Miss Tess Unveils 'If You Don't Know How To Love Me'

Nashville-based chanteuse Miss Tess has unveiled "If You Don't Know How To Love Me," the latest track from her forthcoming album The Moon Is An Ashtray. "Combining vintage-inspired instrumentation and Miss Tess' smoky, emotive vocals, "If You Don't Know How to Love Me" explores the pitfalls of a long-term relationship that's fizzling out. It's the kind of tune in which the hurt lingers quietly behind the lyrics," said The Boot, who called the song "solemnly smoldering" and compared Miss Tess' vocals to those of Bonnie Raitt, Patsy Cline, and Lindi Ortega. "This song speaks to the struggles we go through to compromise and make things work with a partner, while all along questioning the confidence of the relationship," Miss Tess told The Boot. "Are we trying to make it work because we truly believe it's right for us, or are we just stuck because we are comfortable enough, and too afraid of change to try something new?"

When most people think of defiant music, they think of punk rock or outlaw country. But defying genres while transcending eras and resisting clichés is hard to pin down when it comes to artistry unless you're talking about Miss Tess, who does all of that and more on The Moon Is An Ashtray. Swinging for the fences and from the branches of jazz, country, blues and old school rock and roll, she has employed all of her influences and talents on a tour-de-force, while cleverly taking standard perspectives and ideas - like the definition of a love song - to task."If You Don't Know How To Love Me" follows the release of album title track "The Moon Is An Ashtray" and soulful lead single "True Flood," featuring Rachael Price from Lake Street Dive.

To help capture and shape her own unique sound, Miss Tess enlisted not only her trusty 1930s Weymann archtop, but also heavy input from co-producers Andrija Tokic (Margo Price, Alabama Shakes, Hurray for the Riff Raff) and Thomas Bryan Eaton, her full-time bandmate and musical partner. Combining Eaton's' arranging ideas and skilled instrumental work with Tokic's studio full of vintage mics, tube amps, keyboards, and tape machines, the resulting record has a rich, buttery warmth well-suited to Miss Tess' voice and authentic, retro-contemporary songwriting style.

From soulful swagger to jazz, blues, a little old school country, and even a touch of psychedelia, Miss Tess shows both the pluck and poise to fold a multitude of styles into her own. That's what happens when you grow up in a musical household giving the blues greats, big bands, and Chuck Berry equal weight. The idea of defiance parlays itself into the tongue-in-cheek metaphor of the album's title track. It's not about what we look at necessarily, but what we see that matters. From our earthbound vantage and oft storied lore, the moon is a romantic and mystical entity; though as one looks closer, the moon is dusty, barren, and empty. Here, Tess breaks from the moon's typical cliché to deliver a much more cynical, yet whimsical point-of-view, conveyed with her smoky vocals set against a swaying backdrop of bright guitar licks and yearning pedal steel. As Miss Tess shows in every moment of The Moon Is an Ashtray, questioning the status quo while maintaining her unique identity and challenging our ideas of perspective, well, there's nothing more defiant than that.

Listen to "If You Don't Know How To Love Me" here, via The Boot.

TOUR DATES

12/05 - Barley's Taproom - Knoxville, TN
12/06 - Cork & Keg - Asheville, NC
12/07 - Bonefire - Abingdon, VA
12/18 - Panorama Ballroom - Blacksburg, VA
12/19 - Pale Fire Brewing Co. - Harrisonburg, VA
12/21 - Gypsy Sally's - Washington, DC
12/22 - Holiday Market - Washington, DC
12/8 - Barns of Egremont - Egremont, MA
12/29 - The Press Room - Portsmouth, NH
12/30 - The Burren - Somerville, MA

1/1 - City Winery - Nashville, TN*

1/16 - Jammin' Java - Vienna, VA^

1/24 - Purple Fiddle - Thomas, WV^

1/25 - Purple Fiddle - Thomas, WV^

* w/ Langhorne Slim
^ w/ Western Centuries

Photo Credit: Gina Binkley

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