Tag: Anthony da Costa

Ruth Moody on Canadian Roots Music, Parenthood, and Being a ‘Wanderer’

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Ruth Moody has a singular voice, whether she’s joining the soaring three-part harmonies of the Wailin’ Jennys, or carving her own path on her new solo album, Wanderer (released May 17.) The project was almost a decade in the making and finds Moody betting on herself as a songwriter, co-producer, and now-label head for her own Blue Muse Records. The album is parallel to Moody’s own journey at continuing to define herself, with its emphasis on confronting the past and carving away detritus that is no longer needed.

Moody splits her time between Nashville and Vancouver Island. The pull between her sense of place, as well as her identities as artist, wife, and mother, characterize Wanderer. The album was recorded at the legendary Sound Emporium in Nashville and was co-produced with Dan Knobler (Allison Russell, Lake Street Dive) and mixed by Tucker Martine (My Morning Jacket, First Aid Kit, The Decemberists).

As discussed below, Moody waited until the time was right to bring her favorite musicians together for the record: her partner Sam Howard, who plays upright bass and provides backing vocals; her older brother Richard Moody; The Wailin’ Jennys’ touring band member Anthony da Costa (guitars); Jason Burger (drums); Kai Welch (keyboards); Russ Pahl (pedal steel); Adrian Dolan (string arrangements); and duet partner Joey Landreth (on “The Spell of the Lilac Bloom”). Moody’s patient commitment to executing Wanderer the way she wanted to shows in its transcendent arrangements.

In our BGS interview, Moody discusses how she establishes her sense of self amidst the competing demands in her life, the factors that give Canadian roots music their own special quality, and the lessons she’s learned from doing Wanderer exactly the way she intended to.

What do you think it is about Canadian roots music in particular? It does have a different feel than roots music in the States.

Ruth Moody: You know, I’ve been asked this question for so long. It’s a very valid question, because I think there is something, but it’s really hard to have a clear answer. In Canada there’s such a range of geography and music culture. You can’t really pin it to one thing.

I grew up in Winnipeg and the winters are so harsh that I think music and art are one of the things that get people through. It’s something you can do in the winter. I also think that there’s something about the landscape and the winter that creates a certain work ethic because you’re so small against the elements, really. So consciously or subconsciously, that enters into the picture for people. And so I think people tend to work hard and really apply themselves. And when it comes to touring, especially if you’re from Winnipeg, it takes some effort to get to the next town. It’s a six-hour drive before you get to the next major town. So I think right from the start, young musicians know they have to go out in the world to tour and get their music out.

We’re pretty diverse and we’re also influenced by so many different cultures and types of music. So I think there is a very exploratory aspect to Canadian music. And a lot of cross-pollination between genres and scenes. We are very lucky to have government support for the arts and I think that helps artists thrive, obviously, but it also helps to create music communities and bring artists together in collaborative situations.

Well, it’s always good to start an interview out by asking you to speak for your entire country! But Wanderer focuses on the idea of home, and I know you’ve lived many different places. Did I read that you grew up in Australia?

I was born in Australia, and my parents are Australian, but they came back to Canada when I was only a year old. I grew up in Winnipeg, but, as an adult, I’ve moved around a ton and that was what inspired the title track. I’ve been touring for over 25 years at this point. “Wanderer” is a love song that I wrote for my partner, because he helped me have that feeling of home for the first time in my adult life.

There are a number of songs about young love and new love on the album. Was there something that was making you reminisce about those times in your life?

These songs were all written across a long time-span – over 10 years really – since my last record. So the songs come from different stages and sides of love, right into motherhood. Some songs deal with heartbreak too and some are more reflective about the past. During the pandemic, I was reflecting a lot about how we internalize the messages we receive from society, how as a woman I took on the expectations of others and how that has affected my life. I was looking back, looking for clues, curious about where fear comes from, where strength and resilience come from. How we learn how to be our authentic selves when there are so many outside pressures and confusing messages. “Seventeen” isn’t about that, at all, but it ended up coming out of that period of reminiscing. It’s a song that came from my own experiences but that is essentially about being in love and not being ready or able to face it or express it, which I think is probably a pretty common experience.

