Richmond Fontaine was an American four-piece

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...

and alternative country band, based in

Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the list of cities in Oregon, largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, Portland is ...

. They were active between 1994 and 2016 and recorded eleven studio albums, four live albums and two EPs. Underpinned by lead singer and songwriter Willy Vlautin's lyrics, Richmond Fontaine songs often evoke imagery of

Reno Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada-California border, about north from Lake Tahoe, known as "The Biggest Little City in the World". Known for its casino and tourism industry, Reno is the ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a state in the Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th-most extensive, ...

, Portland, the

Western United States The Western United States (also called the American West, the Far West, and the West) is the region comprising the westernmost states of the United States. As American settlement in the U.S. expanded westward, the meaning of the term ''the We ...

, and

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, while telling stories in a style that critics have compared to

Raymond Carver Raymond Clevie Carver Jr. (May 25, 1938 – August 2, 1988) was an American short story writer and poet. He contributed to the revitalization of the American short story during the 1980s. Early life Carver was born in Clatskanie, Oregon, a mil ...

. The group has cited influences such as

Gram Parsons Ingram Cecil Connor III (November 5, 1946 – September 19, 1973) who was known professionally as Gram Parsons, was an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and pianist who recorded as a solo artist and with the International Submarine Band, ...

, X, Green on Red and

Dave Alvin David Albert Alvin (born November 11, 1955) is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist and producer. He is a former and founding member of the roots rock band the Blasters. Alvin has recorded and performed as a solo artist since the late 1980s a ...

History

Formed in 1994, Richmond Fontaine started touring the

Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Tho ...

live circuit to support their first three albums released on

Cavity Search Records Cavity Search Records is a record label in Portland, Oregon that was formed in 1992 by Christopher Cooper and Denny Swofford. It is known for producing debut records by Hazel, Heatmiser, The Helio Sequence, King Black Acid, Richmond Fontaine, ...

. Gradually gaining attention in the UK and Europe the band began regularly touring there. Most of the core musicians and producer J. D. Foster have worked together for a decade, and produced several albums. The band is named after an American expat, "a burned out hippy", that had helped bassist Dave Harding when his car was stuck in the desert in the Baja California Peninsula. Richmond Fontaine first gained exposure outside the United States through a song that was included on a Vinyl Junkie Records 'Loose' compilation released in the UK. This was followed by the band's self-released fourth album, ''Winnemucca''. The band signed with Decor Records in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...

during 2003 with their next two releases proving pivotal to the band's success. Both were made "Albums of the Month" in influential magazine, ''

Uncut Uncut may refer to: * ''Uncut'' (film), a 1997 Canadian docudrama film by John Greyson about censorship * ''Uncut'' (magazine), a monthly British magazine with a focus on music, which began publishing in May 1997 * '' BET: Uncut'', a Black Enter ...

'', which named both their fifth album ''Post to Wire'' (2004) and sixth ''The Fitzgerald'' (2005) "masterpieces". U.S. critics have been generally complimentary but have also cited the band's musical similarity to

Uncle Tupelo Uncle Tupelo was an alternative country music group from Belleville, Illinois, active between 1987 and 1994. Jay Farrar, Jeff Tweedy, and Mike Heidorn formed the band after the lead singer of their previous band, The Primitives, left to atten ...

. The band's 2007 album, ''Thirteen Cities'', received positive reviews across Europe. This was followed by ''We Used to Think the Freeway Sounded Like a River in August 2009,'' ''The High Country'' in September 2011 and ''You Can't Go Back If There's Nothing To Go Back To'' in March 2016.

Other projects

Lead singer and songwriter Vlautin is also a novelist, with five books published since his debut, ''

The Motel Life ''The Motel Life'' (2006) is the debut novel by musician and writer Willy Vlautin. It tells the story of two brothers from Reno, Nevada, whose lives are thrown into turmoil following a tragic accident. It was made into a movie starring Emile H ...

'', in 2006. He formed new group The Delines, along with fellow Richmond Fontaine members Freddy Trujillo and Sean Oldham, in 2014.

Members

* Willy Vlautin:

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or withou ...

, acoustic and electric

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected strin ...

s *Freddy Trujillo: bass, vocals *Sean Oldham: drums,

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...

, vibes,

*Dan Eccles:

lead guitar Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featu ...

*Dave Harding: bass,

s, vocals *Paul Brainard: pedal steel guitar, piano,

Electric Guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gu ...

, vibes, acoustic guitar, Trumpet,

*Joe Davis: drums *Stuart Gaston: drums *Matt Gilley: drums (one live performance in 1997)

Selected discography

Studio albums *''Safety'' (1996) *''Miles From'' (1997) *''Lost Son'' (1999) *''Winnemucca'' (2002) *''Post to Wire'' (2003) *''The Fitzgerald'' (2005) *''Obliteration by Time'' (2006) *''Thirteen Cities'' (2007) *''We Used to Think the Freeway Sounded Like a River'' (2009) *''The High Country'' (2011) (

UK Albums Chart The Official Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales and (from March 2015) audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts ...

peak: No. 115) *''You Can't Go Back If There's Nothing To Go Back To'' (2016) (UK Albums Chart peak: No. 65) (UK Country Chart peak: No.1) *''Don't Skip Out On Me'' (2018) - Instrumental soundtrack to the Willy Vlautin book of the same name. (2018)

References

External links

Official website

Richmond Fontaine Myspace Page
{{Authority control 1994 establishments in Oregon American alternative country groups Cavity Search Records artists Musical groups established in 1994 Musical groups from Portland, Oregon