A raucous Southern sound with harmonies and great original songs

Shovels & Rope is the Charleston, South Carolina–based duo of Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent. They perform as an energetic two-piece band, stirring up a righteous racket with two old guitars, a handful of harmonicas, the occasional keyboard, and a junkyard drum kit harvested from an actual garbage heap and adorned with tambourines, flowers and kitchen rags. But the songs are the deadliest arrows in this duo's quiver. Since 2010, Shovels & Rope has been traveling the highways and back roads of North America, logging hundreds of shows and performing for crowds large and small. If you enjoy the tough new strain of Southern songwriting exemplified by Justin Townes Earle, Jason Isbell, the Felice Brothers, Hayes Carll, and Butch Walker, Shovels & Rope are not to be missed. The duo’s latest album, “Manticore,” contains sonic experimentation they worked on during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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