These are all things I’m thinking about a lot now that I have a child, too, because they become very relevant. You’re trying to model behaviors for a young person and it really makes you face yourself. You have to look at why you do and say certain things and what you want to teach and how you want to be.

Speaking of wandering, I read that you split your time between Nashville and Vancouver Island.

I just got back from British Columbia, and I’ll be back in BC in the summer, so yes, I’m back and forth. I tour a lot, so I try to get home to BC when I’m already out traveling. But I work a lot in Nashville and so does my partner, so we’re still figuring that out.

Do you feel you are different when you are in these two different places?

Definitely. That’s been a real theme becoming a mother, really. Suddenly, you’re responsible for another human life. You have to let go of a lot of ways that you used to do things and prioritize what matters. I’m always shifting modes.

When I’m on tour, I operate in a certain way. When I’m in BC, I’m close to my parents and that brings out certain things. When I’m on my own, I have a bit more freedom to maybe be my creative self and when I’m in parenting mode, that goes out the window. Additionally, a partnership requires a lot of work and time, too. There are a lot of different parts of life that I’m juggling. But it keeps it interesting.

This isn’t meant to be a conversation about being a musician and motherhood and “having it all,” but it is a big theme of the record!

It has been a big theme of my life of late. Actually, I wanted to make this record about eight years ago and then I put it on hold, because I wasn’t able to line up all the musicians I wanted involved. I thought, “I’ll do it next year.” And then I had my son and I just didn’t know that motherhood would be such an all-consuming thing. It doesn’t have to be – and everyone’s different!

I really want to do a good job at everything that I do, and so I found it hard [to balance everything.] I felt like I wasn’t doing a good enough job at being a parent and I wasn’t doing a good enough job at performing. That was really hard on me. And I think now, with this new way of looking at things, I’m just being easier on myself and thinking to myself, “Maybe I was enough. Maybe we can’t be perfect at every single thing.” Maybe we don’t have to attempt to be perfect at everything.

First and foremost I think that any woman should have the choice to [balance motherhood and work] in the way she wants to do it. I am still figuring out how to juggle everything – especially since for this record, I decided to put it out on my own label. It’s really exciting and I think will be really rewarding, but it is a ton of work and the learning curve is quite steep.

Wanderer is your fourth solo album. Do you feel this process is different than when you’re working with another artist or with The Wailin’ Jennys?

It is different. The Jennys – I mean, we’ve been together for so long and we have a certain way of working. We’re talking about making a new record, which is really exciting. It’ll be different, because it’s been a while and we’re all changing all the time, you know? That feels like it will be an exciting new experience.

But it is of course different working on my own, especially in this case, because I co-produced this record. When you’re on your own, you draw on a different part of your brain and even your heart. Wanderer is a really personal collection of songs. With the Jennys, we tend to maybe gravitate towards songs that call for three part harmony, so they end up being a bit more anthemic. With these really personal, intimate songs, I connect to them in a different way.

What lessons do you feel like you can take away now that you’ve finished making Wanderer that you want to take with you on your next project?

I’ve learned so much in doing this. Because it took so long to make it and these songs were waiting in the wings for so long, it felt really important for me to make it. The stakes felt high, because it had been so long in the making.

Now that it’s done and I’m putting it out, I am really excited and proud of it. I want to just keep releasing expectations and I’m very excited to dig into creative work again.

Photo Credit: Jacqueline Justice

BGS 5+5: Mark Erelli

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Mark Erelli
Hometown: Melrose, Massachusetts
Latest Album: Lay Your Darkness Down
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Oh man, I don’t really have any! The only nicknames I had were in elementary school, where kids would taunt me with adjectives that rhyme with “Erelli.” I’m sure you can come up with all the permutations on your own. I’ve always been a solo artist, so I don’t have any rejected band names, either. I feel like I’m letting a lot of people down with this particular answer!

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

At heart, I’m just a really big music fan, so I’ve thought a lot about my influences and how they’ve changed over the years. I think most of us start out trying to follow in the footsteps of our musical heroes, typically bigger, established artists from a different time. I was no different in my early years but, truthfully, the longer I do this, the less those early heroes tend to matter to me in terms of conscious influence. And the music business that helped those artists become so influential is gone for good. So the artists that have deeply influenced me for a long time now are my friends, peers I have worked alongside, seeing firsthand how they manage their art and their careers.

