Jeffrey Foucault opener: Niamh Regan

In two decades on the road Jeffrey Foucault has become one of the most distinctive voices in American music, refining a sound instantly recognizable for its simplicity and emotional power. With a string of critically acclaimed studio albums – “Stark, literate songs that are as wide open as the landscape of his native Midwest” (The New Yorker), “Beat-up troubadour folk whittled to dolorous perfection” (Uncut), “Songwriting Brilliance,” (Irish Times) – he’s built a brick-and-mortar international touring career and a devoted following, one that includes luminaries like Van Dyke Parks, Greil Marcus, and Don Henley.

In September of 2024 Jeffrey Foucault released THE UNIVERSAL FIRE (Fluff & Gravy, 9/6/24), his first album of entirely new material since 2018. A series of high-voltage performances cut live in one room, the album is both a working wake – Foucault lost his best friend and drummer Billy Conway, to cancer in 2021 – and a meditation on the nature of beauty, artifact, and loss.

Augmenting Foucault’s all-star band with members of Calexico and Bon Iver (drummer John Convertino and producer/saxophonist Mike Lewis) THE UNIVERSAL FIRE sets Conway’s death against the massive 2008 fire at the Universal Studios lot in California that destroyed the master recordings of some of our bedrock American music, to interrogate ideas about mortality, legacy, meaning, and calling.

Niamh Regan

Originally from the west coast of Ireland and now based in California, Niamh Regan is a singer-songwriter known for her distinctive voice, intricate guitar work, and atmospheric blend of folk and indie.Her acclaimed second album, Come As You Are (2024), received widespread critical praise and a further RTÉ Choice Music Prize nomination, with comparisons to artists including Laura Marling, Nick Drake, and Nanci Griffith. Now living in California, Regan is working on her third record while continuing to bring her live performances to audiences across North America and beyond.