Tag: black lives matter

LISTEN: Arielle Silver, “Soft On the Shoulder”

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Artist: Arielle Silver
Hometown: Finding the answer to that question has been a lifelong quest. My childhood was spent in Florida, NYC, and New Jersey. Boston raised me from late teens through most of my twenties, but I did a few stints in PA, TN, and NC. Something brought me to Los Angeles a while back, and it’s now been my hometown longer than anywhere else. I’m rather attached – and detached – from a lot of places, but I think I love LA and Boston the most.
Song: “Soft On the Shoulder”
Album: Watershed
Release Date: October 6, 2023

In Their Words: “Inspired by the Laurel Canyon music of the ’70s and the cultural activism that came about after the murder of George Floyd, ‘Soft On the Shoulder’ is a song largely about self-culpability. I was reflecting on the place of music amid cultural change and its place in political activism and social engagement. I was also thinking about the ways that I – as a white-presenting woman – have unwittingly participated in systemic wrongs. While initially inspired by thoughts sparked by the BLM movement, this song applies to any personal or cultural circumstance where we are asked to examine our long-held beliefs and consider another person’s perspective.

“Having grown up listening to records, cassettes, and CDs, I am very album-oriented. I felt that ‘Soft On The Shoulder,’ which opens the Watershed album with the words, ‘It starts with a witness…’ and is threaded with the mantra ‘love more, fear less,’ captures the compassion and reflective nature of this entire collection of songs.” – Arielle Silver

Photo Credit: Anabel DFlux

WATCH: Lady Nade, “Willing”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Lady Nade
Hometown: Bristol, UK
Song: “Willing”
Album: Willing
Release Date: June 18, 2021

In Their Words: “I wrote ‘Willing’ as a message of acceptance, loyalty and friendship. I’ve often tried to fit in, which has meant I lost myself for a while, I’ve been working really hard in the last couple of years to be aware of that. Realising being individual is what being human means, these feelings are particularly poignant for everyone after this prolonged period of separation we’ve all been through. The video was filmed in my hometown in Bristol along the route of the BLM protests last summer. I end the video at the base of the statue of Slave Master Edward Colston, which was dismantled during those protests. The way the video and song came together portray the message of self, as well as community.” — Lady Nade

Photo credit: Arthur René Walwin

LISTEN: Crys Matthews, “Call Them In”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Crys Matthews
Hometown: Richlands, North Carolina (currently Washington, D.C.)
Song: “Call Them In”
Album: Changemakers
Release Date: March 26, 2021

In Their Words: “As a social-justice songwriter, my approach to songs has always been to lead with love and hope, even when it is hard to do, especially when it is hard to do. That message is at the heart of ‘Call Them In.’ It is so easy for those of us committed to justice to do the work of calling out injustice, but it is much harder to take that next step and try to invite people in. But that is the charge, that is the task before us. Not a lot of people did that better than John Lewis.

“As a fellow Black southerner, I grew up hearing about the freedom songs people would sing (like ‘Eyes on the Prize’) as they marched for justice, and I wanted this song to feel like something they would be proud of and maybe march to, which is why I wanted to build a choir into the song. Fellow social-justice songwriters Kyshona Armstrong and Heather Mae, who are singing on the track, definitely helped me achieve that. I hope that this song passes on a little of the love and hope that he and Dr. King passed on to me and so many others. May we never stop believing in good trouble, or in the vision of America that Congressman Lewis bled for on that bridge all those years ago.

“In the summer of 2020, while the entire world was learning how to live through a global pandemic, America was in the middle of a reckoning nearly 400 years in the making. George Floyd’s brutal killing at the hands of police in Minnesota sparked the kind of national outrage that had been sparked decades ago when John Lewis and so many others were brutalized on Bloody Sunday. And while George Floyd was not the first and, in some ways, not even the most horrific of these all too frequent instances of police brutality, he woke so many people up to the reality at the heart of the Black Lives Matter movement.

