Earlier this summer, 90s indie cult favorite Billy Pilgrim announced some exciting news. Though the duo, composed of Andrew Hyra and Kristian Bush (Sugarland, Dark Water), thought their final recordings had been lost in a studio fire two decades ago, Bush found a remaining copy at his home during quarantine.
Recently they’ve shared two new singles, “
Call It Even” and “
Tumblelane,” and the entire full-length album, In The Time Machine, will be released on September 4. Following the release, the band plans to release a special edition vinyl via
Bandcamp, on pre-sale now. After years of embarking on separate dreams, the two friends have reunited to finish what they’ve started, and over the next few months they have a few more tricks up their sleeves.
To celebrate the new album, the band announce two special live stream performances set for album release week on September 3 and 4. The first will take place at Eddie’s Attic, which is the last venue that the band performed together almost two decades ago. It’s also the last time that anyone ever heard music from what will now be on In The Time Machine. Additionally, the performance will benefit NIVA (National Independent Venue Association). The second live stream comes from the legendary Paste Studios, the heart and soul of Atlanta.
ABOUT BILLY PILGRIM:
Billy Pilgrim – originally named for a character in Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse Five,” a shared favorite novel of the pair – was the first band for Bush, who would later become the soulful half of multi-platinum, Grammy Award-winning country duo Sugarland, as well a producer, playwright and solo artist. He met Hyra in Bush’s hometown of Knoxville, Tenn., in 1990 at an open mic night hosted by Hyra and his sister, Annie. As Bush prepared to move to Atlanta to attend Emory University, he persuaded the siblings to also move to the city, where a bustling acoustic scene was unfolding.
Their first major-label effort – the critically acclaimed Billy Pilgrim – arrived in 1994 and spawned the college and Triple-A radio hits, “Get Me Out Of Here” and “Insomniac.” The follow-up, 1995’s “Bloom,” hit No. 37 on Billboard’s Heatseekers chart and offered fans the melodic-yet-muscular “Sweet Louisiana Sound.” Billy Pilgrim’s videos regularly rotated on VH1 and the band was tapped for numerous high-profile opening slots, including Melissa Etheridge, the Cowboy Junkies, Matthew Sweet and Hootie & The Blowfish.
Following their release from Atlantic Records in 1996, Billy Pilgrim began tinkering with what would eventually become In the Time Machine. Nearly five years later, the album received its only public outing at the Eddie’s Attic performance that ended with Bush and Hyra following diverging paths.
Along with Bush and Hyra, the musicians featured on In The Time Machine are Brandon Bush (Sugarland, Train) on keyboards; David LaBruyere (John Mayer) on bass; Joey Craig on guitar; and Sigadore “Siggy” Birkis (John Mayer), Marcus Petruska (Corey Davis) and Travis McNabb (Better Than Ezra) on drums. Producer/engineer Don McCollister, who owned Nickel & Dime Studio, co-produced the album along with the Bush brothers and Hyra.
Billy Pilgrim’s music has been featured as the soundtrack to some of the 90’s most iconic television scenes, on dramas like Melrose Place, My So-Called Life, and many more. With today’s obsession of the fashion, television, and of course, the music from that moment in history, the uncovering of the lost Billy Pilgrim archive couldn’t have come at a better time.
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