BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.4.3//EN TZID:America/New_York X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/New_York BEGIN:VEVENT UID:158257@kingstonhappenings.org DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20261111T000000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20261111T000000 DTSTAMP:20260909T194935Z URL:https://kingstonhappenings.org/events/uptown-honky-tonk-kelsey-waldon- the-ulsterados-tori-tornado-at-assembly/ SUMMARY:Uptown Honky Tonk: Kelsey Waldon\, The Ulsterados\, + Tori Tornado at Assembly DESCRIPTION:7pm Doors\n7:30pm Pre-Show Two Step Lesson\n8pm Show\n\nKELSEY WALDON\nIn the six years since she signed to John Prine’s Oh Boy Records \, Kelsey Waldon has earned wide praise for her “self-penned composition s [with] the patina of authenticity” (Rolling Stone). On her new album\, Every Ghost\, she confronts addiction\, grief\, generational trauma\, and even herself — and comes through it stronger and at peace.\n\n“There ’s a lot of hard-earned healing on this record\,” Waldon says of the n ine-song project\, recorded at Southern Grooves studio in Memphis with her band\, The Muleskinners. As she sings in the record’s title track and f irst song\, “Ghost of Myself\,” she’s put in the work not only to be tter herself and leave behind bad habits\, but also to learn to love her p ast selves.\n\nDoing so wasn’t easy\, Waldon admits. “It took time and experience\,” she says\, adding that she can now find compassion for he r younger self.\n\n“I think you’ve gotta respect her\,” Waldon says\ , “because she was trying as hard as she could for where she was at\, an d she was doing a damn good job.”\n\nCompassion is a throughline on Ever y Ghost\, whether it’s for Waldon herself\, for the person in the throes of addiction in “Falling Down\,” or for a suffering world in “Nurse ry Rhyme.” The people in Waldon’s songs aren’t irredeemable — they ’re struggling.\n\n“You’ve got to have compassion\; you gotta stay h umble and have gratitude\,” Waldon says. However\, she’s learned that you also can’t let people take advantage of an empathetic heart. “Coma nche” — which Waldon jokes is her very own truck song — finds Waldon grappling with the loss of a loved one\, not to death but to boundaries s he’s set for her own good. Waldon owns a 1988 Jeep Comanche\, and drivin g it serves as a kind of therapy for her.\n\n“I love the whole aspect of when design mattered\,” she says\, “and owning your car was an expres sion of yourself.”\n\n“Comanche” is deeply personal\, but Waldon’s most introspective reflections bookend My Ghost. Its penultimate song\, “My Kin\,” extends the idea of loving yourself in spite of yourself be yond the choices she’s made and the circumstances she’s put herself in \, to reckon with both the good and the bad that come from her family tree . Those traits\, Waldon concludes\, make her who she is.\n\n“As the song says\, ‘I’m the best and worst of my kin\,’ and I love that for mys elf\,” says Waldon\, who was born and raised in a hunting lodge at the e nd of a dead-end road in the rural\, unincorporated community of Monkey’ s Eyebrow\, Ky. “And I’m also at a point where I’m willing to break these cycles\, I’m willing to grow\, I’m willing to evolve.”\n\nAmon g those best parts of her lineage is Waldon’s grandmother\, who died in June 2024. “She was a remarkable woman. The women in my family have been rocks\, and they’ve all been colorful and full of character\,” Waldon says.\n\n“Her garden and her yard\, that might have been one of the thi ngs she took the most pride in\,” Waldon adds\, recalling how her granny would often stop to dig up roadside flowers\, then transplant them into h er yard. A display of tiger lilies\, some of which now grow in Waldon’s yard in Tennessee\, was a particular point of pride.\n\n“Transplanting i s such a tradition — it can teach you a lot\,” Waldon says. “Life go es on\, beauty can grow from anywhere\, and as long as a person is remembe red\, they’re never gone.”\n\nWaldon honors her granny with the song “Tiger Lilies.” She didn’t want an over-the-top sentimental song\, s o she instead leaned into the idea of traditions as a way to remember love d ones. “I’m sure Granny would love it\,” Waldon says.\n\nEvery Ghos t concludes with a Hazel Dickens cover\, “Ramblin’ Woman.” Waldon co vered two Dickens songs on 2024’s There’s Always a Song and had added “Ramblin’ Woman” to their live sets as well. While Waldon didn’t o riginally intend to include their cover on this album\, it served as “a sonic star” during the recording process and has a message Waldon feels is still relevant decades after Dickens wrote it. “Hazel was ahead of he r time\,” Waldon says. “Our existence is more than just what society e xpects of us. We’re more than just somebody’s girlfriend or wife or mo ther\, and those are all beautiful things\, but we can have our own indepe ndence\, and we don’t have to do it for anybody else. We’re beautiful\ , magical\, and powerful creatures.”\n\nThat’s certainly how Waldon se es herself after completing Every Ghost. “It feels like there’s a spir it of fearlessness throughout this album\,” Waldon says\, “and I’m r eally proud of that.”\n\nWaldon’s fearlessness is among the reasons sh e landed at Oh Boy Records in 2019\, as the independent label’s first ne w signee in 15 years. It’s attracted fans to her headline tours and her festival sets\, and prompted artists including Tyler Childers\, Charley Cr ockett\, Robert Earl Keen\, Margo Price\, and Lucinda Williams to invite h er on tour. It helped earn her both the title of “Kentucky Colonel” — an honor recognizing goodwill ambassadors of Kentucky’s culture and traditions — and a spot in the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum’s annual American Currents exhibit in 2024.\n\n“True outlaw shit is stick ing to your guns\, and I feel like I’m doing that\,” Waldon says. “I ’m not saying I’m unbreakable\, but I feel almost unbreakable. I’ve already hurt the worst that I could and lived to tell the story. We can be thankful for our ghosts." ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://kingstonhappenings.org/wp-content/upload s/2026/09/honky-tonk.jpg CATEGORIES:@Featured LOCATION:Assembly\, 236 Wall St. 3rd Floor\, KINGSTON\, NY\, 12401\, United States GEO:41.931738;-74.018648 X-APPLE-STRUCTURED-LOCATION;VALUE=URI;X-ADDRESS=236 Wall St. 3rd Floor\, KI NGSTON\, NY\, 12401\, United States;X-APPLE-RADIUS=100;X-TITLE=Assembly:ge o:41.931738,-74.018648 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York X-LIC-LOCATION:America/New_York BEGIN:STANDARD DTSTART:20261101T010000 TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR