Reflecting the fortitude shown by the characters sheâs written about for the last two decades, Patty Griffin made the decision to keep on working when her singing voice disappeared, the result of a battle with breast cancer in 2016. With encouragement from close friends and her own determination to carry on, Griffin spent a year writing and recording at home in Austin, Texas, ultimately regaining the strength to create her new, self-titled album, perhaps her most stripped-down work since her stunning 1996 debut, Living With Ghosts.
Speaking by phone in the middle of her American tour, Griffin offered insight into new songs like âRiverâ and âHad a Good Reason,â and shared her love for her dogs, her guitar, and her dedicated fans.
BGS: On your new record, I keep going back to the song âRiver.â What was on your mind when you wrote that?
Griffin: I had been spending time with Donny Hathawayâs version of Leon Russellâs song, âA Song for You.â I actually covered that song for a little gig where I decided to do all covers. The song just kind of kicked my butt. Leon Russell is writing about something with this super sharp honesty, itâs almost like confessional, and itâs sort of healing for him and for whoever heâs singing that to.
And then Donny Hathaway picked it up and ran with it. Itâs so true that it moved right over to Donny Hathawayâs voice and became his song. Just the feeling of that made me want to try to write âRiver.â Like, whatâs down in there that I want to say, and that makes me want to sing this song? What do I have of my own to say that feels like that?
I noticed the lyric in there: âSheâs been left for dead a million times / And keeps coming home, arms open wide.â That lyric seems like it might be emblematic of this record â that notion of mortality and making it through. Is that fair to say?
I think thatâs fair to say, but in my mind it goes between me, as a part of nature, and what nature does. Weâre beating up on this planet as fast as we can, tearing down trees. Forgetting all about the rivers, but the rivers are going to be here long after weâre gone. The rivers just keep going. Thereâs something in us that no matter how far away we get from understanding how weâre a part of this big incredible magical thing — this existence that no one really understands — we still are! Itâs always there to go to, and in us, too.
Is this a new perspective for you? Did it hit you within the last couple of years to write about that broader scope?
I think Iâve tried to do that. But I think honestly as you get older, you do learn more about the broader scope, you know? I donât know. Sometimes I feel like the more I go along, the less I know, too. (laughs) So I donât know. Thatâs a question mark from me.
I had read that you had lost your speaking voice and your singing voice in the last few years.
Yeah.
What happened?
I believe leading into being diagnosed with cancer, I may have had it for a while. So, your immune systemâs working pretty hard. Your bodyâs amazing. It works pretty hard at trying to eliminate it. So I was out on the road a lot, which is a good place to get sick, even on a good day. I was just getting cold after cold after cold after cold. Like one long, non-stop respiratory illness. It depleted the strength of my voice quite substantially, and then you know, youâve got the diagnosis. Thereâs the surgery thatâs not so hot for singing. And then thereâs the treatment, there are the drugs⊠it was sort of this cocktail of things that finally depleted it to something I didnât know how to use at all, and couldnât use at all.
So, there were a few months there where it was pretty bad. I wasnât sure what to do, but I knew I wanted to keep playing, so I just kept writing. And I thought, people do this. Peopleâs voices change all the time and they keep going. You know, my old friend Robert Plant talked to me a little bit about that, just how he doesnât sing those high notes anymore. (laughs) He doesnât like to sing those high notes, but heâs discovered this other part of his voice that, to me, is so much more beautiful. So, things like that, and other moments like that that I thought about as I was going along. You know, [thinking] Iâll just have to figure this out — keep writing and figure this out as I go, what I can do next.
Where did you record this album?
Most of it was done in my house in Austin, Texas, with Craig Ross. [Recording engineer] Mike Poole came down from Nashville, and we set up the gear in my house. We did that with Mike a couple of times, and then the rest of the time throughout the year — it took about a year to do it — Craig and I worked on it, in the house mostly.
So, when youâre talking about your house, is that a home studio? Or more of a living room set-up?
Yeah, the dining room table, the living room, and the kitchen.
Do you think that environment affected the warmth of this record, and the vibe of this record?
I feel like I can hear my house in it, for sure, and I like that. But also it took the heat off me. It was Craigâs idea to do it this way, just sort of explore, without the pressure, what we had and what we could do. He was very positive about it, just hearing a few songs that I had from the get-go. Heâs a dear friend of mine and I think he was huge part of this. I love his production style anyway, but beyond that, he really guided me with it and was just a friend. He said, âYou can do this. Letâs start and see what we got.â
The guitar playing on this album is exquisite. How did you come to pick up the guitar and develop that talent?
I just thought it would be a great tool to write with. I thought, when I was a teenager, âHow do these people come up with these songs? And how do you make a song happen and not depend on somebody else?â (laughs) I got a Hohner guitar for $55, which was really the entirety of my savings account when I was about 14 years old. The strings were probably a half-inch off the neck, you know? It really hurt your fingers to play, and I started taking guitar lessons with that.
And I hated the guitar, honestly, until I was probably in my 20s. It was just really a tool. Then I started understanding that itâs also a percussive instrument, and when I saw the âBluegrassâ word next to who I was going to be talking to today, I said, âOhhhh!â (laughs) Thatâs some serious playing going on there! Iâm just more of a âfeelâ person. I experiment more than I used to on guitar. I really started to love it and itâs more of a comfort to me, like singing. So, Iâve made friends with it. I even have to say I love it. Weâre like an old couple now.
I would be remiss if I didnât mention the cute dogs on your album cover.
Awwww, those are my boys. Sal is the brown guy and Zeke is the blond guy. Zeke was actually in the original photo at my feet. You can see in his eyes that he was protecting me from Michael Rosen, the photographer. (laughs)
You have a way of bringing your family stories into your music. How has your relationship with them affected your musical direction?
They shape who you are, whether you are close to them or not. I think everybodyâs been shaped by where they come from. Theyâre in your DNA and their stories are in your DNA. Iâve just been sort of piecing the puzzle together with them, and itâs been good for me to do that.
âHad a Good Reasonâ is about a mother-daughter relationship but I donât know that itâs necessarily about the relationship that you have.
No, itâs more based on a combination of stories that I had heard about Billie Holiday and Edith Piaf. Two of those beautiful singers from the last century with these tears in their voices, and they were rock stars, really almost at the same time in their day. The sadness in those voices — both of them at a certain point had that sort of [tumultuous] relationship with their mother. I believe they both ended up living in whorehouses and being taken care of by prostitutes, and they both were not able to be with their mothers as young girls. I think for a woman, thereâs some deep, deep, deep, deep sadness that would happen from that. That was just me making a guess and the song came out around that.
To me, âLuminous Placesâ sounds like a love letter to your fans. What is it about heading out on the road, and having that audience, that compels you to keep coming back, year after year?
Thatâs what is so mysterious to me. I feel like itâs mutual generosity between humans, you know? I work really hard to bring them something, but they also bring themselves and give a lot. That seems to be how the relationship works. And the older I get, the more I am grateful for that, and in awe of that. Itâs really wonderful.
Is touring going well for you now? Do you feel like youâre back in the game?
Iâm having a blast! Iâm getting stronger every day out here and Iâm working with the greatest people on earth. Iâm having a really good time and Iâm really lucky.
Photo credit: Michael Wilson