Tag: ani difranco

The BGS Radio Hour – Episode 201

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

Welcome to the BGS Radio Hour! Since 2017, the Radio Hour has been a weekly recap of all the great music, new and old, featured on BGS. This week, we’ve got music from Ani DiFranco, Andrew Marlin, and a Whiskey Sour Happy Hour appearance from Chris Eldridge! Remember to check back every Monday for a new episode of the BGS Radio Hour.

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Ani DiFranco – “Simultaneously”

Longtime voice of social change and activism through her music, Ani DiFranco brings us a new album, Revolutionary Love, at a time where we so much need it — a time marked by social and political unrest, racial equity, and the COVID-19 pandemic. While DiFranco usually has a busy tour schedule, the past year has been an opportunity to spend time at home with family, write a children’s book, start a free radio station, and write a musical about restorative justice. All of that in ONE year.

Melissa Carper – “Makin’ Memories”

Coming March 19, this Texas-based artist brings us Daddy’s Country Gold. BGS caught up with Carper on a recent 5+5 to talk about influences, memories, nature, songwriting, and the first moment she knew she was going to be a musician.

Elise Davis – “Empty Rooms”

Although the pandemic has been hard on everyone, musicians have a unique experience – most were accustomed to singing in bars and halls every night, for different crowds, in different cities. Even the empty rooms are missed, suggests Elise Davis in this new single from her upcoming project, Anxious. Happy. Chill. 

Mando Saenz – “Shadow Boxing”

From Corpus Christi, TX, singer and songwriter Mando Saenz – AKA ‘Mando Calrissian’ – graces the show this week with with a song from his newest album, All My Shame. His mission statement? To create music true to his heart and inspirations. It doesn’t get much truer than that.

Andrew Marlin – “Oxcart Man”

In 2018, Andrew Marlin (of Mandolin Orange) released his first solo album – a collection of mandolin-based old-time instrumentals entitled Buried in a Cape. Now after nearly 3 years, Marlin returns to the medium with twin albums of a similar aesthetic – Fable & Fire, & Witching Hour. 

Six-String Soldiers & The SteelDrivers – “Long Way Down”

The United States Army Field Band teams up with bluegrass favorite The SteelDrivers for a new collaborative video of “Long Way Down.” From Alabama to their home in D.C., the Six-String Soldiers have been able to collaborate with the SteelDrivers a few times now.

Vivian Leva & Riley Calcagno – “Will You”

A couple of grown-up old-time festival kids, Vivian Leva and Riley Calcagno bring us a mixtape of their “old-time deep cuts” this week. From Roscoe Holcomb to Foghorn Stringband to Hazel & Alice, the duet offers their playlist in celebration of a newly released self-titled album.

Valerie June – “Why the Bright Stars Glow”

Tennessee-born and Brooklyn-based Valerie June is our March Artist of the Month here at BGS! Stay tuned all month long for exclusive interviews and content regarding her new album, The Moon and the Stars: Prescriptions for Dreamers.

Melody Duncan – “Over the Hill”

Aging is something that none of us escape. Melody Duncan relishes in the life lessons that we’re given from unavoidable challenges and growth opportunities, in exchange for more time here on Earth. Like a journal entry, “It’s a dedication for all of those willing to invest in a good today,” says Duncan, “even if our bones ache in the morning.”

Nathan Vincent – “Blue Ridge State”

It’s hard to end something, even when we know we have to. For Texas-based Nathan Vincent, the title is a physical place and an emotional one – and like the mountains, the relationship in the song rises and falls. Vincent and his crew journeyed to Asheville, NC to shoot the video, a “visual motif” that accompanies the sentiment and progression of the song.

Emily Moment – “Master of One”

From her upcoming The Party’s Over, London-based Emily moment brings us a song this week about our hurtful behaviors. We’re drawn to the things that hurt us so much, suggests Moment – like the Fugu fish in Japan, whose tastiest part is closest to its poison.

Chris Eldridge – “Angeles”

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a year since COVID changed all of our lives. We’re looking back at some of our virtual series from last year, highlighting the many performances which deserve to be seen more than once. This week, we’ve got Chris Eldridge (of the Punch Brothers) with a cover of Elliot Smith’s “Angeles” – a tribute to the city where BGS was born.

Ariel Posen – “Now I See”

Sometimes the smallest realizations can lead to the biggest breakthroughs, suggests Ariel Posen. From his new album Headway, this song is about self acceptance, and finding belonging among our imperfections.

Adam Douglas – “Joyous We’ll Be”

By taking a stand against the political and social challenges that we face, Adam Douglas offers this song for a brighter future. From watching his home country since 2016, seeing everything that was hidden rise to the top, Douglas was troubled by the viewpoints of so many. “It’s not an anti-45 song though,” he says. “It is an ‘anti-idiot’ song.”

Photos: (L to R) Andrew Marlin by Lindsey Rome; Chris Eldridge; Valerie June by Renata Raksha

With Hope Shining Through, Ani DiFranco Returns With ‘Revolutionary Love’

Posted on by Editor

Ani DiFranco has long been a voice for social change, using her platform as a widely acclaimed songwriter, activist and record label owner — among the many other hats she wears — to bring attention to societal ills. Her incisive, insightful songwriting has made her into something of a progressive icon, as well as an artist mentioned in the same breath as fellow legends like Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie.

