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ABOUT ISMAY:
ISMAY is an alternative folk music project driven by California-based singer/songwriter Avery Hellman. Their debut album Songs of Sonoma Mountain was released in 2020 and named one of the 10 best Albums in the Bay Area by KQED. In 2024, ISMAY released their sophomore LP Desert Pavement, garnering enthusiastic reviews from No Depression, The Associated Press and Americana Highways. They teamed up with prolific Folk/Americana multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and producer Andrew Marlin of Watchhouse. This record was named one of WMOT’s 2024 Thirty Essential And Outstanding Americana Albums.
Growing up backstage at their grandfather’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, Hellman was inspired early on by artists such as Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch and Hazel Dickens. For a decade, Hellman worked on the family ranch in Petaluma while developing their songwriting craft and storytelling repertoire.
ISMAY has appeared across the country and overseas at music festivals such as Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, The National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, and Americanafest UK. ISMAY has opened for acclaimed artists including Steve Earle, Watchhouse, Robert Earl Keen, John Doe, Chuck Prophet and Sunny War. In March of 2023, ISMAY was featured as one of a select group of artists from around the world participating in the Apple TV+ Show My Kind of Country, produced by Kacey Musgraves and Reese Witherspoon.
Currently, Hellman is based in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California and is working on several projects, including a documentary film project tracing the roots of Lucinda Williams. ISMAY also curates a music festival called Woollystar and is continuing to work on a new record.
ABOUT FOSSIL RECORDS:
Fossil Records is a cooperative project of musicians, writers and artists from the American West. Brought together by Margo Cilker and Avery Hellman, our aim is to capture the expression drawn from seasons of work on ranches and in rural outposts. The folk culture that develops in the analog world and the Artist building a scene out of nothing are what inspire us. We’ve been cultivating our passion for underground folk music for over a decade, and we’ve dug down deep to find carefully penned words and music. We know that those who care about depth in songwriting are out there, and we’re here to foster a community that appreciates songs that stir the soul.
Whether you’re making folk-rock, cowboy poetry, or daisy-chaining analog synths at a saloon; it’s your Western story to tell.
We are underground rock, we are Fossil Records.
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