Time marches on, as Tracy Lawrence once sang. Amazingly, it's been nearly 3 years since I've written or posted anything on this blog site. In that time, my grandson has started public school, I got married to the woman of my dreams, moved to another town, and Americana as a genre exploded to such new heights even birds are jealous. Jason Isbell, Sturgill Simpson, Chris Stapleton, The Lumineers, and Brandi Carlisile are but some of the leaders of this charge, writing and performing among some of the most relevant and poignant material of any time while selling out large theaters and arenas around the world. When the end of 2020 rolls around, Amanda Shires will take her rightful place in that list above (playing arenas may not be her thing, but I think large theaters would be right up her alley, as shown in this interview with The Tennessean).
The wheels are already in motion for this to take place. Year over year, her career has been a slow build to this moment. Building on the success of such critically acclaimed albums My Piece of Land (2016) and To the Sunset (2018), she took on some risk in 2019 spearheading the formation of The Highwomen. Comprised of outstanding female members Maren Morris, Natalie Hemby, Shires and Carlisle, this wildly well-received supergroup is accomplishing their goal of showing the continued inequality of female to male radio airplay and promotion in mainstream country music. Their debut album (as a group) is selling well, having reached number one on the country album sales chart. But as usual with mainstream country radio when something different and creative rolls across the desk, their singles are being ignored. Not that it would seem that acceptance at radio was the big nugget everyone was looking for, rather to me it highlights the continued problem with mainstream country radio that has existed arguably from the time radio began playing music - that is to say, for roughly the past 100 years.
A solo tour that's running from the end of January to April will see Amanda travel across the United States, with Canadian stops in Vancouver (March 11) and Toronto (April 17), will kick off with an appearance at the Girls Just Wanna Weekend festival in Mexico. Her performance at the most recent "Music City Midnight" event in Nashville (with crowd estimates of over 200,000 people) was among the most acclaimed performances of the evening, gaining recognition from CNN's Brooke Baldwin during that network's New Year's Eve broadcast. And, Amanda continues to perform as a member of her husband Jason Isbell's band, the 400 Unit. She is one of the most versatile performers and important artists in music today as she continues to grow and evolve her craft while championing women in music. The world is taking notice. The stars lined up nicely in 2019 for the Americana Music Association's Emerging Artist 2017 winner. The year 2020 will see this young lady explode to new heights. When we do this again next year, we will look back at 2020 as the year of Amanda Shires.
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