LowellArts is featuring The Wild Honey Collective as its January 2022 Artist of the Month! Check out the link for an in-depth article about the band, how it came together, the 2020 album/tour, and what’s coming up next. Thanks so much to LowellArts for featuring this GTG band and for providing opportunities for Michigan artists to share their work!
Posted in The Wild Honey Collective
Tagged Country, Folk, GTG Records, Indie Folk, Lansing, LowellArts, Michigan Music, The Wild Honey Collective
We’re very excited to be hosting This Must Be The Place: Quality Hits From Lansing, a new 24 track compilation of Lansing-area artists performing some of their favorite covers, a project that was spearheaded by acclaimed music writer Rich Tupica (of the definitive Big Star book There Was A Light fame). Lots of old friends here! It’s a little glimpse into what us creative types have been up to with a year of no shows. From the GTG family we’ve got The Plurals, Cavalcade, The Wild Honey Collective, RK Andrews (No Skull/Red Teeth), Counterpunchers (members of Narc Out The Reds), The Stick Arounds, Isaac Richmond Vander Schuur (The Hat Madder), Jennifer Toms (Scary Women), and Disappointed Dad, plus lots of old friends throughout like Crystal Drive, Frontier Ruckus, Dylan Rogers, Rodeo Boys, Nonbinary, La La Delivery and plenty more! 24 tracks! Free download!
Here’s what Rich had to say about the project:
“This Must Be the Place: Quality Hits from Lansing is a totally free download of Lansing, Michigan bands performing select songs by artists they love. This is meant to serve as a fun stop-gap between now and the (eventual) return of live shows. So, please: Listen. Download. Repeat. There’s a wide range of covers here because each band/artist chose whichever song they wanted for this collection. The reason? Every band has a good cover in them—perhaps one they’ve always wanted to tackle, but never had a proper reason to. So, the “art of the cover” was fully realized here. With no limitations, it left the tracklist up to them and it made for a bizarre, yet somehow cohesive blend of genres.
Aside from a long roster of area fixtures Like Frontier Ruckus, Cavalcade, Rodeo Boys, The Plurals, Wally Pleasant (and many more!), there’s also new solo tracks and fresh side projects featured here from Lansing vets: RK Andrews (of No Skull, Red Teeth), Jennifer Toms (of Scary Women), Counterpunchers (members of Narc Out the Reds), Dylan Rogers (L.U.V.S), Isaac Richmond Vander Schuur (The Hat Madder), Seth + Modern Sadness (features Seth Rentfrow of Way to Fall, Kyle Daniel), Myron James (Edible Intention), and The Wild Honey Collective (a new GTG super group). Scroll through the selection, and you’ll see plenty of familiar names. Enjoy!”
Posted in Album, Cavalcade, Disappointed Dad, GTG Activity, Lansing, Narc Out the Reds, No Skull, Red Teeth, The Hat Madder, The Plurals, The Stick Arounds, The Wild Honey Collective
Tagged Cavalcade, Conspicuous Bystanders, Crystal Drive, Frontier Ruckus, Indie Folk, Indie Rock, Lansing, Lansing Music Scene, Michigan Music, Monte Pride, Punk, Quality Dairy, Rodeo Boys, Scary Women, Silktail, The Plurals, The Wild Honey Collective, Wally Pleasant
Here it is, The Wild Honey Collective‘s debut album – the whole thing! 11 songs, originals, traditionals, and songs written by friends. Stream and download right now via the GTG Records bandcamp, and pre-order CDs and Vinyl too!
The Wild Honey Collective is very much a product of the events of 2020 – without any shows to play or go to and missing the spirit of an active band, GTG originators and Drinking Mercury bandmates Tommy McCord (Plural, etc) and Timmy Rodriguez (Sleeping, etc), joined with Danielle Gyger (who had contributed harmony vocals to the last few Drinking Mercury releases) in June 2020 to play some acoustic music on a back porch in Ionia, MI. Dan O’Brien (multi-instrumentalist and a former bandmate of Timmy’s) joined the group a few weeks later and very quickly we began building an extensive catalog of music ranging from folk traditionals, original songs, and songs written by friends. An appreciation for classic country music and early country rock had been rising amongst the individual musicians for the last few years, and with Danielle’s lifelong association with the legendary Wheatland Music Festival came a catalog of traditional songs (both vocal and fiddle-led) that were made for these back porch sessions. This bridging of musical styles modern and traditional dramatically helped fill the void of a concert-less summer, played outdoors for only the crickets to hear (or possibly Tommy’s dad who developed a reputation as a conspicuous eavesdropper on these practices).
As the summer ended and COVID-19 cases began rising in Michigan again – and thus, no shows anywhere in sight – we shifted our focus to making an album through a series of socially distanced recordings and file sharing to capture the spirit and friendship of a musical collective. And it is a collective! In addition to the core band members the album features contributions from acclaimed pedal steel guitarist Drew Howard, drummer Dave Shilakes (Small Parks, Gumsmack), singer Alyson Rodriguez, pianist John Gyger, Tommy and Timmy’s Drinking Mercury bandmate Michael Boyes (who took the original photo featured on the cover and the band also does a rendition of one of his songs), Crooked Sound/ Calliope/ Sexy Murders songwriter Eric Merckling, and the rhythm section of The Plurals, drummer Hattie Danby and bassist Nicholas Richard. It’s a new year, but the pandemic isn’t over, and to help get this winter over with a bit sooner we’re releasing the album right now for everyone to listen to. Thanks for being along for the ride, and bring on 2021!
GTG RECORDS 