Biography

Emerging North Carolina outfit Unspoken Tradition brings a new depiction of a time-honored subject with their new single “Land.”

Written and sung by the band’s guitar player Audie McGinnis, it’s a first-person telling of a simple landowner that finds dignity in a life led elemental. At the same time, the chorus warns that a way of life, once lost, cannot be artificially manufactured.

“Land” is a modern take on sentiments found in Bluegrass standards like “Little Cabin Home on the Hill” and “Blue Ridge Mountain Home.” Classic themes made new through a creative arrangement and original writing by a band that consciously uses an evolving style to connect the traditional to the contemporary.

“‘Land” is about my fear that we are doing irreversible damage to our home,” says McGinnis. “I left the very small town I grew up in to live in one of the largest cities in North Carolina. It seemed like everywhere I looked, nature was being choked out by concrete, and the city seemed to gain nothing in culture or identity. It made me miss the open farmland that surrounded the area where I grew up, a place that was teeming with local color. “Land” reminds us of what should be important and that which can never be replaced. We can pave over it, we can build skyscrapers on it, but we'll never be able to make more of it. We have to protect what's been given to us.”

An accompanying video filmed in Mills River, NC features the band amid the scenic Western North Carolina region they call home.

After two independently produced albums of nearly all original material, the group has begun work on their first selection of recordings for the award-winning Mountain Home label to be released throughout 2018.