Walking into Nashville’s The Basement, November 17, last year, as an ambient mix of traffic and outdoor PA systems chaperone into the second generation-historic, sister-addition to the 8th Ave…
“[Lillie Mae]’s at the OG Basement,” said a Basement East crew member setting up the empty venue for the next event.
“Yeah, we’ve already had a couple people…,” he said.
-With eyes of a woman whose career embodies-to-aestheticize the acceptance such brilliant writing might go unnoticed in a local industry blinded by the struggle of a female, Nashville country musician, Lillie Mae and Family introduced their latest album, Festival Eyes, at an album release show at Nashville rock venue, The Basement, November 17, 2023, with a warming backstory to [tiny cowboy] boot.
Lillie Mae’s stylized crescendos across the eight tracks of Festival Eyes involve an instilled “bluegrass discipline,” which can only be learned over years of practice, and for the sake of humility and self-control within bluegrass circles. Such a musical discipline and respect for the group is learned through playing with the older pickers, and traditionally carried over to maintain the modesty of a song’s traditional and/or gospel intent and sound (thus you can tell when you’re at a Saturday square dance, and you can tell you’re at church). Lillie Mae just happens to instill the seasoned festival eyes of happening authors, Joni Mitchell, Sixpence None the Richer, and even Neko Case, at times, too.
She’s second generation so far back enough from 2024, too, that the men who by she’s been taught, actually stepped directly off the bus (Bill Monroe’s The Bluegrass Breakdown), and it seems untraditional (unreal) just how instilled these values really are utilized in her sets -firstly, noticed in the grace and processing of southern, humanistic bluegrass lyricism in such a tiny package, then on top of that, incorporating the aspects of such a staunch, traditionalist musicianship seamlessly into the direction she’s taken over the last three albums/hundreds of appearances.
A little back story to boot:
CaveFest, 2023, Grundy County, TN:
Peter Rowan Band @ CaveFest 2023, Amphitheater, Grundy County Cumberland Caverns
CaveFest emcee, Larry Nager: One of the greatest Blue Grass Boys of all time, who played in one of the greatest The Blue Grass Boys lineups, including the father of the amazing guitar player at the end of the stage, Mr. David Greir -his banjo playing dad, Lamarr. I am so honored to see this man and see this family. Ladies and Gentlemen, give it up for one of the greatest of all time, Mr. Peter Rowan.
Peter Rowan Band breaks into “Tomahawk,” the old square dance traditional.
“Thank you, folks. Thank you very much. We’re gonna play some bluegrass for you,” said Peter Rowan from the stage.
Rowan, just shooting the sht: When I was a Bluegrass Boy, I lived here in the –well here in the psychedelic era. I have to be honest. Man, me and Chris Gensen, we would ride around on his motor scooter, we’d look at every leaf and every tree thinking, ‘is this it?’ ‘is this it?’ Finally, we cooked up bananas. They didn’t work. We smoked every twig and leaf in this forest. Finally some jazz musicians turned us on. It was like, ‘oh, my God.’ And, y’know, that was the year that the Fisk University gave up their choir, y’know -gave up their final exams to go down to Montgomery and set up for human rights; for anit-segregation (crowd cheered).
[…] We used to play the Grand Ole Opry every Saturday night, and then climb on that old bus Bill Monroe had called The Bluegrass Breakdown. We’d drive on up the night into Bean Blossom, Indiana. I remember the morning that old bus lived up to its name and we were stranded on the highway near Horse Caves, KY, and Bill Monroe sang this melody, and said, ‘Listen good, and don’t ever forget it.’ We’d like to do if for you, now. It’s called “The Walls of Time.”
–Peter Rowan Band picks up “The Walls of Time,” in all of it’s glory. 11:16 – 20:51(everybody gets a solo time).
Peter Rowan: Jim Lauderdale, you still in the building, here, brother? I like to sing one with Jim when we have the chance. All right. -He’ll be here in a second…
Rowan, carrying on: I’d like to do another number that we play quite I often. It’s one that I took down to the New Riders of The Purple Sage, down to where they were rehearsing. This one’s called, “Panama Red,” in the key of D (hillside cheers)….
