Tag: durham

On ‘O Come All Ye Faithful,’ Hiss Golden Messenger’s M.C. Taylor Sees the Light

Posted on by Editor

When M.C. Taylor presented his idea of a Hiss Golden Messenger holiday record last fall, the label team at Merge Records began scratching their heads. Anyone familiar with the singer-songwriter would agree he just doesn’t seem like the type.

But this juxtaposition is at the heart of Taylor’s intentions to create a more relatable soundtrack for a season he felt has been oversimplified by an excess of enduring holiday hymns and hits. As an artist, he has never connected with the holiday music resounding in big box stores throughout the season. Last winter, in the face of inconceivable global hurt, this flamboyant backdrop felt particularly jarring.

After he wrapped up the Quietly Blowing It LP in the summer of 2020, Taylor still felt the tugging desire to create. While the year stormed outside the tiny window of his home studio in Durham, North Carolina, he was determined to capture authenticity within an often-romanticized season. What began as yet another coping mechanism soon took shape as a Hiss Golden Messenger album, O Come All Ye Faithful.

“There were definitely moments when I was making it when I thought to myself: ‘Am I insane? Has the pandemic made me lose my compass on what my music is meant to do?’” Taylor tells BGS. “But once we were a couple of songs into it, everything sort of clicked into place. I was like, ‘This totally makes sense. This sounds like a Hiss record, actually.’”

A self-proclaimed “second-guesser,” Taylor found creative refuge in a more interpretative state of mind, rather than relying solely on his usual songwriting process. His only directives from the start were to make a record that feels “lush, slow, and contemplative.” Despite these uncharacteristic parameters, his purist approach to the album captures the poignant emotions of closing out a season, or a chapter.

As the year winds down, enjoy our BGS Artist of the Month interview with Hiss Golden Messenger’s M.C. Taylor.

BGS: The holiday album has been done by countless artists. What did you feel you could contribute or expand upon within this enduring tradition, and why is that important to you at this point?

Taylor: Well, I should say at the outset that I’m certainly not an expert on holiday music. I’ve realized that even more over the past couple of weeks when people, knowing that I’ve just made this record, will be like, “Oh man, you’re into holiday music. Have you heard this or that record?” And I’m like, “I haven’t heard any of it.” My collection of holiday records is remarkably thin. I have a handful of “holiday records” that I consistently return to.

But I’ve noticed that often the music I hear, the stuff that seems to get played out in public during the season, doesn’t hit the emotional note that I’m feeling. And it doesn’t really resonate with anyone I know either. This big, brash, brassy, super uptempo, almost turbocharged holiday music seems to be the background to this season, but I started to feel like maybe it doesn’t have to be. Maybe I can come up with something that feels more in step with how everybody I know feels around this time of year.

When did you write these three original tracks, and how do they fit into this concept?

I keep hedging my bets by calling it a seasonal record; I’m not sure how that’s exactly different from a holiday record. But these were all written with this record in mind.

The first one, “Hung Fire,” is a very intimate song and a meditation on this time of year and how hard it can be on many people. It’s sort of a meditation on suicide in a way, which is a bit heavy, but I felt like there was a place for it on this record. Aoife O’Donovan sings on that one. That was the first stuff that she sent back to me after I asked her to sing, and I was just like, “Oh my God!” She is an absolute ace in the hole. She’s one of the greatest singers that I know.

Lyrically, “By the Lights of St. Stephen” is loosely based on this old seasonal song called “The Wren” that I learned from a record by an English family acapella group called The Watersons. So, if you ever find that song, certain lines are similar, and then I kind of take it off into a different place.

I felt it was incumbent on me to nod towards Jewish seasonal traditions. My wife is Jewish, and my kids identify as Jewish, so we put Woody Guthrie’s “Hanukkah Dance” on there. And I was trying to work on another one, but it’s hard to fit the word ‘Hanukkah’ into a song. I had this idea of a song that featured candles, a big part of the tradition. I don’t know if anyone else hears this. Probably not. But I think of “Grace” as the other Hanukkah song.