It’s a gift, then, that DiFranco would release a new album — the excellent Revolutionary Love — at a time marked by political unrest, protests for racial equity, and nearly a year into the global COVID-19 pandemic. DiFranco wrote Revolutionary Love before the coronavirus was a household term, but one can easily connect the troubles of our current moment to many of the album’s thoughtful, prescient tracks.

While the COVID-19 pandemic halted DiFranco’s touring, it did open up space for her to spend time with her family and to work on new ideas, like writing a children’s book, starting a free radio station and writing a musical about restorative justice. BGS caught up with DiFranco on the morning of Revolutionary Love‘s release to talk about these recent projects and beyond.

BGS: The album is out today. How are you feeling?

DiFranco: I’ve heard from a few friends. I actually woke up this morning not realizing it’s release day. I’m just trying to function as a human and a mom in a pandemic, and a person without a job, and this and that. Then my phone started dinging at me and it was just near and dear saying, ‘Yay! Woohoo!’ So, I’m all of a sudden feeling good. It’s finally out there and that does feel good.

To your point about trying to function during the pandemic, how have you been holding up? We’re nearly a year into this thing, which is wild. How has it been for you, particularly with how it’s affected the music industry?

It’s been very challenging. Like many people, my job disappeared, and my income took a big hit. So I’ve been figuring that out. But, for me personally, it’s a great blessing, because my job was to travel and travel and travel and keep traveling. Touring and playing live music is my bread and butter; it’s how I support my family, and a lot of other people. I work with a lot of people whose livelihoods depend on me going and going.

So I’ve been in this position for years now where I’ve been petitioning my team for a year off. I’ve felt like I need to step back from this endless touring, which I’ve rarely done in my life. Since I’ve started I’ve always not stopped… Then, boom. You get permission to stay home with your kids. That’s been an incredible blessing.

What did the early moments of inspiration and early songwriting sessions for Revolutionary Love look like for you?

A lot of these songs on this record were written just about a year ago, on my last tour. Of my life [laughs]. We were going up the West Coast last February… Most of my writing since the advent of my children 13 years ago comes on tour, because when I come home to my kids they just eat my head. They consume my head. And there’s nothing left for myself, for my guitar, for my muse. As any parent can probably relate, when I go on tour now it’s vacation…

So I was out on tour doing what I do, the last bunch of years, which is songwriting boot camp. So I was writing a lot of songs on this record… Two of the songs on the record preceded my writing my memoir [No Walls and the Recurring Dream]. I wrote “Chloroform” and “Metropolis” and then I sat down and tried to write a book. That consumed me. I was not able to write songs and write a book and wear all the other hats. So there was about a two-year break in writing songs, which is completely unique for me.

That sounds like quite a fruitful time, and like you were juggling a lot at once. Although that seems like something you’re used to doing at this point.

I do think the record is cohesive, because after this start-stop, wait a couple years… the actual recording of the record was of a moment. When it finally came down to documenting these songs and making this record, I spent two days tracking the songs with a drummer. Then we overdubbed another three days with the other musicians. There was a lot of immediacy. I think all of the disjointedness of it was erased by this very performative act of recording.

As I’ve spent time with the album, it’s hard for me not to hear resonance with much of what’s gone on in the last few months, which would obviously have occurred after you wrote the songs. Given that you’ve been revisiting the songs as you prepare for your release show, have you experienced that feeling yourself?

Pretty much every time, with every record, which has become increasingly fascinating to me over the course of my songwriting life. To my mind, it reveals so many deep and mysterious things. When the quantum physicists say, “Time is not linear,” I really do experience that, as an artist. When you are sort of tapping into whatever it is, if you are blessed in some way with an ability, when you get into the zone, whatever your zone is and you supersede your limited consciousness — something is fueling you, coming through you, that is bigger than you — then it is not of time. The future and past are just artifacts of our limited perception.

I’ve found so often over the course of 30 years that I write a song and it’s like, “What is that about?” Then six months or a year later, “Oh, that’s what that’s about.” I felt it coming. I don’t think I’m special in that way, or unique. I think we have a deep level of consciousness that we’re rarely able to access.

In reading to get ready to talk with you, there was a quotation from you that stuck with me; I believe it was in reference to the title, Revolutionary Love. You said, “It’s about carrying the energy of love and compassion into the center of our social movements and making it the driving force.” There are certainly forces like that at work right now — perhaps not as many as we’d like — but how do you see compassion at work in the world right now? And as you look to the end of the pandemic, whenever that is, how do you hope it will have grown?

I hope we collectively rebound from this culture of division and hate and “us” and “them” — these incredible wedges that have been driven into families, let alone communities, let alone our nation. I hope that collectively, and I suspect I’m not the only one, [that] we can use this as fuel to slay that beast, to finally dedicate ourselves to the work of unity, to the work of seeing ourselves in community, not as warring factions or “rugged individuals” or whatever [drives] these American myths and lies and the calculated propaganda that keeps us fighting each other against our own self-interests.

Will this be the breaking point? Will we really recognize each other as family, with different uniforms, or skin, or cultural aspects? Can we see through this, finally, and become this thing that America has been aching to become? I really hope so. There are so many people out there doing this work of community, of compassion. It’s all or none. You cannot succeed, you cannot transcend, you cannot be successful if you’re pushing other people down to do so. … When you step into that place of [politicians saying], “Let’s come together”… those who have been struggling for so long for basic civil rights, women included, it’s hard to take those words at face value. “Come together? Okay, when your boot’s off my neck.”

You have a collaborative and creative friendship with Valarie Kaur, and she provided some inspiration as you were crafting the album. What is it about her that makes her a kindred creative spirit for you?

