In A Jam Day 3 & 4 Recap

There aren't enough words in the world to describe the vibrant buzzing of creativity happening at In A Jam, Down By the River. Yet, here we are with days 3 & 4 recap. Buckle up, it's gonna be a long one.

One great thing about a festival filled with camping out musicians is we're all in the same boat, making the same bad (albeit fun!) late night decisions. Red eyed & crinkly tailed, myself & artist Kerri Lick found ourselves taking a cold dip in the river before the first morning acts; & we were not alone in the need for rejuvenation! This is an under-appreciated perk of having a festival on a beautiful & clean, quiet river.

Jake Waylon began our day with beautiful, well thought out songwriting. His firm country vocals, paired with Canadian tuxedo set the morning audience up for a good front porch feel. Following was Kerri Lick with guitarist Joel Allan (the equivalent of this festival's Jamie Lin Wilson with appearances on stage with friends, IYKYK). Lick brought the blues & the toe-pumping fishing tunes.

Unfortunately, several artists no-showed or couldn't make the weekend; something I can only chock up to their underestimating how amazing this place is. So in the space of silence, something magical happened: Aaron Bentley. If you know Aaron, he's an animated podcast host & writer of Off Mic, Off the Record. He took the small indoor stage & did something I've never seen done before: INTERVIEWED THE ENTIRE CROWD! Bentley went one by one, asking every person in the audience what their first memory of music was. We heard stories from road trip Johnny Cash CDs to Nutcracker Ballet instrumentals, but one story hit us all in the feels. A regular concert goer told a story on how her father (a keys player) would learn her mothers favorite song every year & play it for their anniversary. This random filling of time brought the crowd of people together in an intimate & uniquely kind way. This is my stance forward to making questions with Aaron a new permanent thing for In A Jam! (Please & thank you!)

One of our all time favorite songwriters took the main stage next, ol' Billy Hartman. He previously played a river stage set the day before, but this set was his time to shine. Hartman told his famously bad jokes (so sorry, kinda) & gave the stories behind his many beautiful ballads. He definitely took the award for having most stage requests, from the audience screaming "FORREST GUMP!" to "BEANS & CORNBREAD!!" I think every single one of his songs was shouted in request by an audience member, a sure sign he's doing something drastically right.

As many vagabond festivals go, there was a tattoo booth available the entire weekend. ZA Tattooer did In A Jam logo vans & flash sheets above the main stage. While being seranaded by the marvelous Mary Charlotte Young (a songwriter with intense passion & deep lyrics) & the legend Theo (think James McMurtry if he was social), I got a Pueblo native emblem with "In A Jam" over it. The tattoo lines stayed constant all weekend, a testament to how loved this place is for people to permanently remind themselves on their bodies of the excitement.

Many a tear was had by all when Presley Haile & Nick Brumley took the stage. Their dynamic duo vocals & soul wrenching songwriting make it virtually impossible not to think of your parents, your past loves, your favorite vinyl record spinning under dim lights. 

The man, the myth, the figurehead of In A Jam, Dustin Brown took the stage, along with 50 of his closest friends! All the musicians in attendance got on stage & opened Brown's set with Seven Bridges Road, a new tradition for the festival. Brown's set was full of electric licks (I'll give you one guess who), sultry folk vocals (Rachel Cole joined for a few songs), & full on audience sing alongs. 

Saturdays surprising standout for me was Supper Party. Duo vocalists backed by a full band with a CELLO (YEAH A CELLO, IT WAS AWESOME!) blew me away. Their sound is best described as woodland fairy meets Shovels & Rope. Soft & airy female vocals with lots of "ooos" & "aaaas," anchored by the wail of a low cello was the embodiment of jamming by a historic river. It was pretty & perfect.

