Exclusive Interview: Drew Holcomb at Moon River Festival 2022
Drew Holcomb and his wife Ellie founded Moon River Festival in Memphis, TN in 2014. Since then the festival moved to Chattanooga, TN, and it’s continued to grow to the size it is today catering to several thousand fans who come in from all across the country and the world. Drew’s band Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors are a staple of each year’s festival, but Moon River’s also become a wonderful platform for emerging and major artists alike to connect with fans in scenic Chattanooga.
Drew took some time out of his busy schedule to speak with Zippy of ConcertHopper in the early hours of the festival on Saturday.
CH: It's an absolute pleasure to speak with you. My family's been a fan of yours since they saw you at Cayamo, and the lineup very much resembles the music that I feel really speaks to us in Tennessee, the South and Americana fans in general. So it's just been very exciting to have the festival in Chattanooga, so, first of all, thank you again for founding Moon River and for giving it a home here in Chattanooga.
Drew: My pleasure! Chattanooga has welcomed us with open arms.
CH: That’s wonderful to hear! So I wanted to ask, as somebody who's performed at music festivals over the years, and I'm sure gone as a youth too, does this still blow your mind that you've kind of evolved both as an artist but as somebody who's now kind of contributing to the community in this way through Moon River?
Drew: Yeah, absolutely. It's pretty bizarre to see what this has become. When we first started this in Memphis, 2014, it was like 2000 people on stage and everybody that was playing was a friend of ours. And now we've got these legendary artists, people like the national career stars and then lots of other great musicians. We were talking yesterday with somebody that one of my favorite things about the festival is how we book people in these sort of earlier slots, and then you look back years later like, wow, that band really exploded. Like, Caamp played the second stage at less than five years ago, and now if they were here they'd be top of the bill or at least close to it. And then catching people early, like Zach Bryan, I mean, we booked him a year ago before he broke out to this degree and since then he's really exploded! So that's been really fun. But really, it's such a team effort. There's hundreds of people involved in putting this on and then the thousand people who come, so it's just yeah, I'm honored by it. And it’s still pretty stressful for myself, but it's also just really wonderful. Yeah it's just a collaborative effort.
CH: Yeah just even being guided around the festival I've already met and talked to so many kind people, so everybody is just super gracious.
Drew: There's a lot of moving parts. We live in a crazy world, so security has obviously got to be super tight just to make sure that fans and the staff and the patrons are all safe. But yeah, I think it's pretty well run as far as my experience playing festivals. I’ve played a lot of them, so I always wanted Moon River to be a great experience for people.
CH: What's your vision for how Moon River can evolve? Like, what do you think of after each year that you want for the next time?
Drew: I really love what it feels like already. The big difference is just the lineup every year. That's, to me, where I get to be creative, thinking about putting together something unique that is different than years past. We've had very few repeat artists except for myself. We always make a little tweaks. Like this year we went try to go greener with our water distribution, so people obviously encourage people to bring bottles, but then if you don't, we've got these reusable recyclable cups that we wash and turn back out the same day. Little things to try to make the experience better for the community at large and also for people that are here.
CH: I know in your career playing live concerts has been a great way for you to really connect with your fans, and as such you've released a number of live albums. Should we ever expect a “Live from Moon River” record, perhaps?
Drew: I haven't thought about that, but that's not a bad idea. I think we've got a couple of shows in the bag. We can probably put something together, so yeah, I don't know. We did one year do…I think it was Paste Magazine, set up like a recording situation inside the Chattanooga Theatre Center, and we recorded for Magnolia Record Club, and then we took a song from each one of those performances, made it a Vinyl Moon River exclusive, which was cool. Yeah, we've done some stuff like that, but I've never recorded and released one of our actual Moon River shows. So you put a little ball in my cross.
CH: Speaking of your albums and all your great music, I kind of noticed that you seem to have a schedule where every two years or so you kind of release a new album and I believe it was 2019. I know the last few years have been particularly strange, but do you have any updates on a new album coming forth?
Drew: Yeah, we just put out one new song about three weeks ago called Dance With Everybody and that's going to be the first single off of a new record that we're finishing right now. And I think we'll probably come out sometime in the Spring, so we'll start releasing more singles. In today's world, people can drop a whole album at once, but the way people consume music, it's sort of nice to kind of dig your way into their playlists and then the artist drops the whole album. So we'll probably release another four or five songs before we put the whole thing out.
CH: Is it fair to say then anybody coming to your show will hear the new single, but also perhaps a couple other new songs?
Drew: Yeah, definitely. We're going to debut it this afternoon. The first time we've ever played a lot of these new songs live. So yeah definitely.
CH: Well I’m personally stoked for that.
Drew: That’s great!
CH: One last question, and you touched on this earlier, but as a veteran artist who’s come up over the past two decades, you’ve really seen the music industry shift, with internet streaming, and new distribution models, and that’s a boon and a challenge for new artists. And you do get the opportunity to work with younger artists and give a space for younger artists. So how would you speak to a younger artist that's either already kind of trying to get their foot in the door or wanting to grow their career further? Specifically what advice would you give them?
Drew: Well, first I tell everybody, do it because you love it, not because you want to get famous or you want to get rich, because that's unlikely for 99% of people to do it. My biggest advice is always to focus on the songs and figure out what you want to sound like and hone your craft. Learn how to sing, learn how to write songs, learn how to play with the band, learn how to record, and just enjoy the process because you never know how long it's going to last. And it's a really hard career to make it in. So if you don't enjoy the process, then it can feel like wasting time. It doesn't just happen. If you get lucky and you get to do it for a living for a long time, then my advice is for those young artists that are already having a real moment but staying, it's like the perspective of generosity and gratitude, or else you start feeling like the world owes you something because you guys have success, your friends are having success, you're jealous of other artists, and that can be a dark path .Keep that gratitude, but don't let anybody else out work you. That's the one thing you can control is how hard you work.
CH: That’s great advice. Thank you Drew for your time and for all you and your team have done with Moon River.
Drew: Appreciate getting to speak with you!