GRIFFIN HOUSE“Rising Star” is not a phrase one would normally use
to describe an artist like Griffin House, who has been touring for
more than 15 years and has recorded over 12 studio albums.
The title of House’s current release, Rising Star, references the
first track on the album which tells the story of a character who
moves to Music City, like so many do, with a guitar and a dream.
Although not intended to be autobiographical, the listener gets the
sense that this comical and fictitious tale could hardly have been
woven by someone without a similar life experience to the protagonist
in Rising Star.
Indeed, House’s story began in much the same way. Moving to
Nashville as a young man in 2003 with not much more than a guitar and
a handful of songs, he took a part time job downtown at a Broadway
gift shop, biding his time before he caught his big break. That big
break came af-ter just a few months, in the form of a phone call from
Island Def Jam Records, which jumpstarted his career and led to him
signing with CAA and Nettwerk Records.
After that, things happened quickly for House. His 2004 debut album
Lost and Found was lauded by music critics such as Bill Flanagan
(Executive VP MTV/VH1 Networks) who featured House on the CBS Sunday
Morning show as one of the “best emerging songwriters.” He began
touring, opening for acts like John Mellencamp and The Cranberries,
and found himself meeting people like Bruce Springsteen and Willie
Nelson. By all accounts, House seemed poised to be more of an
“overnight success” rather than a ”rising star”… but
that’s not exactly how things turned out. “I’ve been a “rising
star” for the past 15 years” House jokes, “It’s a slow
rise.”
Although House has enjoyed plenty of success as national headliner for
over a decade and has earned a great deal of respect as a well-known
performer and singer-songwriter, he seems to not take himself or his
career in the music industry too seriously.
Now married, sober, and a father, House has learned to balance his
career by making his family and his sobriety his first priority. He
pays tribute to his wife and children with When The Kids Are Gone, a
song about watching his daughters grow up and imagining he and his
wife as empty nesters.
There’s a sense of lightness in his new record, which comes across
particularly in the first few tracks, such as in Mighty Good Friend,
where you can hear his daughters on the recording, and the
tongue-in-cheek humor in 15 Minutes of Fame.
House acknowledges that his new album is a collaborative effort. “I
teamed up with my old bud-dies Paul Moak and Ian Fitchuk who helped me
make my very first record Lost and Found. It was so good to reunite
with them and work together again.” he says. “It’s amazing to
watch these guys I started out with in the very beginning who are now
world class musicians and producers winning Grammys. This album seemed
to come together with a little more grace and ease than records I’ve
made in the past, and I think so much of that is attributed to how
good the people I got worth with on this record are, they all just
happen to be really good friends too.”
Several songs on House’s album are also co-writes with friends,
fellow Nashville musician Brian Elmquist (The Lone Bellow) and Joy
Williams (The Civil Wars), and longtime collaborator Jeff Trott
(Sheryl Crow).
“I usually lock myself in a room for eight hours at a time until I
have enough songs done,” House says, “But with touring part time
and being a dad part time, that adds up to full time job, so I
de-cided to call in a little help from my friends to write some of
these songs” says House. “Some songs came easier than others. I
wrote Mighty Good Friend with Brian (Elmquist) and it’s a song about
fighting through writer’s block, and then there are songs like
Change that I wrote with Joy (Williams). We sat on her couch one
morning and I remember showing her the idea for the verse. We worked
on the words for an hour or two, and then out of nowhere she sang this
beau-tiful chorus. We broke for lunch and came back and finished it
that afternoon. It was one of those songs that took years to live and
only one short day to write.”
“I love making music with friends,” says House. “Hindsight was
another one with Brian (Elmquist). He and I share some similarities,
including our journey into sobriety together. There’s a line in the
song “I’ve been thinking lately, of a boy young and on the run”
that always makes me imagine Brian as a little boy with a dream, both
running away from a hard past and on toward a brighter future.” he
says. “We’ve formed a bond and friendship through music and
sobriety and I think you can feel that in the songs we wrote
together.”
Just when you think you have House’s album pegged, there seems to be
a surprise around eve-ry corner. Each song is distinct in its own way.
The heavy guitar on Hung Up On You, a song that House says is a break
up letter addressed to alcohol, gives way to the intro of Cup of
Fulfill-ment, which starts with a bagpipe solo and leads the listener
on an epic journey that crescendos into the record's most moving
moment.
We catch a glimpse of a much more rock ’n’ roll side of House than
we’ve heard before from the Pink Floyd-esque Crash and Burn to the
rowdy punk influenced Natural Man.
House’s new album, Rising Star, was released in the summer of 2019.
And released in December 2019 is a full length film also titled Rising
Star, in which House stared and co-produceed with music video director
and film maker Shane Drake. The film features music from House’s
‘Rising Star’ as well as his previous catalogue and chronicles his
life as a musician.
GRIFFIN HOUSE TICKETS
* Pre-sale begins 9:00pm October 16
* Tickets on sale 10:00am October 18
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Seated (GA) - $25
Bar / Standing (GA) - $20
_For any wheelchair or ADA needs, please contact the Box Office in
advance of the performance at (443) 283-1200._
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18/07/2020 Last update