Brumley’s Suitcase & Tom West

In 2016 South Australian songwriters Taasha Coates, Dan Crannitch and Kelly Menhennett travelled to Austin, USA (UNESCO City of Media Arts) to spend time collaborating with Texan artists writing songs based on the unfinished work of Albert E. Brumley, who composed the most recorded song of all time ‘I’ll fly Away’. This project was the subject of the documentary Brumley’s Suitcase. In 2017 it premiered at the Adelaide Film Festival in October 2017. In addition, the House of Songs Adelaide project saw four musicians from Adelaide’s Sister City Austin, Texas travelling to Adelaide to collaborate to write songs and perform with four Adelaide-based musicians.

Music Development Office (MDO) funded Tom West to attend House of Songs in March 2018 as part of his latest US touring: while in the US Tom performed in Austin and at the Kansas Folk Alliance. The Kansas Folk Alliance is the world’s largest folk-music-focused showcasing event and conference. Tom’s performance was witnessed by an influential part of Spotify US’s team, resulting in Tom being added to much-vaunted playlists on Spotify. This has hugely increased his listenership from around 6,000 monthly listeners to 80,000 monthly listeners and growing. This provides an incredible avenue for Tom to infiltrate the US market and creates the perfect environment to release his debut album.