We are thrilled to announce that “Two Hearts Down” has been awarded the 2012 Independent Music Award for Best Story Song.  100 Miles of Wreckage was also a nominee for Americana Album of the Year.   Winners were determined by a panel of 77 influential artist and industry judges including Keith Richards, Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan, Suzanne Vega, Joshua Redman, Tori Amos, Michael Franti, Bettye LaVette, Del McCoury,
Ozzy Osbourne, Shelby Lynne, Alan Light (Live From The Artists Den),
Kevin Lyman (Warped Tour), Bill Bragin (Lincoln Center), Sara Beesley (Joe’s Pub) Chris Diaz (Knitting Factory Entertainment), and Evan Schlansky (American Songwriter). In addition to industry-determined Winners, music fans from around the world have until Friday, July 20, 2012 to cast their votes at The IMA Vox Pop Jukebox to determine the fan-selected IMA Winners.

We’re very excited to announce that we have been selected for inclusion on the Independent Film Channel’s “Sounds of the Cities” compilation CD.  IFC has chosen the musicians who they feel best represent the unique sounds of the communities that are their top markets.  We’re joining artists such as Hymn for Her, Chris Knight, and Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band on the album, which will be released this spring.

The album will be promoted on IFC (of course!) but also at Record Store Day promotions nationwide and via Amazon.com and YouTube. There will be a short film/music video competition and other cool tie-ins.  The first of these is a cover art competition.  Artists can submit their CD and cover art designs by following the directions below.  The winning design will be used on the album, and the designer will be paid and receive some pretty incredible promotion.  Check it out!

Wow – CMT is celebrating the top videos of the year, and we made the list!  However, only the top 30 (as determined by fan voting) will make the final cut to be aired on CMT Celebrates: Top 30 Videos of 2011. Please take a moment to vote for “Two Hearts Down” and let’s see if we can crack into the top 30! There’s some very stiff competition, but you guys have come through for us in the past and we think we have a pretty decent shot.  Vote here and then tune in to CMT to see the results.  CMT Celebrates: Top 30 Videos of 2011 airs Saturday 12/31/11 8a EST; Sunday 1/1/12 8a EST; Monday 1/2/12 9a EST, only on CMT!

… because we’re in it, right there on page 9 above Carrie Underwood and next to Lady Antebellum. We’re featured as the magazine’s “On the Edge” band. Apparently we’re “rapidly budding into a buzz band” and the “many strains of vintage country that collide in this rising band’s sound make the Lillies a crossbreed to watch.” This may be the one time that being called a “crossbreed” is a good thing!

Thanks to your votes, “Two Hearts Down” was the number 2 video in the CMT Pure 12 Pack this week!  We truly appreciate your support.  Voting starts fresh each week, so keep ‘em coming.

We can hardly believe it, but we’ve been invited back to the Grand Ole Opry – less than three months after our debut there!  We’ll be playing this Friday, Sept. 9 at 7 pm.  Tickets are available at opry.com and of course the show will be broadcast on WSM 650 AM in Nashville as well as via the Opry’s site.

After we played there in June, we all looked at each other and said that we hoped we’d get to do it again sometime soon.  I think we were hoping for sometime in a year or so.  To think that it is happening this fast is just crazy.

More craziness … we were the 7th video in last week’s CMT Pure 12 Pack as voted by fans.  Thank you so much for your support! When our video wasn’t number 12, we figured we just hadn’t made it … number 7 is mindblowing! We still need your votes to stay in the top 12, as well as to see if we can get any higher.  You can vote as often as you like, Fridays through Thursdays.  The new 12 Pack is revealed each Friday evening.  Vote here – a lot.  Maybe 50 times a day.  This is one instance where we highly encourage ballot stuffing.  ;)

We were also in the top 50 of all videos viewed on CMT.com.  We came in at number 34, right in between Darius Rucker and Shania Twain. In fact, pretty much every name on that list is a big name from a traditional record label.  We’re very proud to have performed that well and appreciate all of the time you’ve spent watching the video and passing it along to friends.  If you want to see it again, you can do so right here.

We also learned today that our Mountain Stage performance from last year will be rebroadcast on NPR stations this weekend, beginning 9/9.  Check your local listings to find out when it will air: http://www.mountainstage.org/mtnstageaffiliates.aspx. Of course, you can also listen online at  NPR.org beginning September 9.

All right, that feels like a lot of news for one little update! Thanks, as always, for your support.

Here it is! “Two Hearts Down” premieres exclusively on CMT today. We’re thrilled to finally be able to share it with you and we hope you enjoy it!

Please help us get into the “Pure 12 Pack” of most requested videos! You can vote as often as you like (and we hope you want to vote a lot) right here.

We can finally, officially announce that the “world premiere” (CMT’s words, not ours – it sounds so important!) of the “Two Hearts Down” will take place Monday, August 29 exclusively on CMT.  The video was directed by David McClister, who is not only amazing and incredibly supportive of us, but also award-winning. He directed the videos for Lady Antebellum’s “Need You Now” (which won about a million awards) and The Band Perry’s “If I Die Young” – which actually won CMT & USA Today’s award for “Breakthrough Video of the Year” on the very day that David was shooting our video.  When the call came in that he had won, he didn’t even break stride – just kept on working on “Two Hearts Down.”

We’re so proud of this video and excited to share it with you.  It will be in heavy rotation on CMT Pure, online at CMT.com and available on the CMT iPhone and Android apps beginning Monday.  They will have it exclusively for a few days and then it will be aired by other national outlets, as well.

We’ll also need your help voting for us to make the “12 Pack” most requested videos.  Let’s bring roots music to Nashville and show ‘em how it’s done!

More details as we have them.

We can’t thank all of you enough. Thanks to your votes, we’ve been awarded the Independent Music Award Vox Pop (People’s Choice) for Best Album, Americana for Whiskey Angel. Who would have thought when Cruz pulled together a group of friends to record some songs over a weekend – in his living room – that it might result in this?

We’re incredibly honored and humbled.  Thank you.