Interview: Justin Osborne (Susto)
Susto front man Justin Osborne had only lived in Asheville a few months when an impromptu 2022 performance at the Open Folk — now Golden Folk — songwriter showcase hatched a connection that would ultimately detour his indie-Americana sound down an Appalachian dirt road.
“My wife and I didn't really have a lot of friends in town just after moving there, so I reached out to Zaq [Suarez, Open Folk founder],” recalls Osborne, who moved here from Charleston, S.C. in 2021 and now lives in Austin, Texas. “He put me on a bill, and I did a couple of new Susto songs. Holler Choir played right after me, and I was floored.”
The Clint Roberts-led bluegrass collective took Osborne under its wing following that fateful night at Wicked Weed Funkatorium, and the musicians quickly kindled a creative chemistry.
“I’d be around their house more often, and people would break out in these old-time jams,” he says. “I was like, ‘What is this?!’ It was so cool. Coming from Charleston, old-time instrumentation was not something I was super exposed to. I’d been a fan and was loosely aware of that whole scene, but didn’t really catch the bug until hooking up with the Holler Choir crew.”
Osborne immersed himself in traditional standards for months before gradually filtering Susto songs through the same acoustic, harmony-driven lens. When Travis Book of The Infamous Stringdusters invited him to join his “happy hour” residency at 185 King Street in Brevard in June 2023, he brought his new friends along.
“That was the first time we’d reinterpreted my music before a live audience,” Osborne adds. “My label [New West Records] was intrigued by a video somebody took that night and invited us to play the label’s Christmas party. We agreed to do that, and I booked a handful more shows in the Carolinas. That initial splash led to invites to play festivals, so we decided to make a record to capture and share a reference point for people interested in what we were doing. We put out [Susto String Band: Volume One, in March 2025] and have been riding this wave ever since.”
Ahead of the band’s Saturday, Dec. 6 show at Asheville Music Hall, Asheville Stages spoke with Osborne about the evolution of his collaboration with Holler Choir from living room picking parties into an official recording and touring project.
Jay Moye: Before we dig into the Susto String Band origin story, can you remind me when you lived here?
Justin Osborne: My wife [Caroline Osborne] and I sort of met there. She’s from Austin and I was living in Charleston. We decided to move to Asheville and start our family there in the spring of 2021. We moved out here to Texas in the summer of 2023. It still feels like our family’s ancestral home, if you will. We love coming back and visiting our friends, especially now that I've been collaborating with the Holler Choir crew. It’s become part of my route — I make loops between Austin, Charleston, and Asheville constantly. I'm not complaining because they're all great places.
JM: I saw on social media that you’re recording a second string band record at Drop of Sun [Studios] here in town?
JO: Yeah, but not the whole thing. Volume Two has sort of become this cool Austin/Asheville collaboration. I had a pretty extensive network before I moved out here, which is how I met my wife, and we’ve been embraced here.
The first string band record came out a week or so after South by Southwest, so we made what felt like a big splash in Texas around that time that led to a relationship with Luck Reunion and Willie Nelson's sphere of influence. We've been doing some recording at Arlyn Studios, which Willie is involved with, and we're going to do a session in Nashville, too. It’s been fun to get to work in some really cool, legendary studios. We had an absolutely fantastic experience at Drop of Sun. And being right in the heart of West Asheville was a big perk, taking lunch breaks and all that.
JM: They’ve had a hot hand lately.
JO: Yeah, it was really an honor to be in their space and work in that room. It's just a really beautiful studio. I hope I get to make more music there.
JM: I would imagine that touring with the string band is a lighter lift than the rock group?
JO: That was part of the appeal in the beginning, to go on the road with a lower footprint in terms of overhead. We did end up becoming a full six-piece string band, though, so it's the same number of players as the rock band. But it’s definitely easier in terms of traveling without amps and drums. It’s enabled us to say “yes” to a lot more stuff.
JM: Volume One was mostly reimagined Susto material with a few new songs, including an ode to [Haywood Road honky-tonk dive bar] The Double Crown. Is Volume Two shaping up to be more of the same?
JO: There's definitely reinterpreted material from the Susto back catalog, but this record leans a bit more into newer compositions and what has come out of being a band and touring over the last year. One of the great things about the string band is that we jam in the van as we’re rolling down the highway, which is a completely novel concept to me. A couple of tunes came to life that way, which feels really special to all of us.
There’s a co-write duet between myself and Helena [Rose, banjo/vocals] and a co-write with Jackson [Grimm, mandolin/vocals]. We also got an original fiddle tune Jackson wrote, which I'm really excited about because I didn't even know what a fiddle tune was until I started hanging out with this crew. And we're throwing in a traditional a capella cover.
