Mountain Grass Unit are lighting a new bluegrass fire. The Birmingham-based quartet are riding a wave of festival bookings and a new album called Appalachian Smoke, and they are doing it without a banjo.
The band recorded the record at Sputnik Sound in Nashville, with Vance Powell at the mixing desk. Powell has worked with Chris Stapleton, Jack White, and Phish. Guitarist Luke Black and mandolinist Drury Anderson leaned back during tracking sessions to debate whether an electric sitar belonged on their song “Eagle’s Nest.”
Their sound splits the difference between tradition and progress. They cite the Infamous Stringdusters, Billy Strings, and the Grateful Dead as influences, but they are carving their own path. The absence of a banjo gives them room to move into rock, country, and jam territory.
The Electric Sitars of “Eagle’s Nest”
Anderson told Rolling Stone that the group settled on the sitar for “Eagle’s Nest.” He explained that bands they grew up listening to always tried to go to different levels, and Mountain Grass Unit are following that lead.
“It will definitely be the closest we have to maybe what a Mountain Grass Unit show would [sound] like in this current time,” Anderson said. “Because it feels more natural. It feels like we’re playing off each other. It’s a little bit more raw, a little more fluctuating in the tempos.”
The songwriting theme for Appalachian Smoke centers on homecoming and a desire to return to nature. Anderson sings on the title track about the mountains calling him back, ending with the line “When the mountains call I start to fall in the lake of sin.”
From Andblack to Mountain Grass Unit
Black and Anderson first met as children in Birmingham. Their parents were friends, and they learned their instruments together. By middle school, they formed an acoustic duo called Andblack, performing at restaurants and birthday parties around town.
One of their early influences was the Allen Tolbert Unit. Anderson’s father helped found the Acoustic Cafe in Hayden, Alabama, which ran from 1996 to 2016 and featured bluegrass greats like Tony Rice, John Hartford, and Doc Watson. Tolbert captivated the youngsters with his guitar fretwork.
“He’d buzz up and down his guitar fretboard like a hummingbird in flight,” Anderson recalled. “He took Luke into his arms and taught him everything he absolutely knows, and I ended up taking mandolin lessons from him because he’s fantastic.”
The Birth of Mountain Grass Unit
By 2018, the band was fully formed. Anderson was 15, Black and Wilson were 16. They burned up the highways and backroads of Alabama, jumping on any stage that would hire them.
“Any gig we could get, we’d take — 50th birthday parties, lake parties, high schools,” Anderson said. “Right when we got Mountain Grass going to where we felt we were getting some solid gigs every weekend is right when Covid hit.”
Instead of hanging it up, they pivoted to Facebook live streams from Anderson’s basement. They played new material and Strings and Grateful Dead covers, linked a virtual tip jar, and started making a good chunk of change.
“It feels fresh, like a new era for us,” Black said.
A Quartet With a Clear Vision
The band’s chemistry is central to their sound. They describe the album as feeling more natural, with everyone playing off each other in real time. The rawness of live performance carries over to the recording.
Sonically, MGU ride a razor-sharp line between traditional and progressive bluegrass. They note the influence of New Grass Revival and Leftover Salmon, and they point to the Tony Rice Unit. Their vocal harmonies lean toward the Country Gentlemen and Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.
But the group has a distinct identity. Anderson said they are careful not to be seen as a Billy Strings knockoff.
“We were big into Billy when he first hit the scene, but a lot of our influence were local musicians [from Alabama],” Anderson said. “We love [Billy] dearly, but I think he’d be the first to tell you, ‘Don’t replicate me, do your own thing.’ And I think we try our best to not give people the impression that we’re just trying to be a Billy Strings rip-off, you know?”
The Festival Circuit and What Comes Next
Mountain Grass Unit are one of the hottest acts on the national festival circuit. Over the past two summers, they’ve played bluegrass gatherings, Americana throwdowns, and backwoods jam-band blowouts.
Anderson is 22, Black and Wilson are 23, and Nelson is 29. The group has spent the last few years building a reputation for relentless touring.
The album Appalachian Smoke was recorded at Sputnik Sound, and the band is ready to play it live. They see this era as a natural progression of their sound, one that honors their bluegrass roots while pushing forward.
The electric sitar on “Eagle’s Nest” fits a band that refuses to stand still.
Source material: “Mountain Grass Unit Are Lighting a New Bluegrass Fire,” Rolling Stone.
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