“In an interview he gave on The TODAY Show, Congressman Lewis said that he thought Dr. King would be very proud of how many Americans were standing up for justice, and speaking out for better. Lewis said, ‘He’s looking down and he’s saying to each and every one of us, keep it up, and never give up, never give in, but to keep the faith and to keep your eyes on the prize.’ At 80 years old, and after having suffered so much cruelty and brutality, this great man was still doing the work of calling out injustice while simultaneously calling in more allies, more willing change agents, more of what Dr. King called ‘drum majors for justice.’ So when he died on July 17, 2020, I knew that I wanted to honor him. It is my sincere hope that ‘Call Them In’ does just that.” — Crys Matthews

Photo credit: Rah Foard

WATCH: Yola Takes Her Tiny Desk (Home) Concert Outside

Posted on by Editor

Taking NPR’s Tiny Desk (Home) Concert series to the socially distanced outdoors, much-loved artist Yola offers outstanding acoustic versions of three songs from her breakout album, Walk Through Fire, as well as a song from her debut EP. The Bristol-born (that’s Bristol, England) singer-songwriter is as vivacious as ever, yet the outdoor setting of her home concert channels a different, more personal presentation. Yola accompanies herself on guitar, joined by gifted guitarist Jordan Tice (also a member of the band Hawktail). There’s not much one can do to strip down the power and energy of Yola’s songs, but the two paint the them in a somewhat gentler light.

The second song on the docket is from Yola’s 2016 EP, and in the song’s introduction, she describes the newfound relevance of the song in light of the ever-growing Black Lives Matter movement and our nation’s struggles with the global pandemic. The song, titled “Dead and Gone,” speaks on the impossible struggle that she has felt as a Black woman in a world wrought with racism and sexism. Yola’s delivery is a powerful statement on pretense, one that needs to be heard now more than ever. Watch the full Tiny Desk Home Concert here.

 

2020: The Year of Dolly Parton

Posted on by Editor

Dolly Parton kept her promise to bring good into the world in 2020 and beyond. For so many reasons, this is absolutely the Year of Dolly Parton.

Marking her 50th anniversary as an Opry member in October 2019, she told reporters, “This world is just so dark, ugly and awful. I just can’t believe how we just can’t have a little more light and a little more love. So, I’m going to make it my business to try to do songs that are more uplifting — not just all Christian-based songs but songs that are just about better things. Do better and just have a little more love, a little more light and just don’t be so dark and dirty!”

Gosh, where to begin? How about…

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Dolly Parton (@dollyparton)

Although it seems like a million years ago now, Dolly launched a viral craze on January 21 with a meme that went around the world. Gotta love the acoustic guitar for Instagram!

Also in January, she notched a Top 10 track on Billboard’s Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart with “Faith,” which basically transformed the John Hiatt classic into an international EDM hit. Co-starring in the video with her musical collaborators, Galantis, Parton camps things up as the world’s best-dressed bus driver.

Later in the month, Parton collected her ninth career Grammy Award, this time in the category of Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance/Song, sharing the honor with For King and Country with “God Only Knows.” Although Parton wasn’t in attendance, the duo’s Joel Smallbone remarked from the podium, “To dear Dolly Parton, who is an incredible human being. It’s one of the great moments of our career to collaborate with her and her team.”

He continued, “I taught two of her managers in Sunday school growing up, so they were kind enough to reach out and play her the song. But she said something on a call. She said, ‘I love this song because it’s reaching to the marginalized, to the depressed, to the suicidal,’ which is all of us at some point. And then she said this, in her Dolly accent: ‘I’m going to take this song from Dollywood to Bollywood to Hollywood.’ And we did it, Dolly, we took it all the way.”

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Dolly Parton (@dollyparton)

A few months into the pandemic, Parton told Instagram followers, “I think God is in this, I really do. I think he’s trying to hold us up to the light so we can see ourselves and see each other through the eyes of love. I think that when this passes, we’re all gonna be better people.”

