Billy Strings walked into the Empty Glass, a roughly 100-capacity dive bar in Charleston, West Virginia, on Sunday night and jumped onstage with the John Inghram Band, Saving Country Music reported on August 4. He played a Gibson SG electric guitar rather than his usual acoustic, and people who were there said he stayed up playing for hours.
Video of the set backs up the sit-in, showing Strings trading licks on covers including Leftover Salmon's "Troubled Times" and J.J. Cale's "Call Me the Breeze." He also backed singer Candi Jenkins, who was in town taping a segment for NPR's Mountain Stage, and later picked acoustically on the bar's porch with local guitarist Jakob Thomas for close to two hours.
The Empty Glass has hosted sets from artists including Jason Isbell, Chuck Berry, the Avett Brothers and Gov't Mule since it opened in 1985. Strings was in town ahead of a show at the Charleston Coliseum the following Tuesday, a date rescheduled from April after he broke his leg.
The sit-in came as Strings readies "So Much for Goodbyes," a new album due August 28, and days after he released the album's "Mill Town Flood" as a single. It's the kind of release the release calendar exists to track, and it lands in our country coverage.
The facts
- Billy Strings played a West Virginia dive bar, the Empty Glass, on a day off
- He sat in with the John Inghram Band
- He played a Gibson SG electric guitar
- People at the bar said he played for hours
- He also backed singer Candi Jenkins and picked with local guitarist Jakob Thomas
- His new album, So Much for Goodbyes, is due August 28
How this checks out
Single source
Reported by a single outlet
Only one outlet has reported it so far, so it stays a single source.
Cited sources 1
Every outlet that reported this, linked to what it published. Equal credits, in alphabetical order.