After Trump’s installation by the Electoral College in 2016, I was reeling. We were all reeling. Somebody sent me a speech that Valarie gave on New Year’s Eve. So this is post-election, pre-inauguration of the Cheeto. Somebody sent me this speech she gave and here she is, in an African-American church in D.C. and there are all of these faith leaders, these powerful ministers — you can just feel this community of power and faith. And Valarie steps in and she speaks from her perspective. She is a Sikh American and she speaks from her faith, and she speaks to the moment so powerfully.

My friend sent me this knowing I’d appreciate it, and I said to myself, “I need to get in touch with this woman.” And I did. I found Valarie and lo and behold, she says, “I’m a huge fan. I’ve loved you since college.” So we were fans of each other. We just became allies. She has come and stayed with me. She was part of my BabeFest last year in New Orleans. I gave her feedback on her book when she was writing it, and vice versa. We are deeply kindred in our work and our coming together as friends felt like the universe brought us to each other so we could support each other.

One track I’d love to dig into is “Do or Die.” The arrangement has such a great groove and gets caught in your head. And it has a message that is inspiring but also incisive, which seems like it would be a difficult balance to strike when writing a song. How did you write that one?

What you’re reflecting back is what I’m talking about in terms of my goal as a writer these days: can I be no less incisive but have the light of hope, the light of possibility, shine through? I look back at some older songs of, say, the Bush era, and there are a lot of laments. It was the heaviness of the violence and the oppression and the wrongness. I thought that was as bad as it gets but lo and behold, he’s a good guy now! It’s really incredible how Trump has unified most of the rest of us. But that refrain of “Do or die / we can do this if we try,” I think that sentiment pervades the whole record. It’s like, “Oh, God, it’s hard. Oh, God, it’s dark out there. Do you ever want to just give up? Me too.” But I’m going to wake up tomorrow and do it anyway. This is the good work of the world. Joining all of the many people who do it is really the only thing I’ve got.

You mentioned earlier in our conversation that the recording experience you had was positive, possibly even cathartic. Tell me more about those few days you spent recording, and with such a great group of musicians.

I would say that the process of the record began when I showed up at the Eaux Claires Hiver festival in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. They do these epic gatherings. Somebody must just invest a lot of money and let it go. I was invited to a week-long gathering with many, many artists, tons of musicians, dancers, writers, photographers, designers, and it was all room and board paid, free beer at night, just have fun. … I showed up with ‘Valarie wants songs’ in my back pocket. Valarie said, ‘Ani, write me songs.’… It was very inspirational, being surrounded by this ad hoc community of artists. I met this wonderful producer, Brad Cook. … Then when I had a new album’s worth of songs and suddenly we’re in lockdown, it was all seeming suddenly not plausible.

I was thinking, “I want to make a record now. Damn it, what are we going to do?” I talked to Brad and he was like, “Listen, if you will get on a plane and fly to North Carolina, I’ll put a band together. We’ll track the songs.” So I just trusted this dude that I barely knew and I said, “This is all I got. I’m coming.” I came a week later. All his homies in Durham were on lockdown, so they were all home. And they’re all incredibly talented people, there in them hills.

You have several new projects in the works, like your radio station and your children’s book. As you look ahead to the coming months, what are you looking forward to and what can we expect to see from you?

Beyond the book and the radio programming, which is always expanding, I’m also working on a musical centered on restorative justice. It’s an alternative to our current justice system. It’s a different idea about what is to be done when violence occurs. I believe in it very deeply. I have been aware of the profound potential of restorative justice to actually end cycles of violence. I think mass incarceration, “tough on crime,” capital punishment — these are all continuations of cycles of violence. This isn’t healing. …

This musical I’m working on is centered on the story of my friend Lester Polk, who is in prison for life for a violent crime committed many years ago. Ten years after the crime he was brave enough to get together with one of the survivors of his crime — of course, this woman, the survivor, was an incredibly brave and powerful woman. … I feel that in Lester’s story is also a template for our whole society. There has been great violence committed. There are deep wounds that must be attended to. How do we do that?

Photo Credit: Daymon Gardner

The String – Jenny Scheinman plus Kandace Springs

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

Women with roots in jazz is the heart of this hour. Jenny Scheinman is one of the leading jazz violinists working today, yet her musical life began grounded in folk music and she’s been a prolific contributor to records and tours by the likes of Rodney Crowell, Robbie Fulks, Ani DiFranco and others. Her many collaborations with guitarist Bill Frisell have produced sublime fusions of folk, country and jazz. And Jenny has released two acclaimed songwriter albums as well. Now she’s leading a band with drummer Allison Miller. You’ll hear samples from that catalog as we speak about a unique life in music.


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Also in the hour, Nashville’s Kandace Springs talks about getting mentored by Prince, landing a record deal on Blue Note and making a new album with heroes like Nora Jones and Christian McBride. We’ve posted a feature about her here.

BGS 5+5: Hardened and Tempered

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Hardened and Tempered
Hometown: Austin, Texas
Latest album: Hold the Line
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Less of a nickname than a consequence of a band name for a duo that uses the conjunction “and” is that we are often asked, “which one are you?”

Answers provided by Kristin Davidson

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

I was 12 when I discovered a mixtape of the Indigo Girls in my older sister’s room. Their songs captured my ears, mind, and heart, and remained constant company for me growing up. I think it was the first time I felt transformed and transported by music. But the pantheon of my musical influences is full of powerful writers, and I can pair just about every childhood memory with songs by Indigo Girls, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Nanci Griffith, Tracy Chapman, Lucinda Williams, Patty Griffin, Emmylou Harris, Dolly Parton, Patti Smith, and Ani DiFranco.