She also revealed on social media that she’d donated a million dollars to Vanderbilt University help find a cure for the coronavirus. She wrote, “My longtime friend Dr. Naji Abumrad, who’s been involved in research at Vanderbilt for many years, informed me that they were making some exciting advancements towards research of the coronavirus for a cure. I am making a donation of $1 million to Vanderbilt towards that research and to encourage people that can afford it to make donations.”

Incredibly, when news of the Moderna vaccine emerged in November, Parton’s contribution was duly noted. “Without a doubt in my mind, her funding made the research toward the vaccine go 10 times faster than it would be without it,” Abumrad told the Washington Post.

In April, she kicked off a series of bedtime stories, told online, in order to bring comfort to children who were scared about sheltering in place. “This is something I have been wanting to do for quite a while, but the timing never felt quite right,” she said. “I think it is pretty clear that now is the time to share a story and to share some love. It is an honor for me to share the incredible talent of these authors and illustrators. They make us smile, they make us laugh and they make us think.” Two of the chosen books she wrote herself: Coat of Many Colors and I Am a Rainbow.

In addition, a new line of uplifting greeting cards inspired by Parton appeared in Walmart stores over the summer. Meanwhile, musically, she responded to the pandemic with a beacon of optimism, titled “When Life Is Good Again.” She shared the song in tandem with an interview (while sitting on her porch in her first-ever Zoom call) with the series Time100 Talks: Finding Hope.

Bluegrass fans rejoiced in August as she made a surprise announcement that six of her albums from the early 2000s were finally available on streaming services, so how about adding title tracks of Little Sparrow and Halos & Horns to your Dolly playlists? Overall, 93 once-missing tracks are now available to stream.

Although she’s rarely controversial, Parton’s commentary about Black Lives Matter caused a commotion among its supporters and detractors — and even inspired a mural in East Nashville. She told Billboard in August, “I think that everybody needs to express themselves however they feel they have to. I’m not out here to tell you what to do. I don’t want you to tell me what to do. But I just do what my heart tells me to do, I ask God to direct me and lead me, and if I’ve got his direction, I don’t have to worry too much about anything else. But I do understand people having to make themselves known and felt and seen. And of course Black lives matter. Do we think our little white asses are the only ones that matter? No! Everybody matters.”

In November, she commemorated the 25th anniversary of the Imagination Library – an incredible program she launched in 1995 in order to provide free books every month to preschool children — with a new documentary titled The Library That Dolly Built. Parton stated, “I am so excited that we can finally tell the whole story of the Imagination Library. It is certainly not just about me. Our story is the story of children, of families and communities who all share the dream to inspire kids to love to read and to love to learn. My hope is this documentary will encourage more towns, more states and even more countries to jump onboard. One thing is for sure, I think this is the best investment I have ever made.”

Those who have been fans of Dolly Parton for their whole lives were treated to two magnificent overviews in 2020. The first is a Time Life box set of her career on camera, available in two different configurations. One option for Dolly: The Ultimate Collection clocks in at 11 DVDs, and the other at 19 DVDs. Some of the most interesting footage comes from her variety shows, such as this clip of the superstar singing “Amazing Grace” with Glen Campbell (who, for some reason, has brought along his bagpipes).

The other retrospective is Songteller, a book of lyrics that doubles as a memoir. Compiled by Parton and noted journalist Robert K. Oermann, it portrays Parton as a composer whose catalog goes way deeper (and darker) than “Jolene,” “9 to 5,” and “I Will Always Love You.” Dorian Lynskey, a contributor to the L.A. Times, wrote, “Her shows are carnivals of good-natured inclusivity that unite everyone from LGBTQ millennials to MAGA-hat boomers under one roof. There is room for heartbreak but not deep cuts about suicide and arson. Still, she would not have included so many of these dramas of cruelty and suffering in Songteller if she did not believe that this harsher strain in her life and work was worth remembering. Her optimism stands on the shoulders of pain.”

And if all that isn’t enough, she gifted us with a holiday album and a network special (both titled A Holly Dolly Christmas), a Netflix movie (Christmas on the Square), and even a baking kit at Williams-Sonoma. It may be the only time in history that she’s been affiliated with the words “cookie cutter.”

