Annalyse McCoy and Ryan Dunn make beautiful music together—on and off the stage. The husband and wife team are the co-lead vocalists of New York City-based Americana band 2/3 Goat (“Two Thirds Goat”), who seamlessly blend alt-country, classic rock, and bluesy bluegrass (Blues-grass? I feel good about it), calling it “Metrobilly”, a style as diverse as the pair creating it.
McCoy, a direct descendant of the infamous McCoys of Eastern Kentucky (as in the Hatfields and the McCoys), and Dunn, a son of the southern New Jersey shore, met over music in New York, and the band was born. “I kept asking her to write with me so I could spend time with her, and she kept saying yes,” says Dunn with a laugh. Named for the percentage of Capricorns in the group, 2/3 Goat releases their new album, Let It Rise, on Friday, April 15th. In 2015, the band released songs every two months, until they’d unleashed a whole album’s worth of music they called Let It Rise at the end of the year. Now, the album will come out in physical form with some new songs added to the mix. The first new single, “Whiskey Sins”, a rowdy country banger, was featured on Mother Church Pew in March.
McCoy and Dunn draw on their backgrounds for inspiration, and use those experiences to keep a traditionally ol.d-fashioned genre fresh and relevant. “I grew up playing music,” recalls McCoy, whose family’s rich history is regularly celebrated. “We have reunions every year, it was a big part of my life growing up,” she adds. “Annalyse’s parents are big activists too, they’ve even been featured in a Greenpeace documentary. They passed that revolutionary spirit on to Annalyse,” says Dunn. The pair also use their musical megaphone to bring awareness to environmental and labor issues that permeate today’s headlines.
The album is fantastic, y’all; it’s seven stunning tracks shimmer and groove, a straight up down-home party for your ears. Order Let It Rise here, and be prepared for a good time: http://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/twothirdsgoat2015
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