Tyler Huff and Jason Chambers didn’t have big plans when they started talking about putting a band together a couple of years ago—learn a few songs, play a few shows, and get a little bit of extra cash. Then Josh Smith came along and the whole project got serious.
“Our initial plan was to play a few times a year as a cover band in local bars to make some money,” writes Huff, the band’s bassist, in an email interview. “A few days later, Josh sent a message on Facebook asking if I was playing with anyone and that he had some songs he wanted to work on. Jason and I quickly realized that the demos he sent us were too good not to use and we scrapped the cover-band plan.”
A couple of years later and the trio is now a quintet (Huff, Smith on guitar and vocals, Chambers on guitar, Zack Miles on banjo and guitar, and Jerry Sharon filling in on drums) with a name—Handsome and the Humbles—and a solid professional recording behind them—Hallelujah Alright, an EP released in December. And the band’s local profile is steadily rising—last weekend they opened for Mic Harrison and the High Score in the Old City and North Carolina alt-country journeymen American Aquarium at the Shed in Maryville. Next week, they’re headlining WDVX’s live-broadcast Tennessee Shines series at Boyd’s Jig and Reel.
Even though the band made a quick transition from covers to originals, it wasn’t until the Humbles entered the studio together last fall that Huff was fully confident that he’d made the right choice. When the five-song Hallelujah Alright hit the streets, the response was better than any of them expected.
“Recording really solidified the feeling that I had that we could be pretty good,” he says. “It’s easy to play in a room together and think you sound good, but when you put it on tape and listen back to it (and let others hear it), it can be scary. But the responses we received were very positive and then our schedules became really busy because we had show offers coming in all the time due to ReverbNation/social media and word of mouth.”
Hallelujah Alright is an old-fashioned heartland country-rock record, inspired by Uncle Tupelo, the Drive-By Truckers, Ryan Adams, and the Hold Steady. As a songwriter, Smith specializes in a kind of three-chord wistfulness, exemplified by the yearning, nostalgic “Knoxville Lights,” the chorus of which provides the EP its title: “Hallelujah alright, when I rest my weary head tonight/I close my eyes and see those Knoxville lights/Hallelujah alright.”
“Josh is the main songwriter,” Huff says. “He’ll show up to practice and say, ‘I have a new song,’ and that’s how the majority of our catalog has come about. I have a ‘Josh’ email folder with 30-40 phone recordings that he’s sent over the last two years.”
Some of that material will show up soon on Handsome and the Humbles’ first full-length album. The band is wrapping up recording at Brimstone Recordings in Scott County, the same studio they used for Hallelujah Alright.
“We tracked everything live and went back to add vocals and some finishing touches afterwards,” Huff says. “I’m such a big fan of that method because you can really hear the energy, instead of each instrument layered on top of each other one by one. I want a recording that sounds real—even with flaws and mistakes it’s better than being ‘perfect.’”
Even though the band is now an entirely different kind of project than he anticipated two years ago, Huff says their ambitions remain modest. They’ll focus on the release of the new album later this year and maybe schedule a regional tour to support it. The only real goal right now is to keep playing and keep having fun.
“As cliche as it sounds, we’re really taking it one show at a time,” Huff says. “We all have full-time jobs, mortgages, and some of us a wife and kids. We’re really enjoying our role in the scene, playing shows with great people and making new friends. … Whatever happens with us above and beyond that is just a bonus, since initially we didn’t plan on being more than a bar cover band.”
WHAT:
Handsome and the Humbles
WHERE:
Boyd’s Jig and Reel (101 S. Central St.)
WHEN:
Wednesday, Sept. 9, at 7 p.m.
HOW MUCH:
$10
INFO:
wdvx.com
Senior Editor Matthew Everett manages the Knoxville Mercury's arts & entertainment section, including the comprehensive calendar section—Knoxville’s go-to guide for everything worth doing in the area. You can reach Matthew at matthew@knoxmercury.com.
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