DOORS at 7pm ($10 cover), music starts at 8pm
LILLY WINWOOD: “When something is in your blood, it’s easy to take for granted. But if the last few years have taught Lilly Winwood anything, it’s that nothing is set in stone. Mixing salt-of-the-earth songwriting with a graceful splash of old-world sophistication, the Americana songstress reached a long-sought milestone with her 2021 album debut, Time Well Spent, only to feel like the clock had run out. But with her follow-up LP, Talking Walls, a weary creative heart has something to say once more.
The daughter of Grammy winning British rocker Steve Winwood (Traffic, Spencer Davis Group), Lilly grew up splitting time between the U.K. and Nashville’s neon-lit streets. Back then music was ever present, she says, and whether performing with her older brother, writing teenaged odes to young love or just soaking in her father’s work, it gave Winwood a unique creative perspective – one that felt more in line with Nashville than London.
Moving to Music City for good at 18, Winwood soon gravitated to the alternative-minded enclave of East Nashville, and after forming creative partnerships with locals like Boo Ray and Don Gallardo, released her Silver Stage EP in 2017. Time Well Spent followed in 2021, backed by East Nashville household names Alex Munoz and Allen Thompson, earning accolades from tastemakers like Rolling Stone Country as she solidified a go-your-own-way sense of earthy pop.
Winwood mixes a steady throb of up-all-night angst with a gentle country-rock vibe of dreamy clarity in her latest releaseTalking Walls, penned over long sleepless nights, with clear eyes and a willingness to ask tough questions, Winwood simply wrote her story and brought it to her band at Nashville’s Trace Horse studio – no producer needed. Describing it like “painting with sound,” Winwood spent hours alone with just a guitar and a pen beforehand, getting to know herself and the world she’d kept at arm’s length during the pandemic. No longer trying to impress anyone, this album features the weary sense of freedom that comes with letting down one’s guard – and the title itself speaks to that freedom.”
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CYRENA WAGES: ““The Wages’ were run out of North Carolina for stealing horses and other boorish behavior. We settled in North Mississippi and evolved into three groups: the preachers; the drunks and the outlaws; and then kind of a mid-range group. I came from the mid-range group.”
Cyrena Wages fell in love with music on the country backroads between Millington and Shelby Forest, two small towns just north of Memphis. Her upcoming debut album, Vanity Project, is both an exercise in rebellion against years of conditioning, as well as a way of processing her own struggles, healing, and growth. As much as Memphis shaped her positively, there were aspects of growing up as a woman in the South that didn’t align with who she wanted to become. Cyrena tapped producer Matt Ross-Spang (Charley Crockett, St. Paul and the Broken Bones, Margo Price) to helm Vanity Project at Southern Grooves Studio in Memphis.
“It had been a really long time coming. I was getting ready to make this record,” says Cyrena, “and I heard about a music biz guy saying—before ever hearing my songs—’Yeah, but she’s kind of a vanity project, right?’”
And just like that, the album had roots and the title track was born. “I just feel ready, when I haven’t felt ready before. Everybody comes to terms with themselves on a different timeline. Now it’s my time.” Vanity Project is slated for 2024 release with debut single Carried Away expected February 9th.”