The Down Hill Strugglers – the folk trio whose first all-original album and first album in seven years, Old Juniper comes out August 16 on Jalopy Records – have confirmed tour dates.

Meanwhile, legendary artists like Alice Gerrard (Smithsonian Folkways artist), Bruce Molsky, and Tony Garnier (decades-long Bob Dylan bassist); and up-and-coming musicians like Nora Brown (two-time NPR Tiny Desk alum) and Jake Xerxes Fussell (whose new album is coming out Fat Possum) have weighed in on Down Hill Strugglers’ forthcoming album.
 
Hear/Share "Let The Rich Go Bust" single: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVI7lS5hlN4

"From the first track “I’m Gettin’ Ready to Go” to the last “Let the Rich Go Bust", this is a wonderful collection of original songs and tunes by The Down Hill Strugglers (Walker Shepard, Jackson Lynch and Eli Smith).
 
They have been playing and recording together for fifteen-plus years—this is their first in seven years and it’s a doozy. Old and new, evocative, current—all original. And I, as one who’s always had one foot in ‘old weird America’ and the other in new weird America, love this recording.
 
The Down Hill Strugglers have, as Nathan Salsburg put it in his notes, 'an exquisite sensitivity to [the] seam where collective tradition and individual artistry meet….' I couldn’t agree more."
- Alice Gerrard
 
"Throughout the record, the musical texture of Old Juniper shifts and blooms. Eli, Jackson, and Walker exchange roles freely— the banjo, fiddle, and guitar change hands almost every track. No matter their instrument, the three fall into place with the tune their guide. As these dynamics build and transform, a sound raw and beautifully sincere appears.
 
This album of new old-time tunes and songs will surely be a welcome addition to the well loved canon of American traditional music."
- Nora Brown
 
These guys are a first rate string band! Walker, Jackson and Eli have absorbed the old tradition, and the songs and tunes they wrote for this album are outstanding."
- Tony Garnier (Bob Dylan, Asleep at the Wheel)
 
"How wonderful is it that The Down Hill Strugglers are releasing a new album? I’ve been a fan of theirs from the beginning and will happily spend time with anything they put out!
 
I see The Down Hill Strugglers as the primary successors of the great and longstanding tradition of urban interpreter-performers of American vernacular string band music - They pick up where the New Lost City Ramblers left off, with [John] Cohen’s considerable creative guidance ever in their hearts and minds. Old Juniper is a testament to the vibrancy of this legacy."
- Jake Xerxes Fussell

"If it’s possible to be at the forefront of something old, The Down Hill Strugglers are right there with this new recording! Imaginative arrangements of interesting tunes played with soul, all while reaching back to the best of the old mountain sounds."
- Bruce Molsky
 
Meanwhile, the band confirmed tour dates:
 
September 5 – Kingston, NY – house concert
September 6-7 – Hillsdale, NY – Oldtone Music Festival
September 8 – Putnam Valley, NY - Tompkins Corners Cultural Center
September 10 – Durham, NC – house concert
September 11 – Floyd, VA – Floyd Country Store
September 12 – Thomas, WV – The Purple Fiddle
September 14 – Baltimore, MD – The Red Room (at Normals Books and Records)
September 15 – Takoma Park, MD – School of Musical Traditions
September 18 – Louisville, KY – B-Side
September 20 – New York, NY – house concert
September 21 – Brooklyn, NY – Jalopy Theater (with Jerron Paxton)
November 8-10 – Brooklyn, NY – Brooklyn Folk Fest
 
First single “Valley by the Stream” was added to two Apple Music official playlists: Americana Best New Songs and Americana Coming Soon.
 
The Down Hill Strugglers – the Appalachian-style folk trio that’s had music in the soundtracks to films Inside Llewyn Davis (starring Oscar Isaac) and Dreamland (with Margot Robbie); two of whose members have had music in the over sixty-one-million-selling video game Red Dead Redemption 2; and who have played The Kennedy Center, Newport Folk Fest, The Library of Congress, Brooklyn Folk Fest, NPR Mountain Stage – have recorded its first album of all originals, Old Juniper. It’s the band’s first album in seven years and first since the passing of band member John Cohen (New Lost City Ramblers).
 
Formerly on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings (under the band name the Dust Busters), The Down Hill Strugglers carry forward the sounds of the old, rural America. Eli Smith, Jackson Lynch, and Shepard harmonize in the high, lonesome style and the band plays an array of instruments, including fiddle, banjo and guitar, as well as harmonica, banjo-mandolin and old fashioned pump organ.
 
Old Juniper is the first new album from the Down Hill Strugglers since 2017 and is its first album of original music. The band wrote songs that are true to the deep and diverse roots of the old time string band style where they feel most at home but that also reflect the experiences and feelings of the band members living modern lives.
 
“Whistle Won’t Blow,” reflecting a sound that the Carter Family would’ve recognized, glides atop a lap steel guitar. The instrumental title track takes some unlikely turns via a distinctive chord progression partway through.
 
A beautiful rendition of the traditional “The Girl I Left Behind Me” is a bonus track that appears on the LP and will be released at a later date as a single. Instead of using the traditional tune, they paired the words with a fiddle tune from Zambia that they heard from an old 78rpm record reissued on the Secret Museum of Mankind series.
 
The album was recorded live to tape with the band playing around one microphone.
 
The title track was recorded on a summer night in band member Walker Shepard’s sister's barn in upstate New York. Astute listeners can hear the sound of crickets in the background.
 
The band formed while hanging out at the home of their mutual friend Peter Stampfel of the Holy Modal Rounders, where they also met bandmate and mentor John Cohen of the New Lost City Ramblers. Lynch and Smith are based in Brooklyn.
 
Band members Eli Smith and Walker Shepard spent two and a half years working on in-game music for the new hit video game Red Dead Redemption 2 (Rockstar Games), on which Smith served as Traditional Music Consultant. Smith plays banjo, guitar, jaw harp, mandolin and whistling while Walker Shepard plays the fiddle. Players find Smith in the game, in the role of a cowboy, sitting at a campfire playing guitar. He also appears on the official soundtrack playing the banjo. A reviewer for Forbes.com said, “If there is anything here in this game that feels actually, genuinely perfect, it's the music.