Right before Thanksgiving, the iconic musician logged her 50th Grammy nomination, this time for “There Was Jesus,” a collaboration with Zach Williams in the Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance/Song category. A week later, former President Barack Obama lamented that he hadn’t given Parton the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Perhaps that will happen in 2021?

Not that she’s short on awards. She picked up the new Hitmaker award from Billboard in December, and told viewers, “Of course, I’m proud of all the wonderful women in show business that write all these wonderful songs. I’d like to acknowledge a few — some of them older, kind of back in my day. Cindy Walker, who wrote some of the greatest songs ever, and of course Loretta Lynn, a wonderful, wonderful songwriter. And this day in time, of course, Taylor Swift, she’s just right up there, probably number one. And of course, Brandi Carlile, there’s just so many that write so many good songs. I think it’s so important that we acknowledge the women that write and sing in country music. And I think it’s also very important that they take control of their own business. I know I’ve had my own publishing company for years. Same with a lot of these women that I mentioned. But anyhow, I’ve just wanted to always say, ‘You go, girls!’ We can do it!” (Like hundreds of others, the trophy will be housed in her museum in Dollywood.)

This year, and in all years, we commend Dolly Parton for her work ethic and for making herself available to her fans. Yes, she knows how to market herself through visibility and personality, but in 2020, when so many of us have stayed in, she’s gone the extra mile to put herself out there, safely.

On November 30, she wound up in New York Times‘ Style magazine in its “Diva” series, alongside Patti LaBelle and Barbra Streisand. One of the most accurate depictions of what it’s like to be around Dolly (and to always wish you had more time to spend together), the article’s author Emily Lordi quotes Dolly talking about her ambition: “I just wanted to do really good work, and I wanted it to make a really big difference in the world … to uplift mankind and glorify God.”

Photo courtesy of Dolly Parton

Fingerstyle Guitarist Sunny War Wants Punk’s Honesty Back in Music

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Guitarist and singer/songwriter Sunny War doesn’t necessarily miss performing live, in-person shows — she’s not even sure she ever really liked playing shows that much in the “before COVID-19” times at all. But, as she connects with BGS over the phone in preparation for another pandemic-tailored event, her Shout & Shine livestream show on Wednesday, September 16 (live on BGS, Facebook, and YouTube at 7pm ET / 4pm PT) her general feelings regarding the pandemic and its far-reaching impact on the music industry are very clear: It’s all just really weird.

She, like many creators in the March-and-April maelstrom that swallowed up any/all meaningful work for an interminable period of time, became depressed, distant, and took some time to work her way back into a creative mode that feels respondent to our harsh everyday without being bogged down in it. A punk-influenced and inflected lyricist, she’s once again turning to her songwriting pen as an outlet. 

While her peers turn to that same outlet to process many of the myriad daily tragedies and injustices we’re all so attuned to in this global moment, War instead pauses. “I kinda don’t like protest songs from people who didn’t do it before,” she explains, calling to task the frantic and frenzied rush to pivot records, releases, and pressers into more “appropriate,” digestible bits for a newly awakened, activist reality — and consumer. 

(Watch Sunny War’s complete Shout & Shine performance above.)

But War’s identity, her selfhood, as evidenced through every note of her idiosyncratically finger-plucked songs and through her carefully chosen words in her lyrical poetry and our conversation, calls upon her to challenge that propriety. “[Democracy] actually is working” she explains, noting hypocrisy and/or tone deafness in our roots music communities. “It’s working, it’s always been working. It just hasn’t ever been in our favor.” 

BGS: I’m a banjo player, I came up through bluegrass, and there’s something about your right hand in your guitar playing that’s really entrancing and relatable to me. It conjures bluegrass and fingerstyle, but it is so unique to you, it’s idiosyncratic. Where did your style come from? What influenced your right hand technique, how did it develop? 

SW: I think it came from mimicking banjo, actually. My stepdad’s friend played banjo, so I was around a banjo player sometimes growing up. The first fingerpicking thing I learned was “Blackbird” by the Beatles and that was the first time I thought I sounded kinda good. When I was a kid, I thought, “Wow! This [fingerpicking] sounds way better than just strumming a chord.” I never really learned a lot of chords, I still just play a lot of chords in first position. I was just playing C and G and D open and I thought, “Well now I sound like I’m really playing something.” 

I didn’t listen to blues until I was in high school and then I was kind of imitating country, blues, and my stepdad’s friend on banjo. Later, I was trying to be like Mississippi John Hurt; and I kinda wanted to be like Chet Atkins. But I couldn’t ever figure that out. 

I see plenty of folks in the scene who idolize Derek Trucks or Joe Bonamassa or even Molly Tuttle and Billy Strings who are coming up. There are these guitar fans that just idolize and adore them. Have you seen guitar fans trying to capture what you’re doing with your playing?

Not really? I don’t know. There are some people on Facebook and Instagram who message [me] and want to talk about my guitar style, but they’re usually just into old-timey blues stuff. Then we just talk about that. Sometimes they ask who I listen to. But I think [the implication is], “You’re really close to maybe being like this person I know of.” 

I can think of a lot of shredders out there, but I do the same kind of riffs in every key that I play in. I feel like I can say I really do fingerpick well, but I know people that really do it and can play as well with their left hand as their right. I’m not quite there. [Laughs]

It’s hard to talk about music and performing right now without acknowledging the giant, COVID-19 elephant in the room. It’s interesting to me that this moment of pausing, of stopping everything, especially in the music industry, has given artists a chance to refocus or realign their priorities – have you been thinking about the future? Thinking about the present? How has the pandemic felt to you? 

The first three months I was just depressed and drinking a lot and not doing anything. Then recently, I’ve been trying to write. I’ve been jamming with my friend Milo, who plays a lot of lead guitar on two of my albums, and we’re going to make some demos together. I’ve also been thinking about going to school, trying to get into some kind of two-year program. Since music might not [come back], there might not be live music for two more years. I’m thinking about getting a job. [Laughs] 

It’s daunting to wake up every day like, “I’m going to keep doing this now, because I believe — I think — it’s going to happen in the future.” It’s a lot! 

Yeah, it’s like, “Maybe music is just not essential…” You know? [Sad chuckle] 

Then, with the whole Zoom thing and the livestream thing, I’m just not really into it. I’m not enjoying it at all, it feels weird. It’s just like, sitting in a room by yourself, trying to make a video, and then you think, “Should I look into the camera? Should there be talking in between?” You’re trying to imitate a set at a venue, but you’re just sitting by yourself. It just feels weird! I would rather just play by myself, without a camera. 

I liked playing shows [before] kind of, but I almost didn’t even like that. At least it felt like there was a reason for doing it. I was talking to my mom and we both realized we used to watch concerts before, too. Just then it was an actual concert on film. Even that would be better! If there were somehow an audience in the livestream… I guess that can’t be, but it’s just awkward [without them.] Seeing a band play off of the energy of the room is more what it’s about.

Well, for your Shout & Shine livestream performance we’ll have to ask our audience to be “loud” in the comments! Use that clapping hands emoji! [Laughs] Who would you like to see as a guest on Shout & Shine? Whose music is inspiring you right now and getting you through the day-to-day?

I like Tré Burt! Amythyst Kiah, too. 

Have you heard of Yes Ma’am? They’re from New Orleans – the singer sometimes plays solo, but also has a band. They used to busk on the street in New Orleans. It’s just really good, a great kinda folky string band. 

I like the new Run The Jewels album. I listen to Elliott Smith still, and a lot of ‘90s music. I like Black Pumas a lot.

What would you like to see from the music community, as far as a response to this moment in our culture’s history — not only the racial injustice and righteous rebellions against police brutality, but also how divided and polarized our musical community is now. It’s like half people who want music to “remain apolitical” and half folks who are like, “Music has always been political, where the fuck have you been all along?” What do you see as the urgent need of our community to reconcile all of this? I know that’s a huge question.