–but, Jim Lauderdale walks out from stage left wing, just before: “Speaking of ‘Panama Red, look who’s here,” said Rowan!
Rowan, with Lauderdale: I’d like to do a Bill Monroe number here, but Bill was moving into the jazz field when he recorded this number, here.
The Peter Rowan band strikes up Bill Monroe’s “Sitting Alone In the Moonlight,” as Peter Rowan and Jim Lauderdale cowboy-western harmonize the sht out of it.
Peter Rowan: Thank you, Jim!
Country-Western Troubadour, Jim Lauderdale @ CaveFest 2023, Amphitheatre, Grundy County Cumberland Caverns
“Let’s do something off of the most recent record. We’re gonna be coming up with another one this winter. This one came out a few months ago –several months ago. All right, who am I trying to kid, this has been about a decade… -No it isn’t (Jim and the crowded CaveFest hillside giggle), I’m kidding,” David Carridine lookalike/Country Western Troubadour, Jim Lauderdale said, onstage at CaveFest 2023, located at The CaveFest Caverns in Grundy County (F&P mistakenly went up to The Cavern Sessions’ (formerly Bluegrass Underground’s) Volcano Room in McMinnville, first, too [a bit north of the mark], instead of the CaveFest Caverns, and had to turn back, as again, the Volcano Room is no OG Basement).
“Anyways, it’s a country… You like country music? (Hillside woots). Okay. This is a country record called Game Changer (released August 2022), and this kicks it off on that one…,” Jim says.
The drumsticks tap off to Jim Lauderdale’s “That Kind of Life (That Kind of Day),” in which Lillie Mae’s accompanying violin and backup vocals are introduced.
Jim Lauderdale, after “That Kind of Like (That kind of Day)”: Thank you!
Jim: Hey, is anybody out there with a friend tonight? (Hill whistles/cheers).
Jim: All right. Well, I’ll tell you, and you know, folks -friends?- We gotta have’m. And, I tell you what, I got some of the greatest friends up here that money can buy. I’ll tell you. It’s like, whenever I feel lonely, or something like that, I’ll call up the band and say, get me a gig. I’m lonely. I need that. And they come through. They’re loyal. They’re loyal friends. Every time I have a gig they’re there. And I can count on them. They’re doing a great job.
Jim: But seriously, it does –it is a bummer when you’ve got a friend, and all of a sudden something happens and splits being with you for, you never know for how long, but, oh, how sweet it is when you do that make up. And that’s what this song is about. It’s called, “Friends Again,”
-Lauderdale and his band hit a honky tonk ballad in this one, “Friends Again,” the second track off of Lauderdale’s 2022, Game Changer. Solid honky tonk solo discipline out of Mae’s husband, Craig Smith, the guitarist for Jim Lauderdale’s band on the B-Bender.
“Some good missing has been found/Finally got their feet on the ground/I’m happy that we’re friends again/Friends again,” Lauderdale lyricizes the short, two-and-a-half-minute honky-tonker.
-All right, now here is a tune off the record that this fella right here that you’re gonna meet later plays such a great solo on what they call the B-Bender guitar that Clarence White [The Kentucky Colonels, The Bryds] and Gene Parsons [Nashville West, The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Byrds] invented, and there aren’t too many great B-Bender players, but he’s one of them. And, I was thinking the other day he got to work with the amazing Peter Rowan, who we’re gonna be seeing right after us –[Rowan] was buddies with Clarence White, of course. They did this taping of this –and it’s a great record- called Mule Skin, and Clarence is playing so great. That’s such a beautiful fusion of Bluegrass and Country, and Peter is one of our living treasures and masters, and so it’s gonna be –it’s always so great to see and hear him, so I’m gonna sing this song out to him, and this one’s called “The Game Changer.”
Lauderdale plays “Game Changer.” -Killer solo, minute and a half in, btw.
Jim: Thank you. Cheers everyone…
Jim: Y’know, even though its getting a little cooler, don’t forget to stay hydrated. It is very important, and I’m serious. We’re not joking around this time. Please join us, and let’s have a drink together, right now. Cheers.