What other art forms — literature, film, dance, painting, etc. — inform your music?

I love street photography and am drawn to the captured moments that expose the illusion of anonymity — that split second of absurdity or loneliness on a crowded street. I enjoy the process of finding words and sounds for the images that evoke emotion.

What rituals do you have, either in the studio or before a show?

We love to laugh and try to bring a joyful lightness to the stage. We are big fans of Maria Bamford. In the second season of her show, Lady Dynamite, Ana Gasteyer’s character keeps shouting a particular line as a rallying cry that we think is hilarious. We usually say that line to each other, giggle, and then walk onto the stage.

If you had to write a mission statement for your career, what would it be?

Hard enough to hold an edge; soft enough not to break. The band name, Hardened and Tempered, sums up the dynamic and delicate balance we try to keep in our lives and our music. Both Carolyn and I have intense personalities, we are drawn to big adventures and hard challenges, and we work with a lot of suffering. Slowly but surely, we are learning the artful balance of easing up a little and looking for light in dark places.

Since food and music go so well together, what is your dream pairing of a meal and a musician?

I have dreamed about finding refuge from a cold, big city night in a basement bar room, only to discover Nina Simone playing an impromptu set on an intimate stage. I order my favorite bourbon, but don’t drink it. How could I?!

Photo credit: Norah Levine Photography

MIXTAPE: John Craigie’s “Can We Learn From History?” Playlist

Posted on by Editor

When I was a kid I was obsessed with music. From as far back as I have memories I loved every aspect of it. However, it wasn’t until I started watching older movies and TV shows and becoming educated that I became aware of music as a historical record. Shows like The Wonder Years and Forrest Gump (and others) made me realize that music was telling me a story of what had happened in the past and how we could learn from it. As much as I wanted to be a musician to heal people individually from their darkness, I also wanted to become a musician to inspire large-scale change like my heroes Nina Simone, Pete Seeger, Ani DiFranco and other countless heroes that used their voice to echo what many musicians have been saying since the dawn of human connection I assume.

Here are some of my favorite songs in that vein. — John Craigie

Nina Simone – “The Backlash Blues”

I seriously could have picked any one of her amazing performances, but this one always stood out to me. So direct and in your face. So powerful and moving. It put so much in perspective for my young ears and mind.

John Lennon and Yoko Ono – “Power to the People”

I was always a serious Beatles fan as a kid, but it took me a while to discover John’s solo work outside of “Imagine” and “Instant Karma!” As soon as I got interested in protest music I kept finding such great songs from him and this one has always been a favorite.

Curtis Mayfield – “Move on Up”

When I was in my first band in college I got interested in Curtis Mayfield after hearing the whole album Superfly and falling in love with the bass lines. Taken from his debut album as a solo artist after the Impressions, I’ve included the single version for easy digestion. However, if you can’t get enough I suggest checking out the nine-minute album version.

Buffalo Springfield – “For What It’s Worth”

Most people know this song as the beautiful anthem that it is, and surely still stands the test of time. However, a lot of people forget that this is Stephen Stills and Neil Young before they were in CSNY. I always loved the peaceful and soothing nature of the guitars and harmonics while the lyrics spoke of what was happening all around and begging us to not ignore it.

Richie Havens – “Freedom (Live)”

Legend has it that this song was created on the spot at the Woodstock festival in August of 1969. Richie was slated to go first, and since the promoters weren’t ready with the second band (not to mention many other things) they kept making him go back out after he had finished his set. After several encores he didn’t know what to play so he freestyled this beautiful song. You can feel everything that is going on in the state of the world through his passionate delivery of these simple lyrics.

Bob Dylan – “The Times They Are A-Changin’”

I admit it does feel a bit cliché to add this to the mix but I’ve always felt it was a huge inspiration to me and catalyst for my songwriting. Embarrassingly enough, I first heard this on The Wonder Years when I was about 11 years old. I had no idea what it was but I felt like it had been written that day for exactly what I was going through and seeing in my community of Los Angeles at that time. When I got a guitar a few years later, it was one of the first songs I wanted to learn.

Marvin Gaye – “What’s Going On”

Like most people, I associated Marvin Gaye early on as smooth, sexy date music. Something to put on in the dorm room when your girlfriend was coming by. But I remember getting a little pamphlet from my local record store of “essential landmark albums.” Having never heard of What’s Going On but trusting Marvin I got that album and it has been a favorite ever since. This is the first track on side 1 and it says everything about injustice so beautifully.

Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young – “Ohio”

I’ve read that Neil heard about the Kent State shootings and was so emotionally affected that he wrote this song immediately and soon after they went in the studio to record it. The shootings happened on May 4, 1970 and the single was out just a couple weeks later on May 21. It’s hard to listen to right now with the state of the world as it is, and was probably hard to listen to then. Yet a moment in time we should never forget and never stop learning from.

Aretha Franklin – “Think”

I truly wish Aretha was still with and screaming “freedom” like she does on this track. This track, along with “Respect,” were some of the first songs I heard from her as a young man and felt so inspired by her voice and passion. As tumultuous as 1968 must have been, 2020 feels right in line and this song speaks volumes to the lessons we can learn from our past.

