Ryan Bingham @ Red Rocks

Ryan Bingham brought the house down at Red Rocks on June 25th, 2024. Drayton Farley and Jamestown Revival opened up the evening, and the crowd was pumped in no time.

Drayton Farley

Alabama native Drayton Farley has as honest a voice as you’re likely to hear in this burgeoning scene of country, folk, roots, and Americana music we’re all wrapped up in. With songs and lyrics pulled from real life experience, there’s a grounded feeling to his stories, a confessional quality that rings true to those who know. His voice fills the room like cigarette smoke, curling into every corner of you, with a fine grit rasp that smooths out every rough edge. It lingers hours, days, after you’ve left the bar – turns of phrase that tumble around your mind, bittersweet and familiar. He sings as deeply about the love he holds as the love he’s lost and there’s something so broken-in and comfortable about that Southern inflection that every song feels like coming home.  

pulled from Drayton Farley

Jamestown Revival

Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance forged a musical bond as teenagers growing up in Magnolia, Texas. They draw musical inspiration from groups like Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and The Doobie Brothers, as well as songwriters such as Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt. With themes like coming of age and settling into an identity, Young Man is envisioned as a collection of songs that should be played all the way through. Sonically, the album evokes the experience of musicians huddled together, singing and playing without headphones or click tracks. Producer Robert Ellis joined Chance and Clay on the Young Man sessions, as well as the band’s longtime rhythm section of bassist Nick Bearden and drummer Ed Benrock.

pulled from IVPR

Ryan Bingham

Ryan Bingham was born in Hobbs, NM, hard up against the Texas Panhandle. He grew up in the West Texas oil fields, then spent time as a teenage rodeo cowboy in towns all across the state. Along the way, he absorbed the Cajun culture of western Louisiana, the hardcore hip-hop favored by his Houston friends, and the border songs of the Mexican immigrants. Until he moved to California in 2007, he never lived in any one place for more than two years. It’s this spirit of having done plenty of living early on, that has informed the singer-songwriters world-weary and jagged, weather-beaten vocals.

From the beginning of his recording career, with “Mescalito,” Bingham has defied easy classification. As a rising country star, he ranged from Woody Guthrie-style folk songs and Spanish-language balladry to gritty hard rock. It’s all American music. He has enjoyed thrilling highs and suffered debilitating lows, sometimes all at once. While his career was taking off – he won both an Oscar and a Grammy for “The Weary Kind,” the theme song he wrote for the film “Crazy Heart” – he was coping with the tragic deaths of his parents.

The losses put Bingham in a dark tunnel, and it took a while to crawl his way out. With his sixth studio album, “American Love Song” (Axster Bingham Records), Bingham has come back into the light, on it Bingham takes all of his influences – both musical and experiential – and unites them in his best, most fully realized record to date.

pulled from Spotify