Mountain Blog

Mountain Stage returns to our home away from home at the Creative Arts Center in Morgantown this weekend, for a show featuring Mike Doughty, The Iguanas, Charlie Mars, Jeffery Foucault, and A City on a Lake. Tickets are available, and we’d love to see you there. Order yours online, by phone (304.293.SHOW) or pick tickets up in person at the Creative Arts Center box office. Tickets are $18 in advance, and $23 on the day of the show.

Before embarking on a solo career, singer-songwriter Mike Doughty was the frontman for the group Soul Coughing. Formed in 1992, the group released three CDs for Warner Bros before disbanding in 2000. Doughty - who had been writing a column for New York Press - began playing solo shows and released “Skittish,” a solo disc that he had recorded five years before. He also contributed vocals to BT's club hit "Never Gonna Come Back Down" and collaborated with They Might Be Giants’ John Flansburgh on a CD that accompanied an issue of McSweeney's “Quarterly Concern.” In 2002, Doughty released the live “Smofe + Smang: Live in Minneapolis” and a book of poetry titled “Slanky.” In 2011, Doughty issued “Yes and Also Yes” on his own Snack Bar label. The following year, he released the live “The Question Jar Show” and “The Flip Is Another Honey” which featured Doughty covering artists from Thin Lizzy to Randy Newman. That same year, he published “The Book of Drugs,” a memoir about his life with Soul Coughing and his struggles with addiction.

From New Orleans, The Iguanas have long been one of the region’s most popular live bands, combining styles that range from blues, R&B, Zydeco, Cajun, Tex-Mex and roots rock & roll. Not long after San Francisco guitarist Rod Hodges formed the group in 1989, he rediscovered the conjunto music that was a part of his mother's Mexican heritage and took up accordion. Vocalist/saxophonist Joe Cabral’s first musical experience was playing in his father's Mexican band. In college, he discovered New Orleans R&B and the honking saxophone style. Bassist Rene Coman is a native of New Orleans whose recording credits include Alex Chilton and Guitar Slim Jr. The group’s 1993 debut was released on Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville label. The group’s latest release, “Sin to Sin,” is the first since 2008's “If You Should Ever Fall on Hard Times.”

Mississippi-based troubadour Charlie Mars’ career has run the gamut from major label releases and high-profile opening slots for the likes of REM and Steve Earle to under-the-radar, self-released efforts. Following up 2009's attention-grabbing “Like A Bird, Like A Plane,” his current release “Blackberry Light” draws inspiration from famed producer Daniel Lanois while the songs take lyrical cues from such literary heroes as Haruki Murakami, Cormac McCarthy, Walker Percy, and Denis Johnson.

Longtime disciple of the rich and strange music that sings behind the American veil, Jeffery Foucault has spent the last decade mining the darker seams of country and blues, producing a string of spare and elemental albums of rare power while garnering accolades across the United States and overseas for a tersely elegant brand of songwriting set apart by its haunting imagery and weather-beaten cool. His latest project, “Horse Latitudes” was recorded alongside a folk supergroup that featured Eric Heywood, Billy Conway, Jennifer Condos and Van Dyke Parks.

With Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Alex Wong at the helm, A City On A Lake also features singers Ari Hest and Ximena Sarinana. Over the past few years, Wong has produced and written with cutting edge artists including Vienna Teng, Elizabeth and the Catapult, Melissa Ferrick and Delta Rae. His compositions have been featured in film and television projects such as “The Last Song,” “One Tree Hill,” and “The Lincoln Lawyer.” Wong has performed as one half of the duo The Paper Raincoat with singer/songwriter Amber Rubarth and scored the innovative theatrical work “Everyman For Himself” which won an LA Weekly Theater Award for “Best Original Music.”

Thanks again for supporting Mountain Stage. Click here to see our entire schedule of upcoming live shows. We’ll see you there.