I think it just needs to become about honesty again. That’s something I would like to see. I’m not really that into “Americana” music, but even so I feel like [Americana] musicians are going to be faced with not being able to let these issues go unaddressed anymore. I think that’s interesting. At this point, you can’t just put out your weird corny love song that’s not even about anything that happened in your life, but is actually just something that makes sense pop-wise and hit-wise. You should have to really be honest. People don’t necessarily have to be “political,” they can just write about all the emotions they’re going through. We’re all dealing with the pandemic and with Trump and with police brutality — it’s a lot. Even if people don’t want to write a song about why we should get rid of the police, they could at least write about how scared they are. I don’t know, there’s a different, new kind of folk that could happen about just being freaked out and unsure of your future. I love shit like that. 

I kinda don’t like protest songs from people who didn’t do it before. It’s just not hitting right. I don’t want your protest music if you weren’t writing it before. Whatever issue is being highlighted, it’s always like, “Yeah, we’ve BEEN talking about that.” [Expectant pause] This has been the conversation. I’m into punk, I’ve always liked protest music. As far as folk, I do like its protest music, but I mostly like punk or really politically-charged hip-hop. It’s kind of annoying when say, a really poppy country person who’s never said anything about anything is writing a protest song. It’s just cashing in. It’s corny. It’s weird. 

And another thing, a lot of people who are going out to these Black Lives Matter protests and stuff, I still don’t feel like they would treat me any differently than they normally would. I saw people posing and taking pictures. This is a weird thing to just be a trend. 

Like Breonna Taylor now being a meme.

Yeah. It’s offensive, it’s too much. 

And how many times they show those videos [of Black people being murdered by police]. There’s a lot of murder porn going around! People are saying one thing, but showing someone die every day. I was kind of like, “You know, I don’t think they would show a video of a white person being killed, over and over again.” A lot of things happening right now are really dehumanizing and I don’t think people can see it unless they really, really think about it. Or maybe put themselves in that position. It’s murder porn.

I know what happened. I don’t want to see this over and over again. I don’t need to physically see it to be angry about it. Think of all the bad this is doing to our psyches on top of everything else, seeing people murdered every day. 

But, a lot of musicians are “activists” now, I guess. I just… don’t really know what that means. They were going to put out a song anyway. That’s what they do for a living. Obviously they can’t just put out the typical love song — that’s what people always write about, love. That would be “offensive.” Or, it wouldn’t be “appropriate.” So they all have to change and pretend to be “activists.” It’s just a reflection of what’s trending right now. 

I just want to know: Are they actually going to change in a year? I’m curious to know how long the Black Lives Matter profile pictures are going to stay up. 

Photo credit: Randi Steinberger

The String – Corb Lund

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

With ten albums and 20 years under his belt, Alberta’s Corb Lund is one of the finest and wittiest songwriters working the Western end of country music. The singer is now on his way to legendary status in Rocky Mountain cowboy-inspired songwriting.


LISTEN: APPLE PODCASTS

His newest is Agricultural Tragic, a 13-song collection that evokes the characters and colors of his home region. Also in the hour, Henry Hicks talks about Black Music Month and Black Lives Matter. Hicks is the CEO of the National Museum of African American Music, opening this fall in Nashville.

WATCH: Tré Burt, “Undead God of War”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Tré Burt
Hometown: Sacramento, California
Song: “Undead God of War”
Album: Caught It From the Rye
Label: Oh Boy Records

In Their Words: “I was living in Australia during the 2016 elections and the BLM protests responding to Black lives murdered by police officers, namely Philando Castile and Keith Lamont Scott. The country was wailing in pain, rage and unrest and I could hear it from across the world. With everything in me I wanted to go back home and mourn with my community during such a pivotal time in transition, but I couldn’t yet afford a plane ticket. In the garage shed I was renting out one night I wrote this song, ‘Undead God of War,’ in a state of catharsis. I figure if I couldn’t be home the next best thing I could do was to put it to song. Fast forward four years to the present and nothing’s changed. Today, we are fighting for justice for George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmed Aubrey, Stephon Clark and the countless others. The Undead God of War is as alive now as it was when colonialists first stole this land and took it for their own. We are not surprised by this, for this is the America we are introduced to as children. It is also the America that I fight for, my first love, my demise, my home.” — Tré Burt

