Ward Hayden & The Outliers Bring Hank Williams’ 100th Birthday Alive
Published
“We immediately knew that capturing the live sound
was how we wanted to celebrate Hank’s 100th.
Live music’s a high wire act, it’s exciting and it’s spirited.
We wanted this collection of songs to have that special quality.”
– Ward Hayden
Ward Hayden & The Outliers
Bring Hank Williams’ 100th Birthday Alive
With New Live Album and Music Videos
Boston Globe Critic Picks
Band’s Special Show
Celebrating Hank Williams;
With More Shows to Come
Hayden Chats With Billboard
About Country Music Icon’s
Centennial Milestone
Now, to mark the occasion of what would have been the Williams’ 100th birthday on September 17, Ward Hayden & The Outliers just released a new album, A Celebration of Hank Williams LIVE, on the band’s own Faster Horses Recordings.
“When we started thinking about doing something to honor Hank’s 100th we pretty much immediately knew that capturing the live sound was how we wanted to do it,” Hayden notes. “Live music is something truly special and unique, it’s a moment and in that moment there’s an energy that can’t be replicated in any other way than in a live setting. Live music’s a high wire act, it’s exciting and it’s spirited. We wanted this collection of songs, songs that hold a longstanding meaning to our personal and musical lives, to have that special quality.”
A Celebration of Hank Williams LIVE was produced by Hayden and his band: Josh Kiggans on drums and percussion, Cody Nilsen on guitar and pedal steel, and Handsome Greg Hall on electric and upright bass. All 11 tracks (with four addition stories) were recorded live from three of the bands shows: New Year’s Eve 2022 and New Year’s Day 2023 at the Lizard Lounge in Cambridge, MA as well as March 2023 at Signature Sounds Backporch Festival in Northampton, MA.
Hayden told Billboard for their feature marking Williams’ 100th, “It’s so deceptively difficult to do what he did, like the ability to have humor and marry that with real, raw, honest emotion. He definitely found something unique, which is why I think so many people have used his music as inspiration. I mean, he really set the bar. …The songs are versatile. It’s not a blank canvas, but it’s a canvas that can be rearranged without completely changing it.”
Continuing to bring the special energy to audiences, Ward Hayden & The Outliers have chosen a handful of dates on their fall tour schedule to present special shows with setlists of Hank Williams songs. One of the first “Celebration of Hank Williams” shows, was this past weekend’s Boston Globe Critics Pick for “Things to do in Boston.” Seven more upcoming special events are:
September
29 – Fall River, MA – Narrows Center for the Arts
October
20 – Portsmouth, NH – The Music Hall
November
2 – Rochester, NY – Abilene
3 – Buffalo, NY – Sportsmen’s Tavern
4 – Syracuse, NY – The 443 Social Club
10 – Brownfield, ME – Stone Mountain Arts Center
11 – Westerly, RI – The Knickerbocker
A full tour schedule for the band is below.
In addition to the new album and slate of special concerts, the band has also released new live performance videos of five of the tracks selected for A Celebration of Hank Williams LIVE. This week, their video for “Why Don’t You Love Me,” joins the previously posted videos for “Long Gone Lonesome Blues,” “Ramblin’ Man,” “Cold, Cold Heart,” and “I’ll Never Get Out of This World Alive.”
“My biggest inspiration for ever wanting to put a band together and write my own music was a vision of creating music that combined the styles of Hank Williams and Chuck Berry,” says Hayden. “Lyrics that tackled aspects of life that can be troubling and painful, but done with wit and honesty and sometimes with a bit of humor, and then to occasionally couple that with the rockin’ sound of Chuck’s style of rock ‘n’ roll guitar. Sounds that hit hard and also make you want to move and experience joy.”
A Celebration of Hank Williams LIVE is the second live recording from their Williams salutes. The first, released in 2018 when the group was known as Girls, Guns & Glory, was praised by the Boston Globe: “Hayden doesn’t cover these songs; he shakes with them, almost bleeds them. They roll through him like prayer through a Southern preacher.” The same and more can be said of how this new LP captures the eternal spirit of Hank’s classic country compositions, recordings, and performances and brands them with the Outliers’ own trademark country-rocking sound.
Hayden’s 10th album and most-recent release of original material earlier this year, South Shore, taps into a major country music tradition of writing about the small town where one grew up and calls home. And, in part, channels Williams as an influence. “Our song ‘Blink of an Eye’ shows the most Hank influence. It has the Chet Atkins style electric guitar part and also the sock rhythm on the acoustic guitar, which are both classic features of Hank Williams recordings. And it has the country yodel, reminiscent of Hank’s yodel a la ‘Lovesick Blues’ or ‘Long Gone Lonesome Blues.’
“Hank’s yodel has been a major influence on me. I’d always wanted to include a yodeling song on one of our albums, and in our live show I do a lot of country yodeling. But it had never made its way onto one of our records before South Shore. And I must say that we had such a good time with that yodeling song that I wouldn’t be surprised to see more country yodeling on future albums as well.”
A Celebration of Hank Williams Live track listing:
For media review, listen HERE
1. Ramblin’ Man
2. Intro: No Courage without Fear
3. Settin’ the Woods on Fire
4. Weary Blues from Waitin’
5. Intro: Hank’s Last Song
6. I’ll Never Get Out of this World Alive
7. Long Gone Lonesome Blues
8. Cold, Cold Heart
9. Intro: Leon Payne
10. Lost Highway
11. Honky Tonkin’
12. Intro: The Song that Made Him Famous
13. Lovesick Blues
14. Half as Much
15. Why Don’t You Love Me
Ward Hayden & The Outliers on Tour
September
23 – Center Groton, CT – Firefest 2 (Benefit for Mystic, CT First Responders)
29 – Fall River, MA – Narrows Center for the Arts
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
October
6 – Arundel, ME – Vinegar Hill Music Theatre
7 – Acton, MA – Iron Work Farm
20 – Portsmouth, NH – The Music Hall
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
November
2 – Rochester, NY – Abilene
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
3 – Buffalo, NY – Sportsmen’s Tavern
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
4 – Syracuse, NY – The 443 Social Club
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
10 – Brownfield, ME – Stone Mountain Arts Center
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
11 – Westerly, RI – The Knickerbocker
SPECIAL – Ward Hayden & The Outliers presents: A Celebration of Hank Williams
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