It’s hard to pick the friend that has had the most profound influence, but I have learned more than I can really articulate from Lori McKenna. We met in 1996 when we both lost the same songwriting contest, came up through the Boston scene together, I’ve produced some of her albums, and played in her band since 2005. I’ve had a chance to see the choices she’s made throughout every stage of her storied career—before she even had a ‘career’—and I find her journey to be extremely inspiring and educational. Lori’s consistent friendship and generosity have been a real north star for me, and she’s a big part of my new album Lay Your Darkness Down, having written a wonderful song together and singing harmony on the title track.

What’s your favorite memory from being on stage?

About a decade ago, I opened for Darrell Scott one night in Portland, Maine. I had played the room several times on my own, but I campaigned for the gig just so I could meet Darrell and let him know I’d been a big fan of his for years. I was convinced I’d come on a bit too strong at soundcheck, endlessly proclaiming my love of obscure independent records that he’d played on in the ’90s, but I was later humbled to see that he was watching my set.

When he took the stage for his headlining set, he said, “We’re gonna do something a little different tonight. Instead of just me up here playing one long solo set, I’m going to do a short set, we’ll take a quick break, then Mark and I will come back up together, trading songs until we feel like stopping, like an old-fashioned Nashville guitar pull.” He hadn’t mentioned this plan to me before he went on, so I was just floored. But that’s what we did. I think we played for 90 minutes or so, the whole night of music approaching three hours of music in total, a marathon that no one had even asked for! To have a musical hero invite me into a space where we were both completely in service to the songs, supporting each other as equals, was just an incredible gift. I’ll never forget it.

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

Two words: vocal warmups. This is not a sexy ritual, but I cannot stress enough how regularly warming my voice up for 15-20 minutes before a show or a recording session has changed my life. I’ve always been a decent singer, I guess, but since I’ve been warming up regularly before shows I find that I can sing at the level of proficiency I strive to perform at, for longer, and with far less emotional distress about being able to keep it up night after night. The whiskey you think you need before you go on stage is not doing you any favors, it just makes you care less about how you sound. The vocal warmups I do have helped make singing a more physically enjoyable experience for me, and the sooner you start the more it’s going to help you. I know, I didn’t listen either when I was in my 20s and 30s and people told me to warm up my voice. But if I could go back and change one thing it would be to have started this ritual far earlier in my career.

What’s the toughest time you ever had writing a song?

I think the toughest part of ‘writing a song’ isn’t really the writing itself, it’s the observations, experiences, and realizations that ultimately lead me to the point where I feel compelled to sit down and write about something, to try and make sense of it. The songs on my new album Lay Your Darkness Down were largely written in the wake of being diagnosed with a degenerative retinal disease (retinitis pigmentosa) that is slowly causing me to go blind. The songs that weren’t directly inspired by my RP diagnosis were written against the backdrop of a global pandemic, and the profound hits to what serves double duty as my livelihood and spiritual practice.

Those were just extremely tough times, and for a while songwriting just felt like a very ineffectual tool for dealing with them. Thankfully, the practice gradually came back to me, and it ultimately became something that helped me process what I was going through. I have to thank friends like Mary Bragg, Anthony da Costa, Matt Nathanson, and Lori McKenna, who all co-wrote remotely with me over Zoom during the pandemic and helped me sidestep some of the loneliness and isolation I was feeling. The writing is often fun and exciting, it’s living a life worth writing about that’s the tough part.

How often do you hide behind a character in a song or use “you” when it’s actually “me”?

I think I do this an awful lot. I will frequently consider myself to be writing a song from the perspective of a character, only to find out at some point after the fact that there is perhaps an uncomfortable amount of “me” in the song’s protagonist. This realization can take years, and I think it’s just a simple truth that the songs often get there before I do, and they wait patiently for me to catch up. Even when I am writing from a first-person perspective, I’m often portraying myself and my motivations as I’d like them to be, and maybe not as they actually are. I often use songwriting to envision what’s possible, instead of cataloging things as they are. In that way, I like to think that my songs can be inspiring and stir hope, not just for others, but for me too.