WATCH: Candi Staton, “I Wonna Holla”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Candi Staton
Single: “I Wonna Holla”
Album: It’s Time to Be Free (2016)
Release Date: June 19, 2020 (video)

In Their Words: “I’m so proud to be among the men, women and children of all races, marching together to end systemic racism, police brutality, [and] to reform the criminal justice system. When I saw George Floyd literally being lynched by a white police officer in the eyes of the whole world, my soul and my spirit wept. It brought back so many unpleasant memories from my own life.*

“Then I remembered ‘I Wonna Holla,’ a song I wrote years ago. Sometimes it’s hard to describe pain, tears and emotions. It makes you feel like you’re losing it, but this song says it all — ‘It Makes Me Wonna Holla!’ Now I really, really do want to holla! This song represents the language of the unheard. I will be donating to organizations like Black Lives Matter and others who are fighting to further the cause to stop police brutality, and those helping to rebuild small businesses that were looted while protesters were marching against this injustice.” — Candi Staton

*As a teenager in the 1950s, Staton worked the gospel circuit with Sam Cooke, where she and her musicians were victims of segregation and racial profiling. In 1963, she was in Birmingham, Alabama, and experienced the chaos and heartbreak on the day of the 16th Street church bombing.

Photo credit: Drea Nicole

Healing the Heartbreak: A Conversation with Chastity Brown

Posted on by Editor

“All my life, I was afraid of everything, and I wouldn’t touch what was beautiful to me,” sings Chastity Brown on “Drive Slow,” the first track on her new LP, Silhouette of Sirens. Appropriately, it’s a song filled with motion: an automotive chug toward the horizon, a call to move on and leave our ashes behind. But, like Brown herself, it’s more complex than just that. There are moments to stop, plant your feet, and savor the stillness, a rearview mirror filled with memories both sweet and sinister.

But Brown likes to move, no doubt — right now, she’s just completed a run in Denver, where she’ll be singing in Ani DiFranco’s back-up band later in the night. She certainly likes to move on, too, and Silhouette of Sirens finds the Minnesota-residing, Tennessee-born artist pondering perseverance: how to overcome and heal a broken heart with an understanding of all the many ways one can be shattered in the first place.

Now signed to Red House Records, Brown crafted Silhouette of Sirens with her longtime writing partner, Robert Mulrennan, and the result is a set of songs that exist in the perfect sweet spot between roots inspiration and modern sensibilities. And with plenty of soul-bearing honesty, too. “I try to find a way to sing where I’m not having a therapy session,” says Brown. “But I think there is a lot of longing on this record.” These aren’t songs to be heard prone on the couch anyway. “Pouring Rain” has a soul-filled groove, and “Carried Away” is a delicate but sweeping mid-tempo ode to rising up and over what sets us adrift.

You just got back from a jog — does running help you think creatively?

It helps me calm down. I think I have such high anxiety that it clears out the cob webs. I don’t do it to be entirely healthy. I just have to have something to take the edge off.

It’s been quite a bit of time since 2012’s Back-Road Highways, your last release. So much has changed since then: You have a new label, you’re five years older, we have a new president. How do you reflect back on it all?

There are mile markers that I think are physical: a record label, for one. I finished the album two years ago and, at that point, I had taken two years to make it. That was the longest I had taken for anything. And, at that time, I was also turning 33. I’m not religious or anything, but I was like, “This is my Jesus Christ year. This is my Buddha year.” Thirty-three is where you go big or go home. And I gave myself permission to actually be ambitious and gave myself permission to get what they call in the music business a “team.” To make the album, I had emotionally gone through a really dark time without realizing it, and that influenced the work. I was separating all the dark shit going on in my head with these songs I was writing with my writing partner. It wasn’t until after I finished that I was like, “Holy shit, this actually digs deep into my subconscious and exercises some demons I wasn’t ready to acknowledge.”

