About the Artist
Cicada Rhythm is the Athens, Georgia duo of Dave and Andrea, married seven years and together fifteen. Dave came up riding freight trains out of Atlanta and chasing old blues and country records; Andrea trained at Juilliard. The two fold those opposite roots into a sound they call modern American roots, most recently on Magic State, released in November 2025 and recorded low-key in an old farmhouse in Madison, Georgia. They also host outdoor shows on their farm outside Athens.
Cicada Rhythm
About the Episode (Episode 136)
Cicada Rhythm: We Can Change and Still Choose Each Other
At the 30A Songwriters Festival in January, host Jason English sat down with Dave and Andrea of Cicada Rhythm, a couple who have built fifteen years of music and marriage out of two very different backgrounds. The conversation keeps returning to one question: how do two whole, separate people keep changing without growing apart?
Key Conversation Points
Finding their own sound: For years Dave chased early American roots and the ghosts of Johnny Cash and Roger Miller, until it stopped fitting. "I can't sound like Johnny Cash," he says. "I'm born in like 1988." Andrea's answer was simpler: "It's just be us. Let's just sound like us."
Changing without keeping score: They treat change as the point, not the threat. "We can change and still love each other and still choose each other," Andrea says, adding that marriage and music both have a "spoonful of Tabasco."
Two different islands: Andrea's mother is from Puerto Rico and Dave's is from Ireland, so they joke their families come "from the islands. Different islands." That split runs through the music too, her Juilliard-trained, jazzy polish set against his self-taught, train-hopping roots. Andrea calls it "an amazingly unique blend that may be only Dave and I can offer."
There is also an engagement story involving a buried ring and a metal detector, Dave's freight-train years riding out of Atlanta, and a rehearsal-dinner toast that doubles as a marriage philosophy. The episode closes, as it always does, with a live performance.