Photo Credit: Joe Navas

MIXTAPE: Anthony da Costa’s Quarantine Chill Out Roots-Grass Mix-Up

Posted on by Editor

I know what you’re thinking, Anthony da Costa doesn’t really bluegrass…but hey, I live in Nashville and I have friends and I even say “y’all” now. And there’s something about roots music that cuts to the core of everything and deeply influences what I do…even if it doesn’t always sound like it. Here are some tracks to not go outside to! — Anthony da Costa

David Francey – “Border Line”

David Francey is one of my favorites ever and nothing will change that. I lucked out by sharing a stage with him at the Tønder Festival many years ago. He blew me away with his simple approach, golden voice, and powerful storylines. He stood there like a bard and held our hearts in his hand. After our show, I asked his guitarist which album I should start with and he emphatically stated Torn Screen Door. “Border Line” is track one from David’s debut album, which he made when he was 45 years old. Let’s take a journey with him, since we can’t really go anywhere else.

Jordan Tice – “Chicken Dog”

This playlist has a lot of mood, interspersed with that spontaneous dance party that we could all use right now. You don’t even have to put on real clothes, just dance. Jordan Tice is one of my best friends and also happens to be my one of my favorite acoustic guitar players on planet Earth. He has a fabulous new album that will be coming out soon… but until then, let’s jump to this scorcher of a bizarre bluegrass song called “Chicken Dog.” I still don’t know what it’s about, but also, like, who cares?

Molly Tuttle – “When You’re Ready”

This playlist wouldn’t really be complete without something from Molly Tuttle. I had the pleasure of touring with Molly for her album release in 2019. When the bluegrass kids all told me that Molly had made a “pop” album, my first thought was “ALRIGHT. Calm down, kids. What, are there drums or something? Are you scared?” But the young “queen” of the bluegrass world and honestly craziest picker out there made one of the best albums of last year: pop in the ’90s Aimee Mann singer-songwriter kinda sense. Molly knows how to write a poignant, catchy chorus — and then somehow squeezes in some pretty insane bluegrass runs –in the SAME SONG. Are you ready?

Bill Frisell – “I’m So Lonesome, I Could Cry”

Because, you know, quarantine sucks, right? And I live alone. And it HAS gotten lonesome at times… so lonesome that I could pull up this great compilation entitled The Best of Bill Frisell, Vol. 1: The Folk Songs and just mellowly and totally NOT CRY to myself. ♥

Sam Amidon – “Blue Mountains”

Speaking of Bill Frisell, he features on this pretty mesmerizing track from Sam Amidon. This record made me a believer. I don’t know that anyone else can do what Sam does with folk music. I don’t even know what this music is. It’s Sam Amidon music.

John Mailander – “Forecast”

John Mailander is one of the nicest people in the world, but PLEASE don’t tell him that I said that… it might go to his incredibly large and insufferable ego. All kidding aside, John released his debut solo album (as far as I’m aware) last year. It’s called Forecast and this is the title track… and it’s one of those “get up off your couch and dance” songs I was talking about before. John is as versed in Phish as he is the oldest of old-time fiddle and bluegrass. He is very dear to me and his music endlessly inspires me to push things further.

Rachel Baiman – “Something to Lose”

I met Rachel Baiman within the context of her duo with Christian Sedelmeyer, 10 String Symphony (check them out, they’re out of this world). I’m so glad that Rachel has been doing a lot of her own music these days in addition. This record, produced by Andrew Marlin from Mandolin Orange, has a warm, “right there in the room” kinda feel to it. This song makes me cry. There, I said it. Love is fine, OK? Will I ever see anyone again!?

Aoife O’Donovan – “Pearls – Live”

I recently revisited this live album I got to make with the inimitable Aoife O’Donovan. Lots of people know Aoife from her work with Crooked Still, as well as her more recent recordings and travel as part of I’m With Her. I toured with Aoife as her guitarist and harmony singer from 2016 into 2017. We toured her album In the Magic Hour, which was produced by Tucker Martine and features gorgeous arrangements of strings, horns, fuzzed out guitars, drums, voices… We had to recreate Aoife’s music live with three people and no bassist… which means we made it our own. This particular song is a favorite deep cut of mine.