How so?

The music reflected itself back to me and, in one part, let me know I was quite broken, and in another part of the album, let me know I wasn’t that way anymore. It’s a fucking therapy session, but I can’t say what it feels like to be different. Though I know I’m literally in a different place than when I was making it.

Was it difficult to give up your independence and sign to a label?

Yeah, I’m a little bit — and I think my band mates can vouch for the fact that — I am a little bit controlling. But at the same time, this isn’t really possible to do alone. I had to ask people for their gifts and talent. It was difficult to relinquish some of that, but we all work really well together. I’m a 34-year-old woman who is not going to be told what to do. Working with these people on collaboration, I don’t feel like it’s me telling them what to do or the opposite. But I do have clear goals, and it wasn’t just a spur-of-the-moment decision. It was thought out, and I have to trust them. And I do.

You mentioned the album was finished two years ago, so do these songs still feel fresh to you?

I was expecting them to be old by now, but they’re not old to me. Maybe it’s just my relationship with them. For 2016, I got the incredible opportunity to tour with Ani DiFranco, and that was the real test of these songs. And I feel like they can hold their own. I still love them. But after you create, and you go on the road, and you geek out, the songs are still evolving. All I did is capture where these songs were at the time. But now I’ve changed, shit’s changed. They augment with me.

Who were you then versus now?

What I was experiencing during that dark time was having a really dark childhood. I think because of that — and the album is not about that at all — but I feel really sensitive to other people’s stories, and what I had realized is, that time period in my life broke my heart. As a child, my heart was broken, and it has taken me so long to mend that and allow love in my life. So the overall theme came out that there are different types of heartbreak. Of course there are love songs, but there are other things that break your heart. There is more to life than songs about coupled relationships — though I love those — but this is a little bit broader. A macro view of different types of heartbreak informed by my own personal heartbreak.

You’re singing with Ani tonight and you’ve opened for her in the past. That must have been an amazing, informative experience.

Yeah. Shit. I’ve said this before: It’s the most generous thing that any artist has done. She’s showed me how it’s done, in a different way. I’ve been touring for 10 years, but there are different things at her level, which you can only see from there. In the folk world, it’s generational, passing things down. It’s huge to me, how generous she’s been. And it’s a good affirmation that someone I respect gives me a thumbs up.

Did you have conversations with her about what it means to be a politically engaged artist?

Well, I don’t think we talk in terms of what things mean. We were out on the road when Trump was elected president, and what we talked about was how to act, and in what capacity. We have such a privilege, all across the country: When you step on stage, you are the loudest person in the room. I feel like Ani teaches by showing. She stands in her integrity so fiercely, it made me want to articulate even more what matters to me. Like how Black Lives Matter has been a huge cornerstone in what I talk about from stage the past year-and-a-half, and it will be until I feel like folks get it. You’d be surprised how many “liberal” audiences have a rebuttal to that.

Really?

I remember in Utah, I was talking about this Nina Simone song and I said, “I play this because Black lives matter.” And this woman was like, “All lives matter!” I want to use compassion to educate people, but at the same time, God, that woman fucking infuriated me. But it wasn’t the time. Going back to what to do as an artist during these times, it’s to use your voice in the capacity of your life. I’m from Tennessee; I have family members who voted for Trump. And those are family members I love, and I can’t pretend that they are evil. But I can get down and dirty in a difficult conversation, trying to figure out where they are coming from.

Have you written any overtly political songs?

I have, but none that I would play out. One of the titles was like, “Fuck You Pieces of Shit!” An ongoing rant. I was like, maybe I can kind of hone it in! But I have been creating. A lot of people are saying, “What are artists going to say as a comeback to all this?” And I’ve heard some incredible work that’s going after how fucked up our government is, but there are other things to focus on. Like the beauty of being a brown woman and celebrating that. There was a time after so many police shootings, all the songs I was writing were really angry. But Solange [and her 2016 LP, A Seat at the Table] was a great reminder of “Yo, let’s talk about our beauty.” And we should.

Photo credit: Wale Agboola