Bruce Springsteen – “Born in the U.S.A.” (Demo Version)

To be honest, for the longest time I didn’t like this song. I grew up with the popular album version of this song blaring out of every dad’s speakers and even though I liked Bruce I just felt this song was so cheesy. It also seemed blindly patriotic and I never bothered to listen to the lyrics. It wasn’t until much later that I was digging through some demos that they had released that I heard this version. Once you sit and hear the lyrics against this minor chord backdrop it stands out as a great protest song.

Sam Cooke – “A Change is Gonna Come”

Closing out the playlist with a bit of optimism coming from the eternal Sam Cooke. Written as a response to the many instances of racism he was privy to, specifically when he and his band were turned away from a whites-only motel in Louisiana. This song will always work as a soundtrack to a revolution whose work seems like it’s never done. But hopefully we can learn from history and see how far we’ve come and have hope that we can keep going farther.

Photo credit: Bradley Cox

The Show On The Road – Dar Williams

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week, Z. Lupetin’s conversation with revered singing songstress and deeply wise wordsmith, Dar Williams.

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Coming out of the Hudson Valley outside New York City, Williams has released over thirteen albums across a quarter century as one of America’s touchstone folk poets, first bursting out of the famed Lilith Fair folk rock scene in the mid 1990s with contemporaries like Ani Difranco and the Indigo Girls and gaining a devoted following. She has toured with luminaries like Joan Baez and Patty Griffin, written a book about what makes communities resilient, she runs her own songwriting retreats, and has inspired generations of women to fearlessly embrace their creativity and exercise their limitless potential. Z. was able to catch up with Williams in the green room at the historic McCabe’s Guitar Shop before her second show of a sold out weekend in Los Angeles. A new album is on the way.

Six of the Best: Protest Songs

Posted on by Editor

It’s hard to pick my favorite protest songs. The Woody, the Dylan, the ’60s counterculture pop hits, the singularly chilling “Strange Fruit” — I love them all. The original “This Land Is Your Land” is an anarchist hymn, Dylan’s “Masters of War” is as scathing and righteous today as it was then, “Ohio” by CSNY was so poignant and cathartic in its time, and Billie Holiday laid bare the terrorism of whiteness, breaking the silence for a new generation to sing and speak their truth.

But I’ve opted to go toward the personal: the formative songs that revealed to me just how powerful songwriting could be in conveying a message. The ones that viscerally grabbed me, shook me and changed me; that still send a chill down my spine when they twist the knife. The songs that made me look up from the pages of my diary and want to write songs about the world and the way it could be.

In the past three years I have ramped up my commitment to learning to write this kind of song, and I have had plenty of inspiration. So much so that Front Country’s next record is almost entirely protest songs of one kind or another. Songs of meaning and truth and change. Here are six of the songs that made me the hopelessly idealistic and sanctimonious songwriter I am today. — Melody Walker, of the band Front Country.

“The Wagoner’s Lad” – Traditional

The old ballads are not known for being feminist anthems — far from it — but this one has to be my favorite. The first verse is one of the most honestly brutal accounts of what life was (and still is) like for women in most of the world living under Abrahamic religious rule: “Oh, hard is the fortune of all womankind / They’re always controlled, they’re always confined / Controlled by their parents until they are wives / Then slaves to their husbands the rest of their lives.” As well as the first known field recording sung by Buell Kazee, I recommend Joan Baez’s version because I love her interpretation of the lyrics, and my favorite modern version is by The Duhks. Interestingly, Doc Watson recorded it with a declawed first line “The heart is the fortune of all womankind,” as did several others after him, and I’d be ever so curious to know the story behind that change.

“Killing in the Name” – Rage Against the Machine

You know how parents in the latter half of the 20th century were convinced that music was radicalizing and warping the minds of their children? Well, I can safely say that Rage Against the Machine was my gateway drug into politics and protest, and I’ve never looked back. The raw angst and explosive energy drew me in, and the messages made me stay. Fox News themselves couldn’t write a more cliché tale of my descent into liberal madness: I went to my first RATM show at age 13 in Oakland, California, got a million pamphlets outside the show, read them all, and was immediately indoctrinated into progressive politics. Rare in the realm of protest music, this song, the performance, and the production still sound as fresh today as they did all the way back in 1991. This song was released in the wake of the Rodney King protests and it’s famous refrain sadly still rings true in America: “Some of those that work forces, are the same that burn crosses.”

“One Tin Soldier” – written by Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter

Cheesy as all get out, preachy as hell, but one of the most hard-hitting story songs with a pacifist moral out there. The one time I got to go to sleep-away summer camp at 10 years old, our cabin counselor would sing us to sleep with her favorite folk songs, and when she sang this one I was pretty sure it was the best songwriting I had ever heard in my life. What can I say? It never fails to turn me into a blubbering mess by the end. Truly great songs can stand up to any style or instrumentation, so take your pick of the original ’70s AM gold, punk rock, and pop reggae versions — or this legendary clip of the Bluegrass Alliance from the documentary Bluegrass Country Soul featuring baby Sam Bush and Tony Rice!

“Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” – Buffy Sainte-Marie

I first heard this song on a live Indigo Girls album and it turned me on to Canadian-American First Nations singer-songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie. Though she has had a long and successful career as a writer and performer since the early ’60s, including co-writing the inspirational “Up Where We Belong,” this song is from her ’90s comeback album and it pulls absolutely no punches in its accounting of ongoing terrorism against indigenous people in North America. One listen to this song is an invitation to learn more about the activists of the American Indian Movement and how corporations still collude with governments every day to displace and destroy native cultures around the world.

