Andrew Combs released his debut EP Tennessee Time in May 2010, which has been compared to Mickey Newbury and Guy Clark. In April 2012, Combs released a vinyl 7-inch called “Big Bad Love”.
In July 2012, Andrew Combs signed to the Nashville-based music publishing arm of New York City record label, Razor & Tie.
In October 2012, Andrew Combs released “Worried Man”, which American Songwriter gave a 4-star review, writing: “As singer/songwriter first albums go, it’ll be tough to beat this as one of the years finest, from a newcomer who is hopefully just tapping into his talent.”
In 2013, Combs supported Shovels & Rope and Caitlin Rose on national tours and performed at the Newport Folk Festival.
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Like Tom Petty and Steve Earle, Andrew Leahey writes songs that split the difference between rock & roll, Americana, and alt-country. A Virginia native, he began his career as a vocalist, singing in the Juilliard Chorale during his early 20s and performing at venues like Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center. Focusing on classical music grew old, though — there weren’t nearly enough guitar solos, for starters, and all the conductors seemed to think Sebastian Bach was Johann’s younger brother — so Leahey ditched the Big Apple and moved to Michigan, where he spent four years working as a music journalist and dove back into songwriting. Now a full-time Nashville resident, he writes, records, and tours with the band Andrew Leahey & the Homestead. Forget Carnegie Hall. This is music for city highways and country lanes, for pop fans and roots rockers, for the heart as well as the heartland.
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“After a few false starts in the business, I’ve finally learned to stop writing for an imagined audience and start writing for myself. If you get caught up in making things sound a certain way — if you try to force your music to sound like someone else’s definition of a musical genre — then you’re setting yourself up for failure. You should follow the muse, not force it to follow you.”
Thompson began writing music as a teenager in Roanoke, Virginia. His parents split up when he was very young, and Thompson spent most of his childhood bouncing between different homes, staying with a combination of relatives and school friends. Music was a source of stability, a way to connect with each home he visited.
“If I was staying with my grandparents,” he remembers, “we’d listen to country music, old folk tunes, and World War I songs. We’d watch “Hee Haw” every Saturday. With my mom, I’d listen to a lot of soul music. With my dad, it was southern rock and ‘80s country. And then my friends’ families showed me all the tunes they were into. It was fascinating to learn how different types of popular music touched different types of people.”
Years later, music is still the glue that bonds Thompson to the people he loves. It’s the brickwork for his own community, with “Salvation in the Ground” — the Allen Thompson Band’s best song cycle to date — acting as the cornerstone.
“I don’t have a single relationship in my life that doesn’t have its own special soundtrack. That’s my goal with the Allen Thompson Band: to write our soundtrack. This music is family music. There are husbands and wives in the band, and we’re part of a larger community of husband-and-wife bands. We’re creating our soundtrack together. I spent a lot of time not trying to do that — trying to be a certain type of artist instead — and the music didn’t sound as good as it should have. Since I’ve started creating music in this family environment, the response has changed. And the songs are better.”
Maybe salvation’s in the people, too.