Paper Wings – “As I Walk Down”

I’ve been saying to anyone who will listen, and I will say it to you now: Paper Wings is currently my favorite band. This is as rootsy as I get and I’m quite alright with it. Wilhelmina Frankzerda and I met when we were touring in Joy Williams’ Front Porch band. One night in Houston, Wilhelmina gave me a pair of headphones and showed me some mixes from what became Paper Wings’ Clementine album. It’s my favorite album of 2019. They’re clearly drawing from a very deep well of tradition but with new, crooked and inventive melodies…plus, they’re writing SONGS! New songs. Great, great songs.

Mipso – “Coming Down the Mountain”

Because we’re all going to come out of this eventually, right? Here’s a song to take off your mask to. See you all on the other side. ♥

Photo credit: Jacqueline Justice

WATCH: Veronica Stanton, “Wildflower”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Veronica Stanton
Hometown: Jenkintown, Pennsylvania
Song: “Wildflower”
Album: 827 Miles

In Their Words: “I wrote ‘Wildflower’ about having the desire to be seen and loved but also knowing that I’d miss the freedom and independence that comes with being alone. To me, being alone doesn’t have to mean being lonely and this song is my little ode to individualism. Matt Boylson captured the beautiful footage of wildflowers in California and Kentucky and then he and Nathan Powell filmed the studio footage together. The track is off of my debut EP 827 Miles, which was produced by Dan Knobler and recorded by Justin Francis at Goosehead Palace in Nashville. It was tracked live with Dan Knobler on acoustic guitar, Anthony da Costa on electric guitar, Danny Mitchell on keys, Dom Billett on drums, Sam Howard on bass, and Erin Rae on harmony vocals.” — Veronica Stanton

Photo credit: Bridgette Aikens

Come In, Sit Down: Joy Williams Visits About ‘Front Porch’

Posted on by Editor

Joy Williams embarked on quite the journey to get to her new solo album Front Porch. On the title track, she sums it up best, singing, “I took the long way looking for the shortcut/ To find out that this place was made of the best stuff.” After the Civil Wars broke up in 2014, she left Nashville and headed west to California with her family. The distance felt necessary: It served, on the one hand, as a chance to clear her head after the dissolution of a creative partnership, and on the other as an opportunity to spend with her dying father.

When she released 2015’s VENUS, her first solo project to follow her duo work, she purposely went for a different sound, as if she wasn’t fully prepared to inhabit the style long circulating around her voice and songwriting. Front Porch is a return to form in more ways than the title implies. She moved back to Nashville, and began writing in a more honest fashion about love, desire, and the flaws that people may try to run from but which make them perfectly imperfect. Partnering with The Milk Carton Kids’ Kenneth Pattengale as producer, Williams burrows into a roots sound that is as sparse as it is reverent, her voice so clear and comfortable it’s an invitation for one and all to gather on the porch.

VENUS took you in new directions than what listeners have typically heard from you, while Front Porch feels like a return in many ways. Why was it time to make this project in particular?

VENUS was a by-product of having to cleanse my palate, so to speak. After [the Civil Wars] officially split, I felt a little claustrophobic in Nashville. I realized once I was [in Venice Beach] I was still bringing everything that I was processing with me; the music was an expression of me needing to literally lift out of the space I had inhabited for a while in order to gain some clarity. I left the holler, as it were, to go find a different space for myself in order to clear my mind and heal, because there was a lot to heal from. And I did that.

VENUS certainly felt like a heavy record despite the pop production.

I was also on the West Coast because my dad was dealing with terminal cancer. I wanted to be close to him as he was in the process of passing away. That record, you can hear some heaviness, but there’s a determination to fight and continue on. Once my dad passed away, there was this sense of “Why are we still in Venice Beach?”

So you returned to Nashville?

We came back to the house that never sold and started again. It felt like a whole new chapter. For me, it felt like a return that was really important—to community, and to myself, and to no longer being afraid to make the music that was really inside of me all along, and to actually enjoy and embrace the sound that came from the front porch, which became my guard rails for writing. After everything I’d lost in those past few years, I realized it’s really the simple things that matter the most, to me anyway. I wanted to make a record that reflected that.

