An American Forrest is a storyteller and guitar picker from the conifer forests of Western Washington and Northeastern Oregon. His songs pull inspiration from 4 years of living out of a truck, backpack, and horseback. He released two EPs in 2013, a debut LP, Rosas y Mesteños, in 2015, and has toured the Western US extensively, playing with BJ Barham (American Aquarium), John Craigie, Bart Budwig, and Marshall McLean. His viscerally poetic songwriting, and loose, wild, flat- & finger-picked acoustic guitar playing have drawn comparisons to Townes Van Zandt, Jeffrey Foucault, and Dave Rawlings.
“Boldly sung poetry takes on every color of the roots/country spectrum, from Appalachian arrangements to Pacific Northwestern sweetness and a pinch of Southern grit.” – CityArts Magazine, Seattle
“[Rosas y Mesteños] is really, really good.” – John Craigie
“Forrest’s songs, similar to the harsh winters of the Northwest, are not for the faint of heart.” – Bart Budwig
MARGO CILKER’s got a farewell song for every place she’s lived. Margo Cilker has lived a lot of places: she “used to be Montana, wild and free,” she’s “a California dogwood, not sure where I belong,” “the worst crime [she] commits is hesitation- waitin’ on that Bilbao precipitation.” Since “finishing her studies” in Clemson, South Carolina in 2015 and releasing her debut EP Boots and Spain and Boots Again, the native Californian apprenticed herself to the songwriter’s trade in true vagabond style: move to Spain and busk all over Europe a la Ramblin’ Jack, sing a duet on a Spanish Honky-Tonk band’s recording of an Ernest Tubb classic (“Nails in my Coffin,” with Dead Bronco), front a Lucinda Williams tribute band in Bilbao, make a record in England (2017’s Field Heat EP) and tour Europe with a band of Flatt-and-Scruggs-obsessed Englishmen, then come home and milk cows on an organic farm in Petaluma – and make another record.
Performing at La Laguna 5-7pm