Bassist and singer/songwriter Missy Raines has spent the majority of her life on the road — she began professionally touring with bluegrass bands as a teenager. Early on, she supplied the low end to acts like Eddie and Martha Adcock and Claire Lynch Band, but the greater part of her past musical decade has been spent fronting her own band, the New Hip, and exploring genre-bending terrain on the fringes of bluegrass. Royal Traveller, her brand new album, sheds the New Hip moniker, but keeps the exploration, inspired by the handle of a suitcase and her ever-nomadic life.
But this isnât an album that youâd simply file away as a musical fulfillment of the âitâs about the journey, not the destinationâ cliche. Itâs an open and honest telling of the realities of a life in transit, a life in flux, in constant motion. The countless miles Raines has traveled are a gorgeous, weathered patina on her songwriting as well as the careful, intentional arrangements — and rearrangements — of these songs. That patina — which we temporarily coined âhaggardness,â clearly  the word of the day during our conversation earlier this month — is balanced by a hopeful message, youthful joy, and the feeling that, despite that weariness, the album ultimately still looks ahead to whatâs next.
Thereâs a beautiful kind of — and I donât want this to sound insulting at all — haggardness or road-weariness, this totally relatable human feeling of, âwow weâre still doing this,â in the record. Itâs kind of beautiful because it doesnât feel depressing or downtrodden, it doesnât drag you down, it feels like a musical sigh of relief. How intentional were you in fostering that feeling — or were you? Do you feel that in the record?
I donât think it was an intentional âsigh of relief,â but I definitely chose these songs intentionally to say the same thing, hopefully in different ways, which is, âIâm still here. Iâve endured.â And, not just âIâve Enduredâ — I chose that song specifically because Iâve always loved the words, Iâve always loved it, and wanted to do some kind of different version of it, but also, I wanted to be able to say, âHereâs a little bit about whatâs happened to me through these years.â Itâs that feeling like, âIt is what it is.â Iâm not going to sugarcoat it, it is what it is.
The guests on the album demonstrate, once again, how far your musical travels have taken you. Whether itâs 10 String Symphony or Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls, or your husband, Ben, singing harmony with you. You also collaborate so much across generations. Itâs such an important part of bluegrass as a community, but itâs just as important to these sorts of conversations, right? What shaped the process of bringing all these collaborators together on the album?
A lot of it came from different configurations of the band and people Iâve worked with before. A lot of those guys are a generation below me at least. I just wanted them to be part of it. I do enjoy collaborating with people from different generations, I really do. I donât know that we thought about it like, âLetâs get you paired up with somebody whoâs not in your age bracket.â I donât think we did that in that regard, specifically. I know that I do think about wanting to play music with different people just based on how much I like whatever it is they do.
10 String Symphony was just the obvious choice to do this sort of bowed effect we did on âIâve Endured.â I get so much out of playing with younger people. Itâs a kick in the butt. It makes me want to keep playing. I feed off of that, I feed off of the people Iâm around, the band that I tour with, when they have this freshness and this eagerness and joy. I still have joy, but I know that I canât help but be jaded in certain ways and maybe cynical about certain things that they arenât. Itâs interesting to hear from their perspective and it helps me to maintain what Iâm doing every day, because Iâm getting this input.
Touring with those younger, joyful people is the perfect balance to that haggardness we were talking about, so the music doesnât strike listeners as beleaguering or at the end of a long, tiring road. Even at the end of all these journeys, the music still sounds like itâs not retiring, itâs asking, âWhatâs next?â
Thatâs how I feel. Iâm at the point in my life where I have definitely done a lot of miles and done a lot of things, but Iâm in no way finished. It feels exciting to think about what the next thing is. Iâm thinking about that and excited by that and ready for it. Yes, being around younger people feeds that, to me. I want to learn from them, I want to know who theyâre listening to, I want to be turned onto things that I normally might miss, because I just canât keep up.
Weâre all in our little bubbles. I want to hear what their bubbles are. And on the flipside, I like hearing how young people are viewing how theyâre struggling. I donât mean to say just because theyâre young doesnât mean they donât have struggles, I like hearing how they deal with their struggles. It helps me keep my shit in perspective. Weâre still all fighting and weâre all moving in the same direction and thatâs really empowering.
