Hooten Hallers bringing fiery Americana to Iowa City

Around a decade ago, Kellie Everett guested on a recording by the Columbia, Mo., group the Hooten Hallers. She then joined them for a New Year’s Eve gig, held on the evening that saw 2013 turn into 2014.

Aside from a brief period with a fourth member, the current trio’s been at it since then, as Everett, the baritone sax player, found a home alongside “her best friends” in guitarist John Randall and drummer Andy Rehm.

With 16 total years together, the group’s found a sound that’s uniquely their own, self-described as “Morphine meets ZZ Top mixed with a dash of George Thorogood and Tom Waits.”

Along the way, the Hooten Hallers also has figured out something else, arguably just as important: The act tours super-smartly, finding consistent and enthusiastic home bases in secondary markets that often are passed over by larger acts. The band will be playing Friday night, Sept. 6, 2024, at the Wildwood Saloon in Iowa City.

“Traditionally, we do best in the secondary markets, where they’re not getting all the major tours coming through — places where the people living there might have to drive to the next-biggest city for shows,” Everett said.

“A lot of larger artists aren’t routing through Paducah, Ky., but we’re always welcomed there. Modesto, Calif., Fort Collins, Colo., almost all of our best markets are where a promoter puts a lot of time and care into bringing in bands of high quality, which creates a whole scene of people who are trusting that bands being brought in are vetted and that they’re getting high-quality music.”

Whether headlining or in support, the band always brings energy. Even without a deep knowledge of their catalog, a concert-goer can get swept up in the show within a few songs. The group always gives off the sense that there’s nowhere else in the world they’d rather be than on that night’s stage and in that city.

“We try to do our best to bring the overall level of the show up as much as we can,” Everett said, noting that ethic applies to both headlining shows or when the band opens for another act.

“It’s fun to go out after sets and talk to people — very fun. Both dynamics are fun and they take a special skill set. You just learn to craft each type of show based on where in the lineup you are.”

A challenge for Everett is that she’s an in-demand multi-instrumentalist in her hometown of St. Louis, where she and her husband, Ryan Koenig, perform ins The Goldenrods. That group has a new record coming in this year, with some touring planned. Her other groups are more St. Louis based, while her Hooten Hallers bandmates take on some side play two hours west in Columbia. The balancing act is real and got tricky again this summer, when the Hooten Hallers have been touring behind their just-released latest album, “The Devil’s Egg.”

“John, Andy and I are best friends and we love that element of it,” Everett said. “We’re always having fun together and have found ways to work through any issues we might ever have. The dynamic of the band is a great one, a healthy one, and the live show experience is exciting for me, still. To travel the country and the world is a real thrill. I do have other bands, like The Goldenrods, and so we have some conflicts. You wish you could be in two places at once; that’s always a challenge. But we’re still willing to give this a whirl.”

That “whirl” includes touring outside the U.S., too. Pandemic aside, the band has been aiming for a European stint every summer, although they swapped that out for a first-time run in Australia in 2023. The trio hopes to get abroad yet this year.

“The Devil’s Egg” arrives fairly soon after their previous release, 2022’s “Back in Business Again.” The album finds The Hooten Hallers continuing to hit a bit of a refresh on their sound, a decade in.

“When we solidified as a three-piece, we locked into a sound that we were happy with,” Everett said. “It took a little while for me to figure out how to craft my role, bouncing back and forth between a bass instrument, a lead instrument and one with harmonies. And I’ve started to sing a bit more.

“For the guys, Andy’s switched from being a standing drummer to a sitting drummer, which really opened up a lot of possibilities for him. John’s experimenting more with tones, with a pedal set up that sets up some different avenues.”