As you can see from the new addition to our sidebar – t-shirts are back in stock! Dolour shirts featuring a design from “The Years in the Wilderness” as well as Shane Tutmarc & The Traveling Mercies “Hey Lazarus!” shirts. The Mercies shirts come in black or white, while the Dolour ones are in red or creme. Pick one up today!

In band news, this weekend we are doing a couple private benefit concerts. We are doing long sets with lots of vintage country, rock and roll and r&b sprinkled in between originals. I got a great band featuring my old friend Joey Sanchez on drums (he played on Dolour’s Suburbiac and New Old Friends), Josiah Holland on keys, accordian and additional guitar, and Jeremy Branon on bass. Hopefully we’ll get some good video footage to share with you. Meanwhile, look at the shows page to keep up-to-date with our concert calendar. Adios.

We are looking forward to returning to Bowling Green, KY’s venue Tidball’s tomorrow night. We had such a great time when we were last a couple months ago. Even when the PA died on us halfway thru our set, we kept on rocking (see: video).



With my usual drummer, Aaron Tosti, on the road (guitar tech-ing) with Switchfoot, I have frequent collaborator Ethan Luck on drums. Ethan holds the unique honor of playing the most instruments with me. Over the course of this last year and half I’ve lived in Nashville, Ethan has contributed electric guitar, baritone guitar (the solo on “What is This Love?”), lap steel, bass guitar, and drums to both live shows and recordings. If he’s available and I’m needing an extra element to the show, Ethan can more than likely cover it. Plus he brings an energy and excitement that is contagious and always makes the shows fun.

On bass I have my right-hand guy, Nathan Thomas. He produced the new EP, and we’ve already begun tracking some newer stuff. Not sure where that is headed, but I will keep you posted. If you live near the Bowling Green area, we hope to see you tomorrow, or if you got friends out that way – let them know!

Come on out to our first Chattanooga show tonight. It should be a good one too, as it is the CD release show for James Leg (Black Diamond Heavies), and it also features local favorites Bohannons and Duquette Johnston. Also tonight at the show, Alabama’s The Gum Street Killers will be taking donations for the recent Alabama tornado victims, so come on out and rock and roll for a good cause.

Related reading…

Chattanooga Pulse – Music Feature

We just set up a mailing list that you can now join! In addition to up-to-date info about shows, releases, and other points of interest – we will be providing list-ers with exclusive mp3 downloads, video clips, and other goodies. And don’t worry about us “spamming” you with irrelevant show info. For instance, if you live in Seattle we will not be flooding your inbox with info our shows around the South. So include your zip code, and we’ll make sure the right info is targeted to you.

Take a look at the shows we have coming up. If you live in Chattanooga, Knoxville, Bowling Green, or our hometown of Nashville we are playing near you!


We’ve been happy to have Larry Vance of Blood On the Bluegrass join our team helping with booking. Congratulations are in order too, as yesterday Larry became a daddy. Congrats, Larry!

Kurt Cobain was a beacon of light for me in my early adolescence. I started playing guitar at 10 years old, only vaguely aware of the storm that was brewing in my hometown of Seattle, WA. Although barely old enough to be considered part of the “X” generation, Kurt Cobain was the first musician from my era that really inspired me to sit down and write my own songs. He felt like a natural transition from my obsession with John Lennon. Through his generous accolades of underground music like Os Mutantes, The Vaselines and Daniel Johnston, I developed my own taste for record collecting and seeking out sounds outside of the mainstream. But his early death left me with so many questions. I still wonder where his life and music would have gone had he not put such an abrupt end to it.

It’s A Wonderful Life: Return of Grunge Pioneer Kurt Cobain

In tribute to the 17th anniversary of his passing I wrote an “alternate history” which tells the story of what could have been. I hope you enjoy this happy ending to such a tragic musical revolutionary.

We are in the running for Artist of the Month over at Nashville’s The Deli Magazine website. The site focuses on local indie music scenes and emerging artists (to quote their website). The winner of this contest gets their picture and a link at the top of The Deli’s homepage for two weeks (apparently the most clicked part of the site), which would give us great exposure in my adopted hometown of Nashville.

http://nashville.thedelimagazine.com

So far we have a strong lead, but the contest continues for two weeks, so please take the 5 seconds to vote for us at the Deli’s Nashville Artist of The Month poll, and spread the word!

Hey there – I hope you are exploring this great new website that my brother Brandon Tutmarc has designed. You can now stream every release, and get up-to-the-minute show information, as well as dig through old press clippings and photos. There are updated featured videos, and I will be doing my best to keep you all abreast with current and upcoming information.

When I first moved out to Nashville, a little over a year ago now, I journaled the journey with my blog Through These Eyes. You can see my old posts there, but I will now be doing all my story telling right here at shanetutmarc.com.

In December, through MusicReleaser.com, we “released” a new 5-song EP titled, So Hard to Make An Easy Getaway. Head over to that site to see a video of me explaining how the site works, and sign up for a free account, which gives you access to our new EP for absolutely no charge.

I just returned from a 2 1/2 week trip to the Great Northwest. It was refreshing to catching up with friends and family out there. I had my brother, Brandon, back on the drums (like the Traveling Mercies days) and Rian Lewis on bass. Rian is a longtime friend from Portland, who keeps himself busy producing and performing with a variety of artists in his hometown. The first show was magic. I was invited to participate in a tribute to the late great Townes Van Zandt at the Tractor Tavern on March 7th. The original concept was a bunch of solo artists taking turns performing their favorite Townes songs, but after we all got together, it ended up being a very collaborative show. I ended up playing bass and singing harmonies during Kevin Large’s set, while Sera Cahoone played drums. During my set, I had Justin Davis on lead guitar, Star Anna on tambourine, and Scott Farley (host of Bellevue College’s KBCS radio show, The Outskirts) on bass! To help promote the Townes tribute, Star Anna, Justin Davis, and I were on Marty Reimer’s podcast (which was also broadcast through Seattle’s The Mountain radio station). And later that day, I joined Star and Justin on KBCS‘s The Outskirts.

On Friday, March 11th, I was able to reconnect with former KEXP DJ, Larry Metro on Hollow Earth Radio, which was a fun, very relaxed show. Next up, on March 16th along with my brother and Rian Lewis, we played Portland’s Bing Lounge for a KINK fm radio broadcast. The whole show was also filmed, and the current “featured video” in the bottom right corner of this page is the interview portion of the show. You can find the rest of the performance on KINK’s YouTube page. That night we performed at Mississippi Studios, probably my favorite Portland venue.

And finally, on March 16th, I was back at the Tractor Tavern, but this time with the full band. Playing the Tractor is always a good time, and it was a great opportunity to get a bunch of friends and family out.

Now I am back in Nashville, TN and looking forward to a busy week of shows. We’re playing the Mercy Lounge for the first time on Monday as part of their weekly “8 Off 8th” showcase, on Wednesday the 30th, we get the opportunity to open for the great Dex Romweber Duo, and on Saturday we are performing at the annual Pancakes & Booze Art Show! We already have some dates lined up through May, and we are looking to be doing more regional touring this Spring and Summer.

Keep your eyes here for more updates. Now that I’ve caught you up a bit, I can write something more bite sized next time.