“My IQ” – Ani DiFranco

No one artist embodies the 3rd Wave Feminism of the 90s more than prolific and perpetually independent songwriter Ani DiFranco. Every song is a stream-of-consciousness integration of the personal and the political, redefining and queering the protest song in a polarizing performance style you either love or hate. She paved the way as a completely DIY artist with her own independent record label from the beginning, sending a message not just through her music, but also her entire business model. Each song is a subversive blend of breakup song, political manifesto, slam poetry piece and almost jazz-like playful vocal exploration, unwilling to be pinned-down as a singular statement. I finally settled on one that ends with my favorite of her famous zingers: “Every tool is a weapon… if you hold it right.” I love this well-worn, reimagined live version from 2002.

“If I Had A Hammer” – Pete Seeger & Lee Hays

Speaking of tools, it’s easy to see why this menacingly titled early hit of the “folk scare” put the fear of revolution in the hearts of the powerful. While it was debuted in 1949 by writers Pete Seeger and Lee Hays at a meeting of the Communist party, it became as mainstream as apple pie by the time Peter, Paul & Mary had a hit with it in 1962. Perhaps considered a children’s song today, it has a subversively empowering message in its simplicity. The night Trump got elected, Front Country had just flown to Seattle to start a tour, and there was a palpable sense of grief in the air at those West Coast shows. We closed every show of that run acoustic, on the floor, with a singalong of this song. It seemed to provide a much needed collective catharsis for ourselves and our fans. When one feels helpless, this song reminds the singer that we each have our own unique tools to bring to the work of dismantling systems of oppression and creating the world we want to see. There are a mind-bending number of recording of this song, so here are a few lovely ones.

Photo of Ani DiFranco: GMDThree

Rising Appalachia Tie Worlds Together with ‘Leylines’

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Just weeks ago Leah Smith of Rising Appalachia, the harmonizing duo with her sister Chloe, stood on a high peak and sang the old traditional tune “Across the Blue Ridge Mountains.” She was at the end of a stay in a remote village, and some local women surrounded her for a send-off.

“They circled us up and did traditional music with drums and flute,” she says.

Smith’s song was in appreciative answer, a thank-you for their hospitality. It was a perfect encapsulation of Rising Appalachia, connecting through music with people and the land that nourishes them.

This mountaintop, though, was in the Andes, not the Appalachians, perched above Peru’s Sacred Valley. Leah, Chloe and the four musicians of their band had just finished a six-week concert tour in South America. The others had gone back to the U.S., but Leah stayed behind for a little extra experience. And what an experience it was.

“To close my eyes and receive this absolutely magnificent mountain range in front of me, and these women who are community weavers and medicine keepers around me, and singing this song from my mountains to them in their mountains was a deep offering,” she says, speaking from the Atlanta house in which she and Chloe grew up.

This chat comes on the eve of the release of Rising Appalachia’s seventh album, Leylines. The title is a word for perceived connections and alignments of natural features around the globe, often used in a mystical sense. And that’s exactly what the album, and Rising Appalachia itself, are about.

Here they illuminate lines connecting gospel, fiddle tunes (some learned from their mom, Jan), African and Irish roots and interpolations of contemporary urban folk and soul. Joining the sisters are their regular colleagues David Brown (stand-up bass) and Biko Cassini (percussion and the West African stringed n’goni), plus two new members, West African native Arouna Diarra (also n’goni) and Irish musician Duncan Wickel (fiddle, cello).

The South America jaunt has already sparked “Agua de la Madre,” a new song that Leah wrote in Spanish, inspired by water-rights concerns of the region. But the focus now is on Leylines, made in a seaside studio in Northern California with producer Joe Henry. Leylines marks the first time the sisters have put their art in the trust of an outside producer, but it resulted in mutual appreciation.

“Leah and Chloe are fearless artists, as well as fierce activists,” he says. “They arrived with a sharp and committed point-of-view, yet were wildly open to what might otherwise transpire. I felt the same when I worked with Baez and [Harry] Belafonte — as well as when I produced their hero, Ani DiFranco, many years ago.”

In this BGS interview, Leah Smith explores a multitude of musical influences from around the globe and close to home.

BGS: Before we talk about the new album, tell us about South America.

Leah Smith: It was the band’s first time touring there. We’ve always preferred that our music is a vehicle of cultural exchanges. That’s the primary goal of Rising Appalachia. We’re building bridges and learning other people’s traditions and showcasing ours, and using that as a language. I lived for six years in Latin America — not consecutively. I moved to Mexico when I was 18. We have a really amazing fan base in South America and went to some places none of us had been. We learned about the music traditions and farming traditions, a lot of sustainability practices. We did our due diligence of what we think of as troubadours — musical ambassadors and students of the world.

Leylines was made before this trip, but will certainly impact your music to come, as other travels have before.

The name of the band really indicates what we do. It’s called Rising Appalachia. Appalachia is the foundations roots and culture we were born into. Rising out of it, using that foundation to grow wide branches. I always say about our work that we will never run out of material to study, to learn, to be influenced by. It’s impossible to run out. Every conversation on every trip adds to the fabric of our songwriting and goes into the lens that we view music through.

You start the album with traditional gospel in “I Believe in Being Ready.” Was that a big part of your musical life?

We grew up with so much of the Southern music in our home. Everything from jazz to gospel to old-time Appalachian roots music — and everything in between. This album is such a journey and departs in so many directions from the real simplicity that started our project 15 years ago. But we felt it was important for us to get the first breath of the album in the foundation of where our music came from. It’s got that old, archaic sound, very simple sister harmonies and a bit of the apocalyptic sense of the world coming to the end, in the gospel sense.