Lauderdale: Well folks, I enjoy working with this band so much. It’s really -After many years of being out there and doing stuff, I just really love this unit and I’m really glad that we get to work -I get to work with them- I’m very lucky. We’re working on a record right now –I wanted to write, and co-write stuff for us to do together, but I’m just gonna sing, maybe, one or two songs on the record, and harmonies, and let them shine on there.
Lauderdale: So, this woman I’m gonna to get up here to come center stage, right now, we’re gonna do a song that’s off of the record. The name of the band is Game Changers, and so I think it’ll be out in the spring. We’re finishing up, [but] I’ve got a story to tell you about her.
Jim: I first saw Lillie Mae and her brother, Frank, at an IBMA [Bluegrass Music Awards], several years back when Lillie Mae was 11, and when Frank was 15, and she’s just –this band just blew me away. This family band that’d blew up playing music since they just really, really young, and I was walking upstairs at [that venue] in Nashville and, of course, Peter Rowan knew Lillie Mae playing, so I inserted myself in a jam with them for a little bit and that just meant the world to get to play with my hero Peter Rowan, and then meeting Lillie Mae. So we’re gonna get her to come and sing a song off of the new record. This one’s called, “I’m Happiest When I’m Moving.”
Lillie Mae: Thank you so much, Jim. This is one of my favorite Jim Lauderdale tunes…
Lillie Mae, afterwards: Thank you so much.
Jim Lauderdale: Lillie Mae! Rische!
Lillie Mae: Thanks, guys. ‘Preciate it.
Jim: Oh my God. Hey, guys, you know what? I hope you don’t mind indulging me. I’m a selfish man sometimes I want to hear another song by Lilli Mae, right? (hill cheers) Now, that last one, that a song I got to write with a great songwriter, Susan Gibson, who lives down in Texas, and this one is one Lillie Mae wrote. She’s got, well, I guess, three albums out now. She had a few a few years back –a couple. She just came out with new music, so please, check her out. Listen to her Go see her when she’s playing with her band, too. She’s great. And, a lady came up to me in Florida we finished playing last night. She just kinda, in a very hushed tone said, “Who is… Who is she? She’s just… She’s an angel. She’s an angel and she’s magic…” and I agree, don’t y’all?
Lillie Mae: She hadn’t met me in -yet! (laughs) Just kidding. Thanks, Jim. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. So nice of –of Jim- to have me doing this, here for you; much appreciated/Hey, Travis Gudentsen. Good to see you (It’s noticed Lillie Mae tends to say hi to people in her crowds she recognizes from her past).
They go into Mae’s “Didn’t I.”
Jim: The Great Lillie Mae Richie!
Lillie Mae: Thank you very much, Jim. I appreciate it.
Jim: Boy, doesn’t that jut make your heart feel great. Man, that’s out of this world. Out of this world.
Lillie Mae: Whoo!
Jim: You know what, before we go any further, let me introduce everybody else right now. I don’t want us to run out of time tonight.
Over here on guitar, I mentioned him earlier, and it’s been so great watching him grow up and become such an indemand guitar player, and I’ve heard so many producers speak so reverently about him, and they love him like we do. This is Frank Carter Rische (hill, ‘Fraaank!’)
And this gentleman right here on the guitar, he’s originally from the Orkney Islands, off of Scotland, and he moved over to the states. He played guitar. He used to work on a ship. On a merchant marine ship, and then when he was twenty…..two? Twenty?
Husband-guitarist, Craig Smith: 24, when I came to Texas.
Jim: 24. He moved to TX and studied for a while
Craig Smith: But I played my whole life
Jim: But he played his whole life. I better translate for him because of that thick accent (crowd woots).
Jim Lauderdale: And, I selfishly introduced Craig and Lillie Mae thinking, ‘Oh, my God. If I could get them together, then they would be able to do more gigs with me. Yeah. And maybe if they had a kid, too, that would really… (crowd laughs). And so, low-and-behold, they did. They have a beautiful daughter, and they’re here tonight! This is the great Craig Smith no guitar (hill woots!)
