The COVERSTORY for our March 2021 edition is a twofer: Watch the debut of an original WestVirginiaVille music video of "Be the Change" — and hear songwriters Ron Sowell and Jon Wikstrom talk about the roots of their song and their long songwriting comradeship.
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MUSICVIDEO: “Winter Walking,” when it’s not such a wonderland
A long winter grips the land. Add in cabin-fever weariness from a year-long COVID quarantine—and you can be forgiven if it seems like we are living through "a winter that never dies." Here's a music video about that.
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ESSAYS: ‘David Bowie, Dad & Me’
Here's a new dispatch from our "Play That Funky Music Bureau"—a touching memoir of the ties between a young West Virginia-born writer and her Dad woven by the music of David Bowie—who have been 74 on January 8.
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BREAKING: We Interrupt this Insurrection for David Bowie News
WestVirginiaVille marks David Bowie's 74th birthday today with news from our "Play That Funky Music" News Department. Wait—what does Bowie have to do with West Virginia?! Read and watch on.
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“LAY THAT BURDEN DOWN”: A Musical Homage to John Lewis, Sung by Lady D
Check out the world premiere of the music video of the Ron Sowell/Jon Wikstrom song "Lay Down That Burden," sung by Lady D and inspired by the life, courage, and heart of John Lewis, whose example is ever more needed now in America.
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The West Virginia Musician Who Helped Draw Bob Dylan to Nashville
West Virginia may not immediately come to mind when you think of Bob Dylan's influential 1965 record "Highway 61 Revisited," which one writer says that in an important sense "started" the 1960s. Think again.
