after having been referred to as AJJ by many of their fans for years, the bandmembers officially changed their name, saying they no longer wanted to be either a reminder of the former President or disrespectful (as non-Muslims). The Bible 2 arrived under the AJJ moniker that summer and landed on multiple Billboard charts, including the rock, alternative, and independent albums charts. Yoni Wolf has spent the last two decades traveling the remote sonic terrain where underground hip hop, avant-pop, and psych-rock meet. In that time he’s cultivated a unique sound, and a unique position as one of contemporary music’s most distinctive voices. Some of Yoni’s most compelling and critically-praised musical experiments have been issued under the moniker WHY?, but Yoni has been involved in various other freewheeling music projects, including Yoni & Geti, Hymie’s Basement, and the seminal cLOUDDEAD. For further information, accessibility, and inquiries please visit https://www.zootownarts.org/meet-the-zacc/about/.