–Craig, strums hi.
Lauderdale introduces the rest of the band, drummer Pat Bubert, and bassist Jay Weaver, “The Heart Throb of Madison, TN,” as well, but Lillie Mae’s family takes up the other half…
Jim Lauderdale: And I was talking about this magic angel, here. This Goddess that is up here. ANd also watching her grow up and just become this, I think one of the best artists out there of any genre, period. And she’s just got more creativity and talent in her pinkie. She’s the only other lady besides Emmylou Harris that makes me cry just thinking about her singing. And, it’s just so inspiring for us, especially, because Frank and Lillie Mae grew up in this family band since they were so small. I mean, music is such a natural part of their DNA, and they bring so much joy to us, and to all of you. So let’s here it for Lillie Mae Rische.
(Lillie Mae’s last name is Rische. Her brother is Frank, and along with sister, Scarlett Rische on mandolin, Festival Eyes producer, Beau Bedford on keys, snyth, Moog, and guitar; Aaron Goodrich on drums; and Geoffrey Muller on bass, form Lillie Mae and Family, who performed her latest album Festival Eyes, out of Space Colonel Records, September 8, 2023)
-Larry Nager, after Jim Lauderdale’s CaveFest set, 10/8/23: Jim Lauderdale, everybody (crowd cheering). Is that a band, or a review? Amazing. -Jim, you found your band. […] Give it up again for Jim Lauderdale and The Game Changers! (crowd cheers) -The King of Broken Hearts, The King of Americana, The Emperor of the North Pole!
Lillie took over at The Basement carrying on Jim Lauderdale’s words in action.
Lillie Mae’s setlist, 11/17/23 (~15 minutes late?):
Folk & Proper bust in as Lillie Mae and Family were hitting the last couple of hard strums for the album’s namesake, “Festival Eyes,” through the swing of The Basement’s creaky, wooden door.
Festival Eyes closer, “Love is Love,” followed (Joni Mitchel chorus, and all) while getting ATM money (Basement cheered and yeww’d).
Lillie Mae, post-“Love is Love”: All right. Thanks.
Lillie Mae: It’s like, if I’m gonna forget any of the lyrics to anything, this is gonna be it (basement quietly laughs). There’s a lot of them. This is a Neil Young tune (crowd woots) We did a video for this in Scarlett’s house. Everybody. Jay…
Lillie Mae and Family get into a beautiful rendition of Neil Young’s “Razor Love” led by the seemingly palm muted, picked mandolin of Scarlett Rische, stirring up an old americana maelstrom right before us.
Lille Mae: Thanks so much. Awesome.
…I know you people looked for this one. Mike Fread. Unbelievable. What’s going on, buddy? It’s nice to see you here. Cool. -It’s nice to see everybody. Everyone who’s not expected to be here tonight is here tonight. Bob [Mead?] It’s unreal.
Lillie Mae: Here’s a song that came out of the pandemic. I’m gonna tune real quick.
They tune.
“Safe Place,” off of Festival Eyes.
They tune, again.
Lillie Mae: This one’s about Cherr- Well…It was writt’n about/inspired by the late, great Cherry Pie. She was the best (Some, ‘Awww,’ ‘Nooo!’). She was 16 to 18 (cheers), somewhere around there. Scarlett had gotten her for my 16th birthday. She’s got a lot of friends in the room. I know a lot of you guys have met Cherry Pie before. A few of you, specifically. Her very first day, she ate her dress.
Scarlett: She came from the, um, I think, Hendersonville Animal Shelter (‘whew!’), and she had really red eyes, and we were calling her ‘Cherry Pie,’ until we changed it. Cherry Pie (laughs).
Lillie Mae: I’ll be honest, she was kind of leaning on Fox News. The people at the shelter –I wasn’t there- but they said it was such a shame she was so unfortunate looking; she couldn’t get adopted. But she was so cute. She could until she… She had no bottom. She was bottomless. One time, she ate a whole, like, one of the middle-sized dog food bags –not a huge one, but a pretty big one, as far those goes, and you could see the kernels sticking out of her belly (crowd laughs).
