Tucson-based group Music These Days celebrates the past while looking forward.
The act blended Americana and neo-traditional country on its 10-song album, “Big Wide States,” which was released on May 24.
Led by Ben Wilkinson, Music These Days will host a record release party on Saturday, June 8, at JoJo’s Restaurant. Gabrielle Pietrangelo will open the show. The band will play “Big Wide States” in its entirety.
Music These Days is vocalist, guitarist, harmonica player and percussionist Wilkinson; bassist Christopher Byrne; pedal steel and lead guitarist Jameson Clay Koweek; Wurlitzer player and drummer Michael Newman; and backing vocalist Emily Rockey.
“Big Wide States” is the follow-up to its debut EP “Two Year,” which hit streaming services in March 2023.
With its new album, the band explores themes of life on the American backroads of the past and present, the appeal of open landscapes, love and loss.
“Where it’s rooted is this idea of the American West,” Wilkinson said.
“I’ve always been infatuated with the American West. I came out here when I was 10 years old with my family. They brought me to Tucson. There's just something about the landscapes, the roads, the open and resonant areas, that I think for a lot of artists, for a lot of musicians, you instantly gravitate toward. ‘Big Wide States’ is an album title that relates to that openness, that expansiveness of driving.
“A lot of these songs, I like to think of people driving and listening to them. I create music that I want to listen to when I’m driving. … The songs, some of them deal with relationships. Some of them deal with love. Some of them deal with work, but they all fit into this idea in my mind of various points in time in the American West.”
The record’s lead song, “Redwood Home,” waxes poetic about Wilkinson’s love of redwood forests.
“I’ve lived in them. I’ve been visiting them since I was 10 years old, and they’ve always felt like they were hugging me,” he said.
“In a lot of ways, they’ve helped me to get through points in my life of intense difficulty with mental blocks or emotional hiccups. I’ve always found a lot of peace of mind and comfort in being surrounded by old growth and new growth redwoods and their groves.”
Another song on the album is “Saint Joseph’s,” a down-tempo track that recreates Wilkinson and his wife swimming and floating in the ocean.
Wilkinson has been told his music has changed other's lives.
“It’s happened with a couple of songs on this record, where I’ve had friends tell me it really means something to them or has helped them to heal in a way they couldn’t find before,” Wilkinson said.
The album was produced by Wilkinson and longtime collaborator Floyd Kellogg, a producer and multi-instrumentalist. Kellogg played the drums, other percussion instruments, the pump organ, the guitar and the Farfisa on the album.
They worked on the album at various Tucson studios, and one in Nantucket, Massachusetts. The group collaborated with artists from around the country, including Nashville pianist Phil Madeira, Tucson cellist Claudia Vanderschraaf and Branson fiddle player Bruce Hoffman.
Music These Days is a relative newbie in the city’s music scene. Wilkinson has been a professional musician for most of his life. He started the band shortly after relocating to Tucson in 2019. However, progress was stalled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“In that time, I was able to get a lot of work done in the home studio,” Wilkinson said. “The live performance version of our band is just starting to get its legs, and we’ve been a formation for just over a year.”
Wilkinson had a health scare in 2021 and underwent open heart surgery. Music was integral during his time of healing.
“When I was in recovery and couldn’t do much because of the pandemic, I just had this overwhelming productivity of writing songs,” Wilkinson said.
“They were pouring out of me. That’s a lot of what you hear on our first record and a lot of what’s spilled into the second record.”
Before moving to Arizona, Wilkinson was part of the Bay-area scene.
Wilkinson said although he is new to the Tucson music scene, he has found it to be very open and accepting.
“The energy that moves through Tucson on a creative level is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced before in all of my years of performing and collaborating,” Wilkinson said. “There’s a commitment that when someone wants to play music with you, when someone wants to collaborate with you and perform with you, it is authentic. It’s pure. The family I’ve built here musically, I cherish it so much.”
Wilkinson said with Music These Days, he can take on more of a leadership role, especially in terms of songwriting.
“This project is unique in that it’s all songs that I’ve written,” Wilkinson said. “Projects that I’ve worked on in the past have been more collaborative where I would share songwriting responsibilities with other members of the band. … I’m able to take songs that I’ve written and composed and share them with my bandmates and those helping us in the studio in ways that gives me more creative control than I’ve had in the past.”
Wilkinson said the group also has a different sound than other bands with whom he has performed.
“The genre of music for Music These Days is more neo-traditional country versus other projects I’ve been in. There are a lot more acoustic instruments. There’s a lot more focus on space in the music,” Wilkinson said.
“When I use the term ‘neo-traditional country,’ I’m speaking in terms of country music that is pre-1970. So, the more traditional instrumentation, the pedal steel guitar being a prominent feature in my music, acoustic instruments being a predominant feature in the music, song structure, how I arrange verses and choruses with a modern flair, but I like to tell stories with my songs.
“A lot of the way I write has more of a feel of artists that inspire me from the 1950s and 1960s — Marty Robbins, Willie Nelson. I’m a huge Dolly Parton fan. Tammy Wynette. These classic country musicians who were able to crank out these hits that really held a place in your heart because you related to them. I think that’s where a lot of my songwriting comes from. I was heavily inspired by the music I listened to growing up at my grandmother’s house, which was that era.”
Musically, Wilkinson came from more of a rock background. He came up in the scene playing in thrash metal bands in New York in the 1980s and ’90s.
He started on the electric guitar in middle school. In middle and high school, he was surrounded by a group of musicians who played regularly and pushed each other to be better.
Along with playing, writing, producing and engineering music, Wilkson also has a graphic design background. He owned his own graphic design business, on and off, for about 25 years.
Wilkinson said his experience playing different types of music and his growth personally and professionally have gotten him where he is now.
“Ten years ago, I wouldn’t have been in a place musically or instrumentally where I would have thought about making songs that sound like this,” Wilkinson said.
“They’ve always been inside of me, but where I was in my life and where I am now, they’re critical in the music I’m putting out.”
The group is still building an audience, but they have performing in different venues in Tucson and surrounding areas.
They have played at Che’s Lounge, Saint Charles Tavern, the Patagonia Lumber Co., Tap & Bottle, Bar Crisol and Monterey Court.
Usually, they will play with all five members, if schedules allow. Wilkinson is a full-time musician, but some of the other members have full-time day jobs.
“The beauty of the music is it can scale from a solo performance all the way to a full band. Depending on the venue and depending on availability, that’s how I’ve been positioning us. Ideally, we always play as a quintet. That’s where the sound becomes full,” Wilkinson said.
A three-piece acoustic/Appalachian version of the band plays monthly at Tucson’s Community Supported Agriculture pickups.
“The setting is absolutely beautiful, in a Spanish colonial courtyard, playing acoustic instruments while people are picking up freshly grown, organic produce,” Wilkinson said.
“And we get free produce for playing.”
Music These Days “Big Wide States” Album Release Party
WHEN: 7 to 9 p.m. Saturday, June 8
WHERE: Monsoon Room, JoJo’s Restaurant, 76 W. Washington Street, Tucson
COST: Free admission
INFO: musicthesedays.com
