So as I looked down the Folk DJ list of airplay for the month of October 2010 the group at number 25 (32nd Top Artist) caught my attention The Blackberry Bushes and their new release Little Bit of Grace. So I headed over to Rhapsody and downloaded the album onto the ZenV. Their music 
certainly fits in the Americana genre there music is high energy and infectious and certainly will set your toes a tapping. Here’s a description of their music from their Myspace page
Their music is progressive Americana “like someone threw a radio from yesteryear high into the treetops…” Their repertoire of original, bluegrass, and traditionally twisted music is infused with their love of indie, jazz, punk and alternative styles. They have been dubbed the “Mountain Divas” and Olympia’s “Sirens of Indiegrass”. They are Persephone and her sirens singing songs you have never heard but always known.
The “Bushes” are a band certainly rooted in Bluegrass and Old-timey music. Their roots extend into the music of Appalachia, the Ozarks and the Mississippi River and the branches twist in the winds of West Coast Indie rock. The band formed in 2004 and currently calls Olympia, Washington home. The “Bushes” are composed of banjo and songstress Kenl Winter, Jes Raymond on guitar and stomping, and fiddler Jakob Breitbach and (in their words) “lowdown songsmith” Joe Capoccia on the upright bass. They list list their influences as Old Crow Medicine Show, The Be Good Tanyas, The Pasties. The band were Second place winners of the 2009 Telluride Bluegrass Band Competition.
The three top songs listed on the Folk DJ list were: “Salt Lick” the opening track with a great finish that sets the tone for the rest of the album. “Cluck Old Hen” which closes the album with some ham bone and a little bit of instrumentation from each picker leading with banjo, then fiddle and guitar, and a good cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m on Fire”. The other nine songs are not too shabby and include songs of life and love and then there’s the great cover of Bill Monroe’s “Jerusalem
Ridge” with some great fiddling by Jakob Breitbach (I always seem to be partial to those fiddlers!) and then there’s the very nice accapella
song “Rust”. Oh, just check the whole album out!
In addition to their website and Myspace page you can also check out their music on Facebook
Here’s the “Bushes” with “Old Cluck Hen”
