An Evening with Hot Buttered Rum - and Kate Gaffney

Bluegrass/Jamband
Rock / Americana / Roots Music
www.hotbutteredrum.net
www.kategaffney.com
"Stunning instrumental and vocal virtuosity." – Relix Magazine
"Few things rejuvenate the soul like a warm fireside drink after an exhausting day in the snow. Hot Buttered Rum has that effect. Their original songs are instantly familiar and inviting, and their easygoing versions of timeless classics (the Beatles, Hank Williams) belie the intricacy of the arrangements." –San Francisco Chronicle
Initially formed as an acoustic string band, seven years of constant touring has transformed Hot Buttered Rum into a plugged-in, percussive powerhouse that wows critics and fans alike. Their left-coast rock reveals an access to jazz, country, and world music that few groups can match. While the band's music belies simple categorization, its songwriting and stage chemistry delights listeners at every turn.
The widespread appeal of HBR’s music stems not only from the band’s musical versatility and prolific songwriting, but also from the magnetic chemistry the group creates onstage together. It was this chemistry that drew the group together, and that holds it together still through the rigors of their involved professional life together. It is this chemistry that audiences are consistently drawn to and caught up in, comment on effusively at shows and in online chat groups. It is this chemistry that is propelling the band to ever greater success.
Hot Buttered Rum is just as comfortable plugging in at a large-scale rock festival as it is inviting the audience to enjoy its quieter repertoire at an acoustic folk session. Perhaps this is why the band has enjoyed success at such diverse festivals as the Newport Folk Festival, Bonnaroo, Grey Fox, High Sierra and the Telluride Bluegrass Festival. HBR has managed to do all of this without the use of drums, opting instead to channel their music through the guitars, mandolins, fiddles, banjos and string basses of traditional bluegrass. These, along with their occasional flutes, accordions, and other sundry instruments, are amplified with both electric pickups and microphones, giving them the volume and punch to carry through even the largest sound systems.
The band has shared the stage with some of today’s most accomplished artists, such as Phil Lesh, Bela Fleck, Ben Harper, Chris Thile, Mike Marshall and Peter Rowan, the last two of whom worked with the band on its recent critically-acclaimed studio release, Well-Oiled Machine. The support and encouragement the band receives from these and other musical elders is important, since HBR has such a great love and respect for American musical traditions, as well as those from Africa and Europe. Blues, folk, bluegrass, jazz, and rock permeate the group’s performances, while the members’ varying degrees of classical training lead them to invest heavily in group composition. One of the things the band enjoys most is its ability to turn on a dime and leave its audience wondering what new realms their songs will explore, while at the same time assuring them that, above all, the music’s purpose is not to impress but to entertain and to inspire.
HBR is committed to achieving its musical goals in an environmentally sensitive manner. Since 2003, the band has toured in vehicles that run on vegetable oil and biodiesel instead of fossil fuel products. Doing this has not been easy, especially in the early days. But, being in a business that requires driving thousands of miles each year, HBR knows that using alternative fuel is one of the most effective ways it can reduce its ecological footprint. The band enjoys performing for educational assemblies and benefit concerts, and many of their songs seek to raise awareness about the socially and environmentally volatile era in which we live. Above all, HBR’s goal is to satisfy their audience’s minds, hearts and dancing feet with a unique and uplifting blend of progressive American music.
The new lineup has recently emerged from San Francisco’s Mission Bells Studios, where they recorded Limbs Akimbo under the watchful eye of producer Tim Bluhm (The Mother Hips). Featuring guest appearances by Jackie Greene (Skinny Singers, Phil Lesh and Friends) and Zach Gill (ALO, Jack Johnson), the album marks the beginning of a new creative phase. Limbs Akimbo now signals the arrival of a highly matured, impressively listenable, stirringly rocking, and pleasantly poppy sound. Proving himself a forceful producer, Bluhm has struck an impressive balance between highlighting the multi-instrumental, cross-genre elements of the band’s sound while avoiding the contemporary trappings of music that is complex and different merely for the sake of complexity and difference. The result is beautifully paradoxical: a tremendous, minimalist pop album full of hints, teases, and cameos of the band’s complex musical personality. In “Something New,” Keefe recites the familiar wedding adage “something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.” And right there, in a nutshell, is Limbs Akimbo: an album that is both an elegy and reincarnation of Hot Buttered Rum’s past sound, that borrows heavily from the rock pantheon while sprinkling in just a little of everything else. Limbs Akimbo is an album that evidences the acoustic string band of yesteryear while unapologetically propelling into the scene a mature left-coast, drum-driven, pop-rock band. It was in Northern California that Kate Gaffney found her musical calling and began to hone her skills as a songwriter. Leaving her career as a social worker, Gaffney began to write alongside contemporary artists including Jackie Greene, while soaking in the Americana music scene that was flourishing in Sacramento, CA. She began to perform on the West Coast but found a strong pull to the East Coast, where her roots lie. While on the road, Kate found herself in Austin, TX where she met even more of "the good people" in music and where a chance encounter with Austin's music mogul, Clifford Antone, gave her the validation to keep on with her musical calling. Gaffney returned to Philadelphia, PA and immersed herself in the music scene, quickly becoming a standout favorite in the city’s top venues, including The Tin Angel and World Cafe Live.
Gaffney has supported top national acts including Richie Havens, Chris Smither, Xavier Rudd, Steve Forbert, Jackie Greene, Sophie B. Hawkins, Johnny A., Hamell on Trial, Jeffrey Gaines, as well as Dispatch offshoots, Braddigan and State Radio. Gaffney branches out regionally and nationally with her touring, making stops at venues including The Living Room in NYC, Jammin' Java in VA, The Grey Eagle Tavern in Asheville, NC, Ruta Maya in Austin, TX, Starr Hill Music Hall in Charlottesville, VA, Club Passim in Boston, Club Helsinki in Great Barrington, MA, and Hotel Utah in San Francisco, CA.
A Classic Rock Child, Gaffney recalls rooting through her parents' "small but quality" collection of vinyl records, discovering some of the artists that would influence her most: The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, Jim Croce, Van Morrison, Tom Petty, Janis Joplin, and Creedence Clearwater Revival, CSNY. "The music of the 60s and 70s was honest and bold and it got down to the nitty gritty; there was no holding back. To me that is quality music - when artists can give it their all and manage to strike a resonating chord in the depths of the listener's soul - and that is what the music and songwriting of those decades does for me."