Husband and wife duo Ida Mae (Chris Turpin and Stephanie Jean), have announced new U.S. tour dates opening for Greta Van Fleet this May. “We were a little shocked when we were invited to play with them, but then it quickly made sense,” Turpin says. “Their dad was in a blues band, plays harmonica. They grew up with Stax and Otis Redding, all the same blues things I did. A lot of their heroes are British rock ‘n’ roll bands, who during the 60s fell in love with blues coming out of Chicago. So it makes sense that Greta would be into us, and those shows really work out well.” Ida Mae are currently on the road with Blackberry Smoke on their Break It Down tour. See below for a full list of 2019 U.S. dates. The group will release their debut album Chasing Lights for June 7th via Thirty Tigers.
Ida Mae have also shared a new video for the title track from their forthcoming album, “Chasing Lights”. The band writes, “The video was directed by our close friend Tim Hyland in and around a beach in Norfolk that’s close our hearts… We wanted it to be elegant and simple that pushed a sense of mystery and escapism. The director’s obsession with The Twilight Zone leaked out the edges in this video, creating a fairly surreal “lost in space” feel… The song itself is about someone you love, slipping away from you by choice or by design. It’s about someone in self destruct mode searching for something beyond their situation, trying to get lost, trying to escape their surroundings.”
Watch: Ida Mae – “Chasing Lights”
Rolling Stone Country recently featured their single “If You Don’t Love Me” as one of the “10 Best Country and Americana Songs to Hear Now”, writing that “Ida Mae excel at hushed intimacy on this fragile ballad…it’s proof that the best harmonies often come from artists with a shared history.” They’ve also recently been featured inBillboard who dubbed Chasing Lights “…the culmination of Turpin and Jeans’ journey from the alt-rock band Kill It Kid into the country blues of Robert Johnson, Son House, Charley Patton, and others, a musical path that’s proven fruitful in a very short time.
Watch Ida Mae’s videos for “Reaching” HERE and “If You Don’t Love Me” HERE.
Pre-order Chasing Lights
Ida Mae’s magic lies in the sensuous dovetailing of two voices and the intimacy of their songs. Their chemistry on stage isn’t just a dramatic pose and is a truly captivating sight to behold. Hailing from Norwich and born out of Kill It Kid who established their credentials in the BritishMusic indie Rock world, Chris and Stephanie present themselves as a sensual version of White Stripes meets Civil Wars meets The xx. Singing together, the couple have an unusual ‘which-is-which’ dynamic.
Additional touring highlights as Ida Mae have included support slots with The Marcus King Band, The Lone Bellow, Nick Mulvey, Nikki Lane, and Will Varley. They have also played Emmylou Harris’s Woofstock Festival & Kings Of Leon’s Harvest Night in Nashville.
U.S. Tour Dates:
4/05/19 – Easton, PA – State Theatre Center for the Arts*
4/06/19 – New York, NY – City Winery*
4/07/19 – New York, NY – City Winery*
4/11/19 – Greer, SC – Spring Skunk Music Festival
4/14/19 – Dale, TX – Old Settler’s Music Festival
5/07/19 – Miami, FL – Bayfront Park Amphitheater^
5/09/19 – Jacksonville, FL – Daily’s Place Amphitheater^
5/10/19 – Orlando, FL – Orlando Amphitheater at Central Florida Fairgrounds^
5/12/19 – Atlanta, GA – Fox Theatre^
5/13/19 – Atlanta, GA – Fox Theatre^
5/15/19 – Charlotte, NC – Charlotte Metro Credit Union Amphitheatre^
5/16/19 – Raleigh, NC – Red Hat Amphitheater^
5/18/19 – Asbury Park, NJ – The Stone Pony Summer Stage^
5/21/19 – Baltimore, MD – MECU Pavilion^
5/22/19 – Rochester, NY – Rochester Dome Arena^
5/25/19 – Queens, NY – Forest Hills Stadium^
5/28/19 – Toronto, ON – Echo Beach^
5/29/19 – Toronto, ON – Echo Beach^
6/02/19 – Cleveland, OH – Jacobs Pavilion at Nautica^
6/04/19 – Madison, WI – Breese Stevens Field^
6/14/19 – Manchester, TN – Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival
8/15/19 – Upper Salford, PA – Philadelphia Folk Festival
9/05/19 – Las Vegas, NV – Big Blues Bender
9/06/19 – Las Vegas, NV – Big Blues Bender
9/12/19 – Telluride, CO – Telluride Blues & Brews Festival
9/13/19 – Telluride, CO – Telluride Blues & Brews Festival
9/14/19 – Telluride, CO – Telluride Blues & Brews Festival
*With Blackberry Smoke
^With Greta Van Fleet