× The Devil Makes Three announces Europe tour including two Dutch shows

The Devil Makes Three announces Europe tour including two Dutch shows

15-04-2018

Before the revivals and the festival movement of the 60s and 70s and even before 78 RPM records and live rural radio, American folk music just was – unnamed, unstudied and unaware of itself except as it was happening in shacks, houses, tents and churches. It wasn’t a genre but an organic human response to work and worship in the American South before electrification, when the air was stifling and the living was borderline feudal. But only in such a fiery furnace could something as immutable, hard and heavy as American blues and gospel be forged in the first place.

Not many bands in the current Americana landscape continue to work this hand-hammered source material and channel the primeval, cathartic origins of roots music with as much pride and power as The Devil Makes Three. This shared ideal brought Pete Bernhard, Cooper McBean and Lucia Turino together almost 15 years ago, and they’ve remained steadfastly together and true to their vision over a staggering number of miles and gigs. They’ve been simplistically tagged as everything from punk to bluegrass to rockabilly, but one sweaty show will dispel and clarify;They know their tradition, but really what they do is throw down.

The Devil Makes Three has been ahead of its time, playing stomping folk before it started trending. And no matter how large the diaspora of old-time and early roots influence in America grows, we can count on the trio not to sanitize its source material or purge the suffering or the deviance or the repentance from the stories they sing. “That’s what we think the best stuff is,” Pete says. “And it belongs there. To take it out is to destroy it.”

After two years The Devil Makes Three are back in Europe, including two Dutch shows - tickets to go on sale this Friday:

22/09 - Amsterdam - Melkweg
23/09 - Groningen - De Oosterpoort

 

 

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