That’s a thread that runs through the rest of the album?

That’s what we wanted to do. I feel like every album is a chapter in our story, in a book of our lives. This to me is really exciting. Whether you’re remotely interested in the roots of music or not, this album holds all the roots of Appalachian music. We’ve always been influenced by that — the African roots of it, the Irish roots, the urban presence of Southern music, all the ways a very diverse and broad community has influenced Southern music. But we’ve never really presented it like this.

There are a couple of fiddle-tune pieces on this one, drawing on some of your first music experiences.

“Cuckoo” is one of my favorite songs on the album. We learned it from our mother and I just love that. Her version of this old traditional Appalachian song. I feel like we’ve probably known versions of “Cuckoo” since we were little kids. She has a beautiful trio, the Rosin Sisters. They recorded this version a few years ago and we said, “We’re gonna learn that version.”

Your dad is a musician too?

He’s primarily a [visual] folk artist, but also plays blues guitar.

Do you all still play and sing as a family?

We do all the time! Every now and then we get them up on stage, but they are reluctant. I don’t know why. I would love for them to join us more often. I think they don’t want to be assuming that it’s okay.

On the song “Sadjuna” you explore African sounds.

That’s a song that Arouna Diarra brought to us, a traditional West African song. We do several different songs that are Arouna’s. This one had an incredible surreal dreamlike state to it. The song in its origin is very much about people that leave the world too young — when families lose young people in war or strife, or when parents see the passing of their children. So Chloe and I wanted to write two verses to accompany it that held the same space. I don’t like to be over-literal. But we wanted to bring that to people, a balm for people who had that passing in their lives.

For “Make Magic” you cite Erykah Badu and André 3000 of Outkast as influences. It still sounds like folk music, though with some different aspects. How does their impact figure into it?

That is our folk tradition, as young women growing up in the ‘90s in downtown Atlanta, Georgia. That’s where the genre [labels] don’t serve us. Hip-hop and soul are urban folk music, storytelling music.

More expected is the influence of Ani DiFranco, particularly on “Speak Out,” on which she guests.

Ani had such a potent influence on me as a young woman from the urban South. My folk traditions were a lot of underground hip-hop and blues and soul, and the folk music our parents were playing felt very distant to me. Ani was a bridge, this young, folk-rock, righteous babe, but she was playing Woody Guthrie songs and had a banjo in her hands. I was so inspired to see a radical young woman carrying these traditions that I did not have access to. And to top that off, using the stage, using her platform to be talking about really important issues — voting, women’s rights — with no apologies. Wasn’t polite, wasn’t tidy, was in your face and made you think.

What would you consider your mission?

What’s our signature mission? We don’t have one, really. We believe our roles are as public servants. It’s a public service job. We are collecting the joys and sorrows and struggles of ours and of our community. We want to know what the community is talking about and that has to be part of our show. Different every night. Water rights and human rights. Our role is to provide the stage for the people who show up night after night. We have to listen. That is an important thing.

Photo credit: Chad Hess

Hangin’ & Sangin’: Ani DiFranco

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From the Bluegrass Situation and WMOT Roots Radio, it’s Hangin’ & Sangin’ with your host, BGS editor Kelly McCartney. Every week Hangin’ & Sangin’ offers up casual conversation and acoustic performances by some of your favorite roots artists. From bluegrass to folk, country, blues, and Americana, we stand at the intersection of modern roots music and old time traditions bringing you roots culture — redefined.

With me today in the Writers’ Rooms at the Hutton … Ani DiFranco.

Hello!

Hello! So glad you’re here.

Nice to be here.

…

Your latest record, Binary … I want to get granular on some of the themes because you have recurring themes going on here. And I love your brain because your music makes me think and feel so much about the world around me. So let’s get into that.

Alright!

Connection with each other, with nature, with life in every possible manifestation… do you feel like advances in technology have helped or hindered all of that?

Yes. [Laughs]

[Laughs] Okay.

Yeah. I feel all of that and more. Yeah, see, this brings us right to my ongoing meditation of late in my life which is that everything is binary. And, by that, I mean not either/or. I mean both. Always. All the time. Everything is made of relationship. That’s my new way of looking at stuff. Ones and zeros … it brings us closer together. It increases our information. And, yet, it separates us and isolates us and makes us less conscious through that separation and isolation. So, it’s all happening.

Do you think it just enhances what was already there? So, like, if you’re, prone to connection, it enhances that; but if you’re someone who is prone to isolation, it enhances that. Potentially?

Possibly. Yeah. I don’t know. I’ll pontificate with you all day. Let’s go!

Yeah!

Seriously, who knows? I mean, it seems like we are being pushed to recognize that it does bring out something that is very dark, something that is latent, in terms of that disconnection — that sort of road rage that happens between two metal boxes that doesn’t happen between two faces.

When you’re up in someone’s countenance …

Conversing with their heart! BAM! [Laughs] Yeah. I think it has a propensity to draw that out of us. So I think there’s a danger in it. There really is. Of course. Anything that powerful of a tool is going to be dangerous.

Yeah. I’m assuming you’re familiar with Brené Brown’s work to a certain extent …

Yeah. Yeah.

That’s one of her ideas, that you can’t hate close up, so get close up with people.

Yeah. Get to know your neighbor who’s too loud.

If that’s what it takes.

