Next Wednesday, January 29, the Wood Brothers will be performing at Rams Head Live on their latest tour. They are out on the road in support of their latest album, Kingdom In My Mind, which will be available this Friday, the 24th. We are very excited for the show and this new album!
“Everyone has these little kingdoms in their minds,” says Chris Wood, “and the songs on this album all explore the ways we find peace in them. They look at how we deal with our dreams and our regrets and our fears and our loves. They look at the stories we tell ourselves and the ways we balance the darkness and the light.”
Courtesy of Calabro Music Media
The theme of balancing darkness and the light weaves all throughout the Wood Brothers’ seventh studio album. In addition, the recording of this album was unique in that the boys got together to record these songs over a series of improvised sessions that resembled more of rehearsal time then actual recording sessions. While the lyrics may deal with deeper subjects such as human nature, mortality, and accepting things we cannot control, the music maintains it’s style traditional to The Wood Brothers musical style.
“We weren’t performing songs,” explains Oliver. “We were just improvising and letting the music dictate everything. Normally when you’re recording, you’re thinking about your parts and your performances, but with these sessions, we were just reacting to each other and having fun in the moment.”
In addition to a bit of a different recording method, The Wood Brothers wanted to locate an organization that they could support with their musical endeavors. Not far from their recording studio, they came across a group called Thistle Farms.
“Their goal is to help women who have been victims of sex trafficking or prostitution or addiction to get off the street and into safe housing where they can participate in therapy and job training. The work they were doing was so inspiring and it felt like such a fit with the kind of album we were writing that we teamed up with them to donate a portion of ticket sales from all our shows. It’s our way of using what we’ve got to do whatever good we can in the world.”
The mindset that we’ve all been dealt our own particular hand of cards but it’s the way we play them that makes up our life, is what defines Kingdom In My Mind. As Oliver sings on the captivating “Satisfied,” which finds its narrator wondering about the glories of the afterlife before ultimately deciding to make the most of his time on Earth, “I’ve got nothing left to be afraid of / Because I will be satisfied.” With an album this remarkable, The Wood Brothers have plenty to be satisfied about.
Make sure you catch their show next Wednesday at Rams Head Live and pick up their latest album, Kingdom In My Mind, this Friday. Tickets for the show can be purchased, here.