-She ate a very tall high hill, one time. Just the heel. Found that at the KOA parking sometime later.
Lillie Mae: Anyway, this one’s called, ‘Cherry Pie’ (crowd applause).
-Lillie Mae belts out a Union Station’s “Boy Who Wouldn’t Hoe Corn,” intro into a hold-breath, start and stop blues seemingly capturing the wailing acoustic and vocal sentiment attached to the cat, Cherry Pie, filling The Basement with a type of full, string band acoustic warmth and wall of sound-kind-of flaky crust perfection The Basement is made for. Folk and Proper was apparently standing in the sweet spot for “Cherry Pie,” the runaway dress eater of Festival Eyes.
Lille Mae: Thank you. I appreciate it so much, everybody. …Thanks a million, everyone (audience memeber, “Thank you!”)
Lillie Mae: All right. -Lillie Mae and Family break into “Didn’t I,” from her Aug. 2019 album, Other Girls.
(Crowd erupts at end of) Lillie Mae: Cool.
Lillie Mae: Thanks, guys.
-In Neko Case intro, Lillie Mae and Family bust into “Some Gamble,” off of Aug. 19’s Other Girls (crowd member, ‘yup!’d’). Lille Mae sets down her guitar for the fiddle in this one, better matching the song’s timbre.
Lillie Mae: Thank you. …Gonna do a few more.
Lillie Mae and Family slink into a picked, dirge-y, “Love Dilly Love,” such a sullen ballad spoken against a seemingly impossible love from someone unfit for the scenario, possibly Mae’s anthem to an industry rife with men. Aside from “Cherry Pie,” -the runaway song of Festival Eyes, “Love Dilly Live,” recorded for her debut album, Lillie Mae, (crowd as blown away, ‘Please do that again,’ an audience member said). Cannot stress how the surprising spoken word song placement within the set and in the dimly lit ambience of The Basement, that evening, was something else to have walked in on. That would’ve happened with or without the paper being there, and seemingly to the song, that’s why it’s there. It’s beautiful by itself.
-Mandolin, palmed picked, with a Moog effect on the mandolin is how they’re doing that sound -check out Scarlett’s picking in “Cold June,” and add a Moog whirl to it.
Lillie Mae: I know that laugh anywhere, to a lady in the front saying (crowd cheers and yews)
Lillie: All right, here’s one about South Texas, also y’know there’s are so many people I could say something about tonight, and so much love in the room, and so much –I have a lot of admiration for a lot of poeple in the room, and some of my biggest musical influences are here tongight, and that means a whole lot that you guys came out, so Thanks a lot. Appreciate it.
“We were playing in South Texas, every year, with our dad, here, Forest. He’s turning us out. A long time ago (Forest Rische’s fan section chants). We even played the Rio Grande Valley, and RV Parks, and we would always visit South Padre Island, park the motor home on the beach, and also, we played our gigs out there, too. Anyway, this one’s called “Padre wind,” and it was -Scarlett and I wrote this one and it was just inspired by that –anyway…”
(band still tuning)
Lillie Mae: … By a dream where the van got washed away over the bridge. The bridge did collapse a long time ago. A giant wave comes over and swoops the van away, in the dream and we fly, so…
-How many miles did it flood the bridge?
Forest Rische, done tuning, now: Two miles.
Lillie Mae and Family break into the brushed snare, country traveler, “Padre Wind,” on the Basement stage.
Lillie Mae: Awesome.
Lillie Mae: All right, so, uhh….. Frank –actually- Jay on the bass, Gabe on the drums, Frank, over here, Craig and me all play with Jim Lauderdale, too. The wonderful Jim Lauderdale -got to play with him last night. It was awesome (crowd cheers). This next tune is one of my favorite songs of his that we actually have recorded with him. We have a project that’ll be coming out in Spring (claps and cheers). This is our mix called, “I’m Happiest When I’m Moving.” So, it’s just a Beatles song I wanted to do it tonight. We haven’t done this without him, ever, actually, so his part will be missing. […] Been living this song for a long time, and Frank and I have been singing it around the house for years. And we finally recorded it.