Totally. Mr. Rogers. He rocked that stuff back in the day.

…

Which points to the premise of “Pacifist’s Lament”… which is, who among us is ready and willing to step fully onto the high road? You have to have a bigger vision and a lot of humility to know that winning at all costs isn’t winning at all. So, how do we get there?

Yeah. Yeah. This competitive advancement of the species. Yeah, maybe, to some degree. But, really, cooperating is how we succeed.

I guess that song, “Pacifist’s Lament,” comes right out of that moment of recognition when I’m sitting there watching the NRA lady say whatever the talking points are and I’m so full of anger that I just want to shout at her. Then I remember when that kid shot up that church in South Carolina and the families of the victims stood before him and spoke to him like a human being, said, “I forgive you.” They said just the most humbling solution to the world’s problems. They’re living and breathing and showing us the way. And I have so far to go, myself.

But I think, as a society, we’ve slipped so far from this idea. We can’t dismiss each other. We just can never give up on each other. We have to reach out and build bridges over even the most turbulent waters. So, I mean, it’s a daily struggle for me as much as anybody.

The idea in “Telepathic” of putting yourself in someone else’s shoes, that sort of deep empathy of trying to imagine what burdens they’re carrying, what fears they’re facing … is that something you do?

Yeah. And you don’t have to think about it at all. You just feel it. You just feel it in a moment sometimes with people. All the distance that can lie between you and someone on the other side of the counter. All of the walls. All of the veils. I guess, yeah, connected to what we’re talking about, I just want it to all go away. I want us to all be family, but we can’t because of so much in society and history. It’s that searching around — and not even intentionally — just when you feel what someone else feels, it can be overwhelming.

Watch all the episodes on YouTube, or download and subscribe to the Hangin’ & Sangin’ podcast and other BGS programs every week via iTunes, Spotify, Podbean, or your favorite podcast platform.

3×3: Rising Appalachia on Latin America, Lucky Ages, and Leonard Cohen

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Artist: Rising Appalachia
Hometown: Atlanta, GA. The dirty South.
Latest Album: ALIVE
Personal Nicknames (or Rejected Band Names): The band considered the Grassy RootHeads, Squalor, RISE, but Rising Appalachia was the name of our first album and it stuck as the band name 12 years ago.
Leah: L-Dogg, Snake Eyes, Leo, Leah the Lip, Sito, Wakes Talking, chief meteorologist
Chloe: Chlo-Bo, Bo, Boskers, Trisket Biscuit, The Dark Queen, Sito, Pumkin, Pum Pum

 

Take me to your ocean. Take me to your sea… #FloydFest #risingappalachia #ilovemyfilthydirtysouth Photo @leahsongmusic

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What song do you wish you had written?

Leah: “When Doves Cry” by Prince.

Chloe: “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen (Doesn’t everyone wish they wrote that damn song?!)

Who would be in your dream songwriter round?

Leah: Gillian Welch, Outkast, Bob Dylan, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Ani Difranco, Robert Johnson, the Buena Vista Social Club, Lila Downs, Bonnie Rait, Prince.

Chloe: Ani Difranco, Hosier. Nahko. Mos Def. Erykah Badu. Bob Marley. Joni Mitchell.

If you could only listen to one artist’s discography for the rest of your life, whose would you choose?

Leah: Bruce Molsky. Makes me feel home.

Chloe: Ohhhhhhh. That’s a hard one! Probably Bob Marley.

 

As one of our elders put it last night, We want to put the U.S in a chair in the middle of the room Surrounded by healers, activists, grandmothers, lovers, and children And tell it how good it could be. How it could rise to the occasion of its full potential in the face of white supremacy, the dismantling of Standing Rock, of distasteful leaders and embarrassing media, of capitalism over culture. All these hard working people from all corners of the globe. This land and all its beauty. We have so much more work to do And I know folks are tired. What else is there to do but show up again and again and again and again ? In solidarity with the people of Charlottesville and all others whom work to uplift the story of the south (and this country) May love triumph. . . . #notmysouth #blacklivesmatter #notoursouth #standup #speakout #showup #solidarity #alternateroots

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How often do you do laundry?

Leah: What a weird question. Um , whenever the duty is called for. Depends on the show night.

Chloe: All the time. Randomly on the road and we string it all up to dry in the back of the bus, which gets pretty intimate and funny.

What was the last movie that you really loved?

Leah: I almost NEVER watch movies. But I watched an amazing South American film on the plane the other day called Vengo Olviendo that was a beautifully filmed, slow and delicate story about the complexity of human migration. It was excellent.

Chloe: I loved the movie LION that just came out about the boy who got lost in India and found his way back home via Google Maps. Crazy wild true story. Reminded me that technology can be a good thing (I can get a little anti).

If you could re-live one year of your life, which would it be and why?

Leah: Hmmm, I would probably go back to my early 20s, when I was traveling out of a backpack across Latin America learning to play banjo and studying folk music from all over the place. It was such a free and inspired time in my life. Not nearly as weighted as this whole “professional musician” thing. 

Chloe: Year 7. Lucky number, lucky age, the mind is so open and spongey at that time. I’d go hang with my grandparents some more and pick their brains … especially my father’s mother who was a poet.

What’s your go-to comfort food?

Chloe: Thai food all day every day.

Kombucha — love it or hate it?

Leah and Chloe: LOVE ! Although once we got sponsored by a kombucha company and things got a little too fermenty in the van. It has to be handled in the right dosages.

Mustard or mayo?

Dijon