Chloe Peevyhouse
Contributing Writer
In my endless search for music to add to my study playlist, I turned to my roommate in hopes of discovering a new artist. As it turned out, she went to a concert in Charleston, a couple weekends before heading up the mountain for college.
“Have you ever heard of Easy Honey?”
The band consists of four members: frontmen Darby McGlone and Selby Austin, who both sing and play guitar and share writing duties, and Charlie Holt (drums, vocals) and Webster Austin (bass, vocals). The band began at college parties, moving towards to Nashville, TN, and now to Charleston, SC. McGlone and Austin both attended Sewanee and met here. The rock band was formed during McGlone and Austin’s college days at Sewanee.
Intrigued, I pressed play on one of the songs titled “Gotta Get Back” about being homesick- an all too familiar feeling for the 18 to 23-year-olds wandering around campus for their four years here. The lyrics “Getting cottonmouth as I’m looking South ignites feelings every times” struck a chord and sparked a curiosity to learn more about this group of alumni that perfectly encapsulated some of the emotions that occasionally ran through my mind throughout my first week away from home on campus.
During my dive through their discography, I recognize the hallmarks of indie rock with inspiration from the salt water sounds of Charleston. Their early tracks outlined the romances experienced at Sewanee under the beautiful canopy of nature and Gothic architecture. As I moved down the tracklist of their self-titled debut album, a song with only 54 words again seemed like a curated anthem for students. “Hold Your Breath”, while simple, acted as a reminder to take a moment, slow down, and know everything will work out in the end. Papers, due dates, commitments, and midterms swarm our minds and often make it difficult to take a break. Hearing the words, “Count to ten, and you will find you’re doing fine”, can be just the affirmation someone needs during a particularly stressful week. What makes this track even more special is that it comes from the voices of alumni who have walked the same walk as all of us.
Easy Honey’s sounds take you to their home on the coast, while the words that fill the songs take you back to yesterday’s emotions. As I added more and more of their songs to my playlist, I found myself connecting to the feelings of love and excitement throughout their albums. More than that, I felt a commonality of a very specific experience of life on the mountain.