Von Bieker Shares New Single, “Asheville”
Von Bieker plays indie folk that haunts your heart with small stories and big questions. Mostly.
In Von Bieker’s soundscape, the earnest retro charm of a bowtie meets the world-worn grit of rock and roll. Vintage guitar twang channels resonant writing through a voice often pushed until it cracks into free-fall falsetto. Von Bieker draws on influences ranging from Bahamas to Bruce Cockburn; Glen Hansard to Radiohead to Talking Heads.
Based in Edmonton, Alberta, Von Bieker frequently plays solo and with his band, Von Bieker and his Small-Tones.
Today, Von Bieker shares his brand new single, “Asheville,” his tale of post-lockdown travel and transformation channeling his visit to Asheville, North Carolina in the summer of 2022.
First off care to introduce yourself to our readers?
Sure – I’m Von Bieker and I write and record songs here in Edmonton, Alberta. I love the way music makes connections. It’s magic. My favorite songs pull big feelings from small stories. When I write I’m wrestling for beauty and meaning.
Tell us a bit about your recent release.
Asheville is a collection of small stories from a recent trip to Asheville, North Carolina. I was there for an arts and spirituality retreat. I knew nothing about the place and I was traveling alone, so my antennae were up. I took notes on overheard conversations between frazzled travelers in the airport. This was pretty soon after travel rebooted post-lockdowns so everyone seemed on edge between missed flights and long lines.
I filed that rocky start away and enjoyed my time in Asheville – it’s a beautiful city with so much going on for how small it is.
One afternoon I was supposed to lead a jam session back at the retreat, but got stuck in a bus shelter during a torrential downpour that came out of nowhere. This is not uncommon in Asheville. I was watching the water flow by the bus shelter when the chorus for Asheville popped into my head. “The rain it comes and goes in Asheville / about as steady as my faith”.
I started connecting the dots between my bus stop waiting and the airport waiting and the feeling that I was waiting for some spiritual change in my life. All of this longing just poured out to become Asheville.
At the end of the week, I heard a poet friend of mine (Jen Grace Stewart) read her line “love is not a fullness, but an ache” and that sealed it for me.
How do you typically go about the songwriting process? Do you have a specific method or creative routine that you follow?
I wish, because I love routine. Buy mostly I try to catch up with an idea that comes at some inconvenient time. I’m about to leave the house or sit down to get some work done or driving around somewhere. I’ve learned that if I don’t capture the thread it’ll disappear. The result is a couple hundred voice memos and snippets of lyrics in my notes app. Often I’ll have at least a chorus if not a chorus and one verse. The discipline part is giving time and attention to those ideas to try and fill out the rest of the song. Most often that is hard work..
My favorite songs to write are just like Asheville, where I’ve written down specific experiences that I can pull from for the lyrics.
Looking ahead, what are your plans for supporting this new release? Are there any upcoming tours, music videos, or additional content that fans can look forward to in connection with this project?
I’ve got a livestream coming on IG on release day and I’ll be playing some solo and band shows leading up to the album release in June. This is the first single from my upcoming record DUMB HOPE, which people can pre-order now. I’ve got a great band backing me up on a lot of these shows and Asheville feels best when we can lean into the grit and groove of it on stage. There are a couple of different live performance videos of the song coming out that capture that.
You can actually find a demo version of Asheville that I released just a few months after my 2022 trip. It’s totally different – just me and an acoustic guitar but also a different feel.
Looking back on your musical career, is there a particular moment or accomplishment that you consider a turning point or a highlight?
There are a lot of little moments, rather than any big pivot point so far.
As a songwriter, there are times when I play something I’ve written in the perfect context, and all the energy of that song gets reflected back to me by the audience – as if the song was written just for that one instant.
I once got to play my love song Move With Me at a small anniversary party. The event was partly outdoors and the weather was terrible so I was about to call it when someone said the couple hadn’t had their wedding dance yet, and did I have one more song for that? I’d actually forgotten about Move With Me until that moment and everything aligned in this perfect way. I played that song as this couple married for 40 years waltzed within a circle of their closest friends and family. There were misty eyes. I don’t think it gets better than that for me.
Last but not least, it’s time to pay it forward, what upcoming band or artist would you recommend your fans check out?
I’m a huge fan of Alberta band Starpainter and I may have listened to their record Rattlesnake Dream more than any that came out last year. Great songwriting with strong imagery and melodies that get stuck in my head all the time. So many songs doing exactly what I hope I’m pulling off with Asheville.