Lille Mae and Family, Jim Lauderdale’s “I’m Happiest When I’m Moving,” video.
Lillie Mae: Thank you all. Thank you so much.
Lillie Mae: Hey, I can’t thank everybody enough, truly (audience, ‘yew!’). It’s been so much fun. Craig Smith on the guitar, over here, today. Give him a shout (Basement applauses). Craig, come say ‘hi.’
Craig Smith, Scottish-as-hell: What’s up? (crowd laughs, ‘hey, Craig’).
Lillie Mae: Say, ‘Hey,’ Craig…
Craig Smith, Scottish-as-hell accent: Hey, Nashville (applause). That’s my wife. She’s awesome.
Lillie Mae: Thanks, Craig.
Lillie Mae: Except I’m kinda -I’m pretty rotten to him, sometimes, though.
Lillie Mae, with the band intros: Beautiful sister, McKenna Grace (crowd applause). […] My wonderful sister, Scarlett (crowd yills). And our brother, Frank Carter (crowd applause), tuning on the guitar over there. He plays with everyone and all over the place. I’m sure you see him play multiple times a week. He’s got some bandmates here, too, tonight. Such a pleasure to play with him on the bass, that’s Jay Weaver crowd ‘yeeeahh’s). And on the drums –wonderful to play with him tonight, Dave Riscen. I’m Lillie Mae. Thanks, Grimey, for having us tonight. Much appreciated. -Staff of the basement, Thanks as always. Please get home safely. -Here’s one called “Cuckoo Bird.”
-Thanks, Alex, for running sound tonight. It sounds great.
Lillie Mae picks up her fiddle for a closing, upbeat rendition of staple bluegrass traditional, “Cuckoo Bird,” covered by the likes of OCMS to Woody Pines to even Peter Rowan and Jim Lauderdale, with every member of the Family band flatpicking up a storm into the basement until Lillie Mae’s vocal bridge softens into accenting bluegrass discipline as Folk & Proper places the phone, recording, next to his heart, in the navy-blue chest jacket pocket.
(Crowd goes wild, “owowowowowows,” and all).
Lillie Mae: Thank you very much, everybody. Appreciate it.
Lillie Mae, back at the mic, briefly: Can I just say that, um -I did- I don’t know how many there are over there, but there’s cupcakes, and they’re awesome. Everybody…
Festival Eyes can be found across the icons, at Spotify, YouTube Music, Apple, Pandora, as well as through Lille Mae and Family’s homesite, Lillie Mae | Official Site (lilliemaemusic.com) where touring information can be found, as well. For more updated information, find Lillie Mae across her socials on Facebook, LillieMaeMusic, and her Instagram page, @littlefiddle7.
With the 2024 year so much so an in-demand year for Lillie Mae Rische, and her talents, it’s so uncertain what’s for grab while she whirlwinds up.
There’s a possibility she’s still out on a boat somewhere in the South Atlantic, still on a gig, but Lillie Mae was poached from the CaveFest 2024 lineup, Sunday, Oct. 13, to join Post Malone oh his -this year’s- F1 Trillion, coincidentally making a stop at Nashville’s Nissan Stadium, 10/19/24.
On Sunday, October 13, the last day of CaveFest 2024, when Lille Mae was originally scheduled to play, Jim Lauderdale and The Game Changers had The Cavern’s great amphitheater stage from 4pm to 5:30 pm, at which there was a rolling blackout in the area, according to Larry Nager’s annoucement, after-the-fact, but during/meanwhile, one of Lillie Mae’s teachers utilitzed the opportunity to make create perfection out of an unfortunate event, in bluegrass discipline, and seemingly like it was nothing at all, pulling his set down into the pit for an as-best-can-audibly-and-beyond -a full acoustic Jim Lauderdale and The Game Changers CaveFest set, making the best of something already there, and in absence, as well.
Folk & Proper News time-travelled to Lille Mae’s Post Malone appearance, October 19, 2024, the weekend after CaveFest, 2024, when Mae was making an Atlanta-to-Arkansas run, F1 Trilllion-style, to see what she was up to…
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