In ending VENUS with “Welcome Home,” did you already see yourself pointing in the direction that became Front Porch?

Yes, absolutely. Doesn’t that happen so much in our lives anyhow? We give ourselves away before we move in that direction.

The body knows before the brain does.

Yes, I’m a huge believer of what I call the animal body or the animal instinct. I don’t mean that in the barbaric sense, but in the deepest wisdom.

And what wisdom did you gain?

I felt like in the process of writing this record — which was a slow and steady process — I was also coming to terms with embracing who I am, and learning to love the scars and the bruises and the bumps along the way, realizing that’s what makes people ultimately beautiful and interesting. I’m a recovering perfectionist from a conservative family. Unraveling those things lead to more spaciousness within me, and a deeper gratitude for everything I’ve gone through — the tough shit and the highs as well.

It’s interesting that you say you’ve come to terms with the scars and bruises because you sound so comfortable on Front Porch, like you’ve rediscovered something about yourself.

As I’ve hopefully grown over the years, I’ve become more aware of my coping tricks, and learning to lovingly dismantle those, if I’m able, and also to treat them all with an open curiosity. That rootedness and groundedness within me really began influencing a lot of things in my life, music being one of them. On top of all of that, I was newly pregnant with our daughter Poppy — I knew I was pregnant, but I didn’t know I was having a daughter at the time — and really sick while recording that record. There was a part of me that asked, “Should I postpone the recording?” I thought, “No, this is the prime time to do this because I’m going to sit on this stool and sing.” I don’t care if this comes out perfectly, I just want it to be as honest as it possibly can be. It was the most joyful experience I’ve ever had in the studio, and I’ve been doing this since I was 17.

I’m sure that’s not how any artist would plan that process, but what comes out ends up being its own kind of perfection.

Right. We recorded 15 songs in five days. The process for that was really a product of Anthony da Costa and I on my green velvet couch rehearsing these songs, just guitar and voice. The purity of that and the ability to focus on the performances allowed for an organic experience.

I was particularly taken with the vocal chorus that shows up on “Trouble With Wanting,” and how it plays into that idea of the power in gathering. What prompted the choice to include it?

I really love the idea of the front porch because you can gather out there with yourself — you can commune with yourself out on the front porch — or you can bring a best friend, or at least on my porch you can bring 8 to 10 people. There’s always a beautiful energy with any one of those configurations. With “Trouble,” that song felt like such an open conversation. I wrote it with my friend Natalie Hemby when we were talking about the devastation of desire, and what it’s like to have those moments where you go, “If only that person….”

I’d had a conversation with my best friend who’d had an on-again, off-again relationship with someone for 10 years, and I thought, “God, every one of us has been through some kind of version of this heartache and longing.” The experience of desire and that universal sense that many of us can relate to, it felt like it begged for group vocals. We did that all live. Kenneth is singing harmonies, and Anthony is singing harmonies, and I’m singing harmonies, and it felt like a collective expression of something that felt true, at least to me.

Speaking of desire, one of my favorite things about your songwriting is how raw and honest you’ve been about dealing with desire. How have you seen that shift from project to project?

I was always writing romance and different shades of it. In the Civil Wars, it was like tapping into the destructive, obsessive side of desire. As I’ve grown, I realize that romance has many facets in the same jewel, so if you turn it, you see something completely different. What does it look like to experience the romance of what is present and in front of you? And the romance of learning to love yourself? …

I think in the process of writing this record, I wanted to write about how difficult and challenging and scary and vulnerable it is to love someone a long time, and to love someone without any real sense of knowing what the future holds. No one can foretell what the future will be. The process of making this record, I wanted to dig my hands into the earth even more about the sumptuous and sensual nature of what romance is and what it looks like to love myself, and what it looks like to love someone else, and what it looks like to love my family, and what it looks like to lose, and what it looks like to begin again, and what it looks like to say, “I’m done,” or “Enough.” Whatever it is. I wanted to write in a way that there was no glossing over anything.