The magic of this group is that when we get together, we’re very productive — whether it's in the studio, on stage, in the van, or the spaces in between. We use our time in a very efficient way, and I think that'll come through on the record in terms of both new tunes and reimaginations of older tunes.
For example, we were doing a demo for my [2017] song “Hard Drugs” on our last little run. I was driving, and Jackson and our fiddle player, Nat [Copeland], were sitting in the front row of the van. Our tour manager was riding shotgun, holding a mobile recorder, and I was doing the vocals while driving. Probably not the safest way to do a demo, but it worked. [laughs]
JM: Is it safe to say that more time playing together has created a more collaborative dynamic?
JO: For sure. Everyone was so gracious to me, coming into the project. I’m still learning about the history of old-time music and how to use traditional instruments to tell stories that have been told another way. It was collaborative to begin with, but as our friendships have grown, the collaboration has grown.
There's a lot of trust in our band. We've navigated a lot in a short time and made a lot of things happen that we couldn’t have imagined possible. We’re a really tight-knit crew, and that's definitely coming out in the creative process.
JM: Has the project given you a different perspective on Susto songs you wrote years ago in a different format?
JO: Absolutely. It’s given them a second life, especially earlier songs from our first two self-released Susto records. It feels good to give those songs their due with a fresh shot at the algorithm.
When I make a record or, to a lesser but still important extent, put together a live set list, I’m thinking about the overall thematic movement of the experience. Songs are pieces you put together to tell a story and deliver some sort of takeaway. It’s been cool to see these older, mid-catalog songs live in a different storyline alongside newer ones.
I've always been a confessional writer. I base my songs off personal and secondhand experiences of people around me and things I'm intimately involved with. Some of my older songs have gained new relevance, because you don’t always learn some lessons the first time around. In the last several years, there's been lots of shifts and crazy things to navigate, both good and bad, in my life. Dealing with joy amongst chaos is something we all have to continuously figure out.
That's a long-winded way of saying, “Yes, there's certainly been new life breathed into these songs.” And, also, their energy has helped bring the life of this new band into existence, if that makes sense. It goes both ways.
JM: And to take it even a layer further, how has writing, recording, and playing with the string band influenced what you do with the rock band?
JO: I actually was on a podcast last night talking about this. I only recently started to realize just how much of an influence it’s having because I've been so focused on trying to absorb and understand the ins and outs of old-time music: what it means, where it comes from, and what the communities it belongs to are all about.
Two weeks ago, we spent three days in the studio here in Texas tracking for the next string band record after ending a run of touring. That very next day, I started on what I'm considering to be the next Susto full-band record, which will come out years from now, and I kept a couple of the members of the string band back to play on it. When we started recording, it was like fusing the two worlds together on some of these new songs I'm working on. It felt like an “aha” moment of realizing, “This is the sound.” I now can see how it's influencing the way I'm envisioning production. It's safe to anticipate a bit of crossover when that comes out.
With the string band, especially on the recordings, we’re very particular about sticking to a standard bluegrass quintet — banjo, upright bass, guitar, mandolin, and fiddle — with maybe some dobro or other stringed instruments to supplement here and there. Having that confine makes this project really special.
But it's definitely a side quest for me. Susto is not on hold, and I'm not permanently jumping ship from rock 'n' roll. But right now, I'm enjoying being able to bounce between the two. We all get together sometimes, which has made the Susto family that much better. I'm grateful for that. I'm the only overlapping member of the two bands, and both are fluid in membership. [Asheville guitarist/singer Andrew Scotchie is an occasional touring member of Susto.]
JM: I'm sure you've grown as a writer and performer through this lineup. To me, it sounds like a painter discovering a fresh set of brushes or colors.
JO: I definitely feel like it's helped me gain some new skills and perspective. Going through this clinic, my string band bandmates have been my mentors and tutors. They’ve helped me understand everything and pushed me to become a better guitar player and to be more intentional about how I write, sing, and perform.
This opportunity came as a surprise. It was always something I was interested in, but a few years ago I don't know if I would’ve been able to say I'd be working on a second string band record or having a conversation with you about touring. We're really excited to cap off all the cool stuff that's been happening for us this year with some shows back in the Southeast where the band is born out of, specifically Asheville.
IF YOU GO
Who: Susto String Band with Oliver Hazard
When: Saturday, Dec. 6, 9 p.m.
Where: Asheville Music Hall, 31 Patton Ave., ashevillemusichall.com
Tickets: $25
(Photo by Mia Al-Taher)
