Next Thursday, August 15th, the Vail Valley Foundation is closing out their Alpine Bank ShowDown Town season with local Colorado bluegrass-folk duo Shovelin Stone. This is the final FREE concert of the year in Eagle. The concert begins at 6:30 p.m. in Eagle Town Park.
5 Fun Facts About The Band:
- The band rose to fame through a Facebook post. While the duo (vocalist/guitarist Makenzie Willox and banjo player Zak Thrall) have known each other for over a decade, they always lived in different parts of the country until three years ago, when Willox moved to Austin, Texas, where Thrall was living at the time. Once in Austin, the duo decided to put a video of one of their songs on Facebook. Willox explains, "I wrote a song called 'Austin,' which was about moving down there... We shot a video of it and put it on Facebook. It got 8,000 likes in the first two or three days it was up. We thought, 'hey, maybe we should start a band.'"
- It took the band a while to perfect their signature sound. Once they become official, the duo took their talent to local gigs around Austin, while continuously working on their sound. Willox explains, “You get to Austin and you go to an open mic and everybody is good. Everybody’s a good singer, everybody’s a good songwriter...You gotta step your game up or you’re not going to get noticed.”
- The duo won a battle of the bands contest and worked with a Grammy-winning producer. Once the band moved back to Colorado they won a battle of the bands contest with their song "Austin." The prize for winning the contest included a free day of recording at Eagle Wind Sound in Winter Parker with Grammy winning artist P.J. Olson (the lead singer of the Alan Parsons Live Project). With the help of Olson, Shovelin Stone's self-titled debut album will be released this fall.
- The band has roots in the Valley. Willox hails from Fort Collins, and Thall grew up in Eagle and attend Eagle Valley High School. Thrall explains, "[We've] already gotten a lot of love... Weez at KZYR (97.7 FM) has really supported us by playing our song on the radio. It's just been a massive amount of support we've seen already."
- Shovelin Stone believe that ShowDown Town is the best way to discover new music. Willox says, “We’re really exposed to art [now], which is beautiful and it’s great that you can draw from all these different places and be inspired. But it also spreads the butter a little thinner. Instead of a hot tub, you’re in an ocean of all the art [that’s] out there.”