Well howdy there folks,  Isaac of The Freight Hoppers hoping everybody is well and wishing everyone a happy Fall.  We in the band thought it was high time we dropped you guys a line and let you all know whats going on in the band.  Since Frank and David don't like messing with computers, I took it upon myself  to handle the blogging.  First of all, we would like to say a big Thank You to all of our fans and friends we have met as we've traveled around the country this last year.  It was great to meet all of you and hope to see you soon.  Next, a big thanks to Jim Roe, Julie Aitchison, and Frank Hart of Roe Entertainment. Thanks for all that you do for us!
     For anyone who has caught a Freight Hopper show this past year you were lucky enough to see Thomas Bailey playing guitar in the band.  We're sad to say that Thomas is no longer in the band. We'd like to offer eternal thanks and much luck on his next project.  Keep an eye out for it, it's sure to rock!   With him gone I've found myself moving from bass back to guitar and we've brought in our good buddy Bradley Adams to keep the downbeat rocking on.  Bradley and I have been playing music together for several years in a band called Commonfolk, and it's been a blast having him on board.
      The band is currently hard at work back at home in Bryson City, NC getting ready to record our CD.  Look for a brand new Freight Hopper CD in spring 2009!  We're also lucky enough to find ourselves playing for most of October at the Great Smokey Mountains Railroad.  If any of you are familiar with the history of the Freight Hoppers, you'll recall that it was there that Frank and Dave got there start playing music together.  The GSM Railroad is a tourist train that winds its way through the Smokey mountains where we all live.  Back in 1993 Frank and David got a job playing for the tourists at the train depot and a fire was born between them that hasn't quit yet by a long shot.  Now after a  crazy year of being back together and some unforeseen  changes, the band has found itself back at home to record the CD and ,lo and behold, back at the depot for a couple of weeks.  We're playing two sets a day, starting at 7:45 am, seven days a week of rocking old-time music right here in our own front yard.  Not only is this downright handy for the old pocket, but the band is having a blast and rediscovering that same energy and drive that launched this whole thing years ago.  I was lucky enough to see the Freight Hoppers years ago and I can't say enough about what a treat this is for me to be playing music with all these boys.  We have lived around each other and played music together for some time now and its been nothing short of a good time since the Freight Hopper train has gotten back on the move. 
    Well in short,  we in the Freight Hoppers are working like the furies on our new CD and enjoying playing some good old-time music. We're looking forward to seeing all of you at some point soon!  Thanks again!!!            
                                                                             Isaac
    

WAMU's Hubie King present's a great live recording from our July 26th Stechoah Arts Center concert.
Listen live from the button in the left-hand side of Bluegrass Country's website at http://bluegrasscountry.org/programs/open-mic/.
Broadcasting eastern times -

Sat, Aug 23 @ 6 a.m. ET,

Mon, Aug 25 @ 5 a.m. ET

Thurs, Aug 28 @ 3 a.m. ET(8am GMT),

Fri, Aug 29 @ 6 p.m. ET (11pm GMT)

Revival time!
FREIGHT HOPPERS BACK TO BREATHE NEW LIFE INTO OLD-TIME MUSIC
By Shay Quillen
Mercury News
Article Launched: 01/31/2008 01:36:18 AM PST

At the close of the 20th century, the Freight Hoppers blew the dust off Appalachian old-time music with a youthful spark and a hell-for-leather abandon that won over bluegrassers, punk rockers and retirees alike.

But while followers such as Old Crow Medicine Show and Uncle Earl picked up the band's torch and ran with it, Freight Hoppers fiddler David Bass faced a heart transplant and an arduous recuperation.

Now a healthy Bass, 41, is re-teaming with banjo player and singer Frank Lee to get the Freight Hoppers back on track. The new lineup, with Thomas Bailey on guitar and Isaac Deal on bass, makes its West Coast debut next week with three shows as part of the San Francisco Bluegrass & Old-Time Festival.

"I was at a place with my life that I needed to try to do this," Bass says from his home in Durham, N.C., "in just a commercial sense and a fun sense, and a really-let's-play-some-good-music sense."

Lee, 49, speaking from his home in Bryson City, N.C., concurs. "I feel like I do my best stuff when I'm playing with him, and he makes me feel like he does his best stuff when he's playing with me."

Just as important, the Freight Hoppers name means something special to those who have experienced the band's exhilarating take on '20s and '30s string-band music.

"They weren't freezing it in place," says Jeff Kazor of the Crooked Jades, who will open for the Hoppers Feb. 8 at the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley. "They were taking it further. That's
what made them such a great band, and that's why so many young people gravitated to them."

Kazor remembers seeing the band perform at the Freight before a crowd dancing wildly to the band's driving rhythms.

"It's totally infectious," he says. "You can't help but just get up and start dancing to it."

Unlike many old-time musicians, the Freight Hoppers never merely preached to the converted. Bass developed his ear-catching style playing for tips on the streets of New Orleans and New York.

At a Brooklyn subway stop, Bass often found himself performing for Latino laborers who knew nothing of his musical tradition.

"They didn't tip dollars, man; they tipped quarters, but there was a lot of them, and they were into the beat, and they were into music," he says. "My lifestyle was seeing somebody, looking into their eyes, and playing this music and getting them hooked on what I was doing with it."

Bass combined his thrilling fiddling with bursts of frenzied step dancing. No one watching would guess that he had a congenital heart defect that severely reduced his aerobic capacity.

"I wouldn't really show anybody what I couldn't do by overdoing it to the point where it was like, 'Oh my God, the kid's turning blue,' " he says.

Bass met Lee, a Georgia banjo ace who had traded the virtuosity of bluegrass for the raw power of old-time music. With Lee's encouragement, Bass relocated to Bryson City, where a tourist railroad provided a steady musical gig and a constant stream of new listeners.

A young schoolteacher named Cary Fridley joined on guitar and vocals and, with a series of bassists, the Freight Hoppers released two albums and toured hard from coast to coast for five years.

Fridley left the band in 1999, and the next year Bass opted out as he awaited the birth of his first child. But he soon found his heart being taxed by a simple walk across the room. He had been through multiple open-heart surgeries, but this time the prognosis was even worse.

"The doctor turned around with the answer I was most afraid of," he says. " 'The heart muscle is completely worn out. You're not going anywhere with that thing.' "

A six-month wait in the hospital followed, and his health continued to deteriorate. But Bass never stopped playing his fiddle, even when he was too sick to sit up.

"I felt like if I couldn't play and I didn't have that, I couldn't deal with things," he says. "That totally relaxed me."

Once he got his new heart, Bass gradually got back into playing at parties and festivals, then formed the Forge Mountain Diggers with Bailey. Meanwhile, Lee was playing in Bryson City with Deal, a Freight Hoppers fan who had moved to town to get closer to the music.

When Lee and Bass decided last year to reunite, the new lineup quickly came together. Kazor inquired about getting the Diggers to perform at the festival and was delighted to be offered the Hoppers instead.

Though the male-female vocal blend with Fridley in the band is gone, Bass says the musical approach remains the same.

"We're trying to get the feeling and the spirit without really battering ourselves over the particular details," Bass says.

It all comes down to a simple question, he says: "Are you out there really raising hell and having fun with the music, or are you trying to get a master's degree in musicology?"

For those who know the Freight Hoppers' music, the answer is clear.