Nick Bosse & Northern Roots Perform At FloodFest

By ROB DUGUAY

Various areas of Rhode Island have their own music festival happening during the summer. Providence has PVDFest, Pawtucket has Culture Shock, the southeastern corner has the Rhythm & Roots Festival in Charlestown and the southwestern part has the Washington County Fair in Richmond. In the northwest region of The Ocean State, there’s FloodFest that takes place at Little Rhody Vasa Park in Foster. This particular festival is making its return to the park on August 13 with local acts Jabbawaukee, Northeast Traffic, RumbleKats, Rat Ruckus, Tai Chi Funk Squad and James & The Giants performing starting at 1pm. Another band who’ll be taking part in the festivities are country rockers Nick Bosse & Northern Roots.

Bosse and I had a talk ahead of the festival about a popular single he put out last year, an EP he recently released, being involved in a few local festivals this summer and him looking to put out more music.

Rob Duguay: Back in January of last year you released the single “What Happened To Country” that has gotten over 800,000 streams on Spotify since. Do you view the song as a reaction to what’s happening in mainstream country music and what are your thoughts on the attention the song has gotten?

Nick Bosse: I would have to say that I’m very humbled by the amount of people that have listened to it. As of last week, it just hit over a million streams along with over 14,000 streams on my new EP I just released a month ago. That particular song seems like people are having a reaction to it because they too feel the same way. I tried very hard to write a song where I wasn’t necessarily bashing pop country and the mainstream stuff but as I was driving home from Nashville I wrote the song because I have a tattoo of the George Jones song “Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes”. I just kept on running it over in my head and apparently I’m not the only one who thinks like that so I’m very appreciative of the people who’ve listened to my song and I’m very excited to get more music out to the world.

RD: Speaking of more music and you just mentioned it, was the experience like writing and recording the self-titled EP you put out this year?

NB: Honestly, it was a very long process that got dragged out because of the pandemic. I wrote the songs for it between 2019 and 2020 and they all took a while to get out but I was very excited to finally release my first EP. I’ve definitely written quite a few songs since I’ve written those and I have plans to do another record at No Boundaries Studios in North Kingstown in November I believe. We’re gonna get together and start working on that so I got more music coming out already and I just want to keep on pumping out more EPs as much as I can.

RD: That’s a great goal to have. Who are some of your favorite country artists these days? Who do you consider your influences but who is also putting out country music today that does the artform right in your opinion?

NB: First of all, every single day I listen to Waylon Jennings. I don’t let a single day go by that I don’t listen to his music along with Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson, I listen to those guys so much. Guys that are around today, in their prime and doing it in my opinion the right way are guys like Sturgill Simpson, Tyler Childers, Ryan Bingham, Charles Wesley Godwin and Colter Wall, they’re very unique in their own ways and how they express themselves. There’s so many others that I think are doing it right but they’re also doing it their way so it doesn’t sound like it’s coming out of a Nashville computer.

RD: Sturgill Simpson is weird, man. He’ll write country songs about aliens and it’s awesome.

NB: Oh, I love it.

RD: I’ve seen him live a couple times. He’s fantastic so I couldn’t agree more with that. Floodfest is one of a few festivals you and Northern Roots are going to be playing this summer with a performance coming up at the Washington County Fair on August 20th and another one at the Rhythm & Roots Festival on September 4th. What are your thoughts on playing festivals and do you prepare yourself any differently for a festival gig than you would for a show at a bar or a club?

NB: The more that I play festivals, the more I love them. I guess more so than playing at bars or clubs, I just like the idea that you get a bunch of different bands and we all get to pick each other’s brains, talk and jam behind the scenes. The performance itself is fun, I end up doing a lot more because we usually have a shorter set so we want to make it count with a lot of our originals and very special covers. We try to mostly just stick to the original stuff lately but I just love the overall vibe of fairs and festivals. People that are watching are there to watch and not just sit at a bar or a restaurant with the music in the background.

It’s very fun and obviously you get to go to bed at a more reasonable time (laughs). Unless you’re hanging out afterwards, you get done at a reasonable time to go to bed.

RD: Yeah, that’s always a good thing about it. You mentioned that you want to put out some more music, so what’s the situation with that? What are your plans for the next few months?

NB: During the next three months I’m just going to keep promoting the new EP while I get through some of these shows I got. I got some bigger ones and some fun things coming up. I just took some time off for a family vacation but I’m coming back rip roaring and ready. My plan is to get another EP done for next year hopefully in the early months of 2023. I hate giving out dates and I usually don’t sit on a record, as soon as it’s ready to go out I put it out. I kind of want it to be a surprise and then move on to the next one, but I got plans to work with some other studios and I got a single I want to put out along with some other original songs for a full length.