A very big thanks to Jed Gottlieb and The Boston Herald for their preview of our Sept 6th show at City Winery Boston.

In January we promised that we'd be back to our hometown for another show this year and we've been looking forward to this one for a while. Daniel Miller & The High Life open the night (8pm) and we've got a great set planned to celebrate the release of our new album "Can't Judge a Book". 

​

Our new album "Can't Judge a Book" is officially out now!! The album is a collection of songs that we picked up in our travels, sometimes it was a song we heard another band perform or a song that captured a moment while we were on the road, or in the case of Chuck Berry's "Promised Land" it was the story behind the song that made us want to record it. 

The album also includes a brand new original song called "Naturally Crazy" inspired by one of our tours through France and the realization that anyone who chooses to spend half their life on the road and rambling from city to city all over the world has to be naturally crazy, not only to want to live a life where you're constantly on the move, but also in order to roll with the punches, sometimes literally, and survive. 

You can download the new album on iTunes and Amazon and it's also streaming on Spotify. Or if you're old school, like me, then you can order a copy of the CD via CD Baby. 

​

Our new album "Can't Judge a Book" officially comes out on Aug 23rd and will be available in most places where music can be found (iTunes, Amazon, etc), and to celebrate the release we have a string of shows happening all over the Northeast beginning with Aug 23rd at Dangerously Delicious Pies in Washington DC and Aug 24th at The Stoltz Listening Room in Easton, Maryland. 

​We really can't wait for you to hear the new album and we hope to see you at a show real soon!! -Ward Hayden & The Outliers

​

A huge thanks to The Bluegrass Situation for premiering "Hackensack" of our upcoming album "Can't Judge a Book". 

The new album officially comes out on Aug 24th and will be available on iTunes, Amazon and Google Play. We hope you enjoy "Hackensack" and be sure to help spread the work by sharing on social media. We have a bunch of album release shows happening in the Northeast and we'll be headed South in December. More tour dates will be announced very soon!

Very excited to announce we'll be coming home to Boston for a special hometown CD Release Show on September 6th at City Winery Boston. 

Our schedule really gets busy from here until he end of the year, including a European Tour with shows in Sweden, Norway, France, Switzerland & Spain. So, we're thrilled to be getting to have a big show like this in Boston and get to rock 'n' roll with you all again this year. 

Daniel Miller & The High Life, who are a great band with Tennessee Roots, who now call The Bay State home, will be kicking off the show. Tickets are on sale HERE. Spread the word, invite your friends to join you and order your tickets today. 

​

The first interview I ever did about music was with a Massachusetts based music magazine called Metronome. So, when they reached out recently to check in and talk about the debut album from Ward Hayden & The Outliers, I jumped at the chance. Metronome magazine has championed local, regional and national music for 34 years and we're thrilled to be a part of their August issue. Take a look, we discuss why we changed from GGG to Ward Hayden & The Outliers, what it means to be an outlier, the upcoming album, the state of country music, touring, recording, Europe and more. Enjoy!!

​

I'm a big fan of Mystic, CT and we're very happy to be headed there on Monday (July 22) to take part in their Blue Monday Concert Series. 

Sondra Levine opens the show at 5:30 and canned goods and/or donations benefitting Stonington Education Fund and Pawcatuck Neighborhood Center will be accepted at the show. 

​And thanks to Rick Koster and The Day for the write up!! Bring all your friends and family along, show is FREE to the public, we hope to see you in Mystic. 

A huge thanks to Wide Open Country for premiering our version of "Promised Land". 
In the early 60's Chuck Berry was imprisoned for violating the Mann Act, it's a whole story and worth looking up, and while locked up and flipping through an Atlas this song was born. 
It exemplifies Chuck's creative genius. And Chuck Berry, the man, exemplifies the concept of gray area. He straddled the line of what can be considered good and bad. In 2019 we're pulling apart many things and examining a lot of what makes us....us. Humanity, history and people are complex.
He was the architect of rock 'n' roll. A man of the blues who channeled it through himself and the results are some of the greatest songs ever written. The creativity of his sound is in almost every bit of music you hear today. 
I've spent a good amount of time thinking about this story, it's a tough one and hard to reach any definitive conclusions. But, his lyrical genius and musical contributions are undeniable. Imagine writing a song about freely traveling the country all while locked up in prison? He is America's poet laureate. 
We hope you enjoy our take on this classic, our goal was to get in the room, plug in and hit this song as hard as we could. To do my part I kept the idea of recording this song a secret from the band right up until just before the session. I wanted them to show up without any preconceived ideas of what we'd be up to and to hit it with as fresh and unrestrained of a sound as we could muster. We wanted to do it justice. Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll. 
Our album "Can't Judge a Book" OFFICIALLY comes out on Aug 23rd. Pre-sale will be available shortly, be sure to stay tuned. -Ward