By LESLIE EIKLEBERRY
Salina Post
When the Sunset Sinners take the City Lights Stage in downtown Salina Saturday, fans will hear some of their favorites, but they also will get to hear new music by the group that has yet to be released.
The Sinners' performance is a part of Salina Downtown Inc.'s Santa Fe Weekender event going on Friday and Saturday in downtown Salina.
READ: Santa Fe Weekender: Free music, public art, and fun!
The Wedel Financial and Salina Downtown Inc.'s Weekender Concert will begin at 2 p.m. at the City Lights Stage.
"We have a band, some pretty young cool cats that play some '80s stuff called Visual Lies, and they're playing from 2-3 p.m. and then the Sunset Sinners play from 3 to 5ish," said Blake Blackim, Sunset Sinners drummer and spokesperson.
Blackim noted that the free event is a "lawn chair, cooler concert."
A Rollin' Smoke BBQ food truck also is scheduled to be on hand.
Blackim said that in addition to favorites such as Always Time For One More Beer and Friday Night, the band will perform new music that has yet to be released to music streaming services and radio stations.
"We have two brand new songs that are recorded but have not been released yet," he said. "The first song that will be coming out is called Coming Home. It's based on the military veteran that's done with his service and now he's back home and it's kind of like, 'now what do I do?'"
Another song that will come out later is called Meant to Be.
"It's honestly our first kind of love ballad song," Blackim said.
When Coming Home is released, probably next month, it will have enhancements from some Grammy Award winners.
"Coming Home, we're super excited about because around the first of the year, we started working with Jesse Atwell of Atwell Management out of Austin (Texas)," Blackim said. "He's worked extensively in the music industry, with Sony Records in New York and Nashville and another group called Thirty Tigers label in Nashville. He's worked with a lot of bands that are big now like Whiskey Myers and Scotty McCreery, and folks like that."
Atwell is a Salina native and a graduate of Salina Central High School, Blackim said.
Through Atwell's contacts, the Sunset Sinner's song Coming Home came to the attention of some Grammy Award winners.
"The cool thing about this song is that we have all sorts of Grammy Award winner-industry heavy hitters that worked on this particular song," Blackim said. "Andrew Scheps, who is one of the most famous industry music engineers, we sent the song to him. He really liked it. He's won three Grammy Awards. He's worked extensively with everybody from Adele to the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Lady Gaga to Black Sabbath and Whiskey Myers. And that's a short list."
After Scheps worked his magic on Coming Home, the song was sent to Peter Limon, a Grammy-nominated music mastering engineer who owns Infrasonic Mastering.
"Peter does all the mastering for Chris Stapleton, Sturgill Simpson, and folks like that," Blackim said.
Additionally, the Dodd Sisters out of Austin, Texas, who also are Grammy Award winners, are doing the cover design work for the song, he said.
"So for the mixing, the mastering, and the artwork, we're working with all of these Grammy, big heavy-hitter industry folks. What that does besides just having a cool, great-sounding song, it opens doors in other areas for folks in the industry to open their eyes to go 'oh wow! These cats are actually doing something big,'" Blackim said.
The Sunset Sinners also are working on a follow-up to Always Time For One More Beer titled Two Beers.
"Ironically, this summer is the four-year anniversary of when we filmed the video for One More Beer," Blackim said.
Most of the music video for Always Time For One More Beer was filmed at the Hideaway bar in Salina.
"That was only supposed to be just to get a 10-second clip for the actual video, but it ended up blowing up and taking on a life of its own, so the majority of the video is from what happened that day," Blackim explained.
"So actually, there's going to be a four-year anniversary party in July at the Hideaway on a Saturday afternoon, and yes, we will be filming just in case there's some cool footage to get out of that for our new song coming out," he said.
The band also plans to remaster and rerelease Always Time For One More Beer and Friday Night, Blackim said.