Watch Bella White’s Paste Session Recorded Live at Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion
Paste Studio “On The Road” set up shop at the 2024 Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion in Bristol, Tennessee-Virginia, the annual music festival that’s been honky tonkin’ since 2001. The festival features Americana, Appalachian Roots and more, honoring the legacy of Ralph Peer’s 1927 Bristol Sessions that introduced the Carter Family to the world, and continue to inform and inspire musicians to this day. We chose the most fitting location for this intimate series, showcasing artists in the performance space inside the Birthplace of Country Music Museum, dedicated to telling the story of the Bristol Sessions.
Full Session
Bella White joined us to share two songs from her 2023 album Among Other Things, and a third brand new unreleased song called “Stuff.” She starts her Bristol x Paste session with the song “Numbers,” which helped to crystallize and inform the rest of the record. “I wrote that song the day that my first record came out, which ended up happening in the middle of the pandemic,” says White. “I started writing about the confusion of nothing going as planned, and realizing that maybe that’s just the way life is. The way the lyrics came to me was much more stream-of-consciousness than anything I’d done before—there was no pressure to appeal to a certain genre, and that felt like a real turning point. I just felt this incredible vastness.”
“Numbers”
After “Numbers,” we had a chance to discuss the importance of downtime to the creative process. She’s taking a good chunk of time off at the end of 2024 to recharge and do less. We’re sure she’s going to write and do stuff and not literally just stare at the wall for two months. But a little wall staring is well deserved, and an important part of avoiding burnout, remaining able to access the headspace that good music comes from. Good for you, Bella! Next up is “Stuff,” hot off the presses, a Paste exclusive.
“Stuff”
Between the second and third songs, we chatted about the broad theme that her new writing is trending towards. White described feeling more empowered as a result of realizing more and more how little control we have over our environment, and how much control we have over our own internal perceptions and reactions. Consequently, the songs are more about her internal reality, less about the external factors surrounding her. Bella wraps up her session with “Among Other Things,” the title track of her 2023 album.
“Among Other Things”
Big thanks to Charlene, Danielle and the whole team at Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion, and to June and her team at the Birthplace of Country Music Museum for bringing these sessions to life. Stay tuned for more Bristol x Paste sessions on the way.