Image by Katie Langley Photography

Needless to say, The Deslondes are something special. Their four part harmonies, ability to switch lead vocals, their SINGING drummer, the whole thing was awe-inspiring. Their sound rotates from rockabilly, to Red Dirt, to barbershop quartet-ish, to western swing. At one point, the band sang the slowest a capella song that quieted the crowd, silenced the crickets, stopped the river's flow. It was time altering, & everything a headliner should be. I was so moved at one point that I waded out into the darkness of the nighttime river & sat on a sank picnic table beneath the trees, just to hear their vocals carry over the still water. Pure talent. But in true Taylor (that's me btw) fashion, I dried my drenched skirt by joining the collection of dancers kicking up dust on the dirt dance floor side stage. Laughter, happiness, & joy echoed off The Deslondes performance. 

The river stage continued the music with Casper Allen, king of the night time talk show. His silly jokes, love for his crew, & overall bubbly personality is a genuine balance to his dark & twisty, blues meets outlaw country songwriting. I feel it is necessary to announce, as he did thanks to his recent viral TikTok videos, that just because he has face tattoos does NOT make him a sk*nhead. Insane I even have to write that, but again, felt necessary. He kept every audience member hanging on his gritty vocals & tip of his vivacious storytelling.

Following the darkness that is Casper was the physical embodiment of sunshine, Mollie Danel. This girl is IT. She's fresh, she's kind, she's thoughtful. While listening to her sing, all I could think was if Nancy Griffith could see this girl now. I want to put her in a room with Gillian Welch & Allison Krauss just to see what happens. Danel's sweet use of vibrato & just slight hint of twang makes her sound folkish. I actually sobbed streams of tears during her set, so much so that my fold out chair neighbor literally patted me on the shoulder in solidarity. But it's not for sadness, but for growth & change. Danel's music is so intertwined with hope core that it almost feels sacrilegious to think badly about anything after she sings. She's yellow over your blue.

Something I haven't quite mentioned in entirety yet is the after shows pickin' circles. As much as I want to describe what happens here, I feel that they should remain sacred. The campfire circles are a massive release of creative energy happening all at once & should only be experienced in person over word. All I can say is there aren't a lot of places where this still happens genuinely & without ego.

NOW ONTO DAY FOUR, THE SUNDAY SCARIES hahaha.

Part of me doesn't want to count this as an official day of the festival, but that doesn't mean the talent was any less mind blowing or scratch-your-brain good. By noon, many a camper & RV owner had hit the road. However, the stragglers & the super fans came ready for another day of hard hitting music.

Day 4 was rampant with no shows, but the good thing about this festival is the amount of deeply talented artists who came just to be a part of the family, two of which were Tyler Layne & Jaxon Malone. Tyler gravitates more to traditional country like Dan Seals or George Strait, but his vocals lean more on the Texas Country side. Jaxon is for the saddies & baddies. He sang a few low & slow originals, while throwing in Elephant by Jason Isbell (okay, saddest song in the world at 1 PM was not on my bingo card) & a broke down Gregory Alan Isakov tune. The two sang duo on a couple songs to include As Your Heart Breaks by The Droptines-- again, why are y'all ripping hearts out in the middle of the sunshine afternoon?!

While in search of a much needed bottle of water, I stumbled upon another situation that makes In A Jam, Down by the River a special space. Mary Charlotte Young led a group (to include myself) in a collaborative songwriting session down by the river (<-- totally unironic, actually happened). Jonna Mae hit the high harmony & added lead mandolin, Anna La Mare hit the middle harmony with funky lyrical additions, I added the low harmony & a little word bending, Mary Charlotte led with the instrumental melody & lead vocals, while Colton French & Burton Myers aided in the creative flow. An entire siren song was written in its entirety in a completely collaborative effort, with no strong hands & no overtaken conversations. It was a really beautiful thing to be a part of & another testament to the energy that flows freely at this festival.

When all is said & done, In A Jam Down, By the River festival was the best festival I've ever attended for so many reasons. I almost want to gate keep this place to keep it sacred, but that's not what we do around here. More artists need to experience this, create lifelong relationships, & maybe even find your bandmates or cowriters here. It's a truly safe space for all the shenanigans that being an artist entails, from recreational debauchery to good ol' whole hearted friendship. I'm lucky & grateful to have set up a booth here & to have met all the creatives I met. 

Keep up with us this week as we have full interviews from Cameron Smith, Colton French, & Rachel Cole coming out soon!

Image by Decker's World