I hear your activism in the album as well; itâs simply you, your ethos, and your worldview coming through the music. Youâre not only collaborating with all these women, but your deep pride in Appalachia shines through as well. You donât fall into the trope of a downtrodden, helpless, bleak Appalachia and South. I wonder if this has been a conscious decision, to opt for this sort of hyper-personal approach to your activism, or is it subconscious, just you being you?
Iâm just inspired by the fact that there are so many amazing women, both in my generation and coming up behind us, and the ones who came before, too. Iâm inspired by the young women, by the women who are my age and kicking ass, and the women who are older than me who keep kicking ass. Iâm also so encouraged and feel positive and excited and happy — I canât find the right word⊠content. Not content with the way things are, exactly, but content with the fact that it is changing. Iâm content that we are on a path. Things are changing. And that my nieces and grandnieces that I have are not going to be in the same world that I grew up in.
And I think itâs just me being me. I donât think Iâve ever had anything together enough to make a plan that couldâve been contrived that well. [Laughs]
But see, I think that thatâs why your music, and that more subtle activism, is so effective, because itâs not overwrought.
I appreciate that, I had tried to make those kinds of important decisions come from my gut. It sounds cliche, but itâs really true. The times that I havenât done that, when Iâve done things that Iâve felt were what I should do or what would go over better, Iâve always regretted those decisions. When Iâve leaned back and allowed my gut to take me, itâs always been a better feeling and itâs always worked out better in the long run.
Itâs interesting that you bring up the heritage and the Appalachian thing, because a few people have said this to me anecdotally or from fans, theyâll come up to me and say, âI can tell youâre such a proud person from Appalachia from this record.â I can tell you that that is the absolute last thing that I was going for. I feel that I am that [proud] person, itâs not disingenuous, but that wasnât in my thoughts at all. All I was trying to do was to capture a bit of my story.
With âAllegheny Townâ I just went to the feelings I get when I go back home, because I get all these really weird feelings when I go back home. I was trying to capture all of that in all of this — in âRoyal Traveller,â in âSo Good.â I leaned on a lot of visual images [of home] while I was writing this stuff. Itâs fascinating to me that people are getting this from this! Iâm thrilled, because when youâre not actively trying to get something across, but it is part of what you feel and part of who you are, it feels good when itâs worked.
Youâve played our Shout & Shine showcase at IBMA twice now. Itâs not the first or only movement thereâs ever been for inclusion in bluegrass, which is important for the record to reflect, but there is this new movement for diversity and inclusion in bluegrass and I wonder what you think, watching this unfold and being a part of it, after being in this community for your entire life and your entire career?
It fills my heart with joy. Itâs like the fulfillment of something. Something that had been so missing is now being filled. Itâs not completely full, you know–
But the spigot is on.
The spigot is on and Iâm just thankful that Iâm still alive and that it happened within my lifetime. Iâll hopefully be around for a lot longer, but to know that itâs happening feels like — you know, Iâve often talked about bluegrass is my family. Itâs more than just music, itâs literally the family and community that I have chosen to be in. I donât know where I leave off and where bluegrass begins, I really donât. Despite all of my explorations into other kinds of music and my fascination with other kinds of music, I say I am bluegrass. I am of bluegrass.
Itâs not where I end, but it does define the core of me. Without the community itâs nothing. Itâs like being at a family reunion that lasts all year long. Youâre at the family reunion and youâre sitting there, and youâve just eaten a bunch of things, and youâre sitting with all your favorite people, but then you look over here and you see that two facets of the family that havenât been speaking are now talking to each other. And youâre just filled with joy cause the familyâs coming together more, becoming stronger.
All of a sudden itâs like a Fellini movie, people are hanging off of chandeliers and riding Ferris wheels that werenât there a second ago, and weâre all just playing together. Because another link just got connected. Thatâs how I feel. Weâre all in this family reunion where in the past, people wouldnât have been connecting, and now thatâs all starting to change. It makes me very, very happy. Itâs an inexplicable feeling because itâs so important to me. Iâm just happy to be a part of it.
Photo credit: Stacie Huckeba