From your perspective, why did “Shine a Light” and “As Long as I Can See the Light” work well with this theme?

I had a long list of songs I felt could be seasonal songs by association. Meaning if I put them together with other songs like “Silent Night” or “O Come All Ye Faithful,” they could be, in that context, interpreted as a song as it spoke to this particular time of year. Thematically, the record returns to the idea of light and dark, searching for light or a spark during a season that feels quite dark. It also uncovers the notion that we don’t understand light without darkness. I’ve always loved those tunes, and I wanted to see if we could do something to them that made them feel like they were supposed to be on the record.

When we spoke earlier this year, you felt uncertain about getting back on the road after adjusting to life at home. With your tour starting up again, has that feeling changed?

One thing I’ve grown to miss over the past couple of years, aside from playing live in front of people, is routine. And a tour gives me the closest thing that I have to a regular, everyday routine. I’ve always been a creature of habit, but the past couple of years brought this idea home that I function best with like a daily regimen; I like to know what I’m going to be doing. And I can’t say that I had that during this pandemic. Certainly, many of the traveling musicians I know were at loose ends as to what to do with themselves.

How did the pandemic and all the political fury affect your approach to this record?

This idea came in the fall of 2020, a few months after I finished Quietly Blowing It. Again, the approach goes back to this need for routine. I needed to be working on something that kept me busy in the days, and I also needed to be working on something that made me feel peaceful at a time full of chaos and anxiety. So, that was where I went. Music has always been a pretty dependable place for me to go. I’m not even sure that I would have made this record had we not been living in such a chaotic time that felt so full of uncertainty and grieving.

Growing up, what were your family’s traditions surrounding the holiday season? How do you feel that translates in these musical selections?

We celebrated Christmas, and my family was pretty tight. I grew up in Southern California, so I have this specific set of memories, like a beautiful, sunny Southern California Christmas Day — not the norm for most. Strangely, the soundtrack to Camelot was a constant. If you were to ask anybody in my family what holiday music you listen to, everybody would say Camelot. It took me until I was a full-grown adult to realize that that is not technically a holiday record. But somehow, it’s still really associated. If you place songs in the vicinity of the holidays, your brain will start making a connection.

Are there any particular points of nostalgia within your selections here?

It’s kind of a nostalgic feeling record, but I don’t know that it comes from childhood. The songs are not necessarily from my childhood, but I feel like the emotions within the record speak to a bittersweet set of emotions that have been with me since I was a kid. When I was quite young, I remember talking to my mom about the holidays, and she said: ‘This is always a really hard time of year for me.’ And I understood what she was saying. There is a sense of grief that comes with the closing of a year. I feel like that grief can be echoed in the natural world outside as we see things closing up for the winter before the hopefulness that comes with spring. My feelings about the winter holidays have always been a quiet time of contemplation.

Photo Credit: Chris Frasina

LISTEN: Rodes, “So Well”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Rodes
Hometown: Durham, North Carolina
Song: “So Well”
Album: All of My Friends
Release Date: October 22, 2021

In Their Words: “‘So Well’ was an idea that came to me on the drive home from work one night, that was then fleshed out on a guitar the next day. I was nearing the end of a tumultuous professional relationship and feeling frustrated and powerless. I think there are elements of it that can be interpreted as a breakup song, and in some ways it is. Ultimately, it’s a song about power imbalance and not having the right tools or access to bring someone to justice.

“We tried out a couple different arrangements for ‘So Well,’ but ultimately decided on one that centered on rhythmic acoustic guitar and a straightforward drum beat. I had the slide guitar line in my head, but I couldn’t quite translate it to the guitar while keeping it in tune. Ryan (Johnson, formerly of American Aquarium) stepped in and laid down a beautiful lead part that really anchors the whole song. I think he captured the mournful and resigned spirit of it perfectly.” — Rodes

Photo credit: Chris Frisina

The Show On The Road – Hiss Golden Messenger

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

This week on The Show On The Road, we dial into North Carolina for a comprehensive conversation with Grammy-nominated songwriter MC Taylor, who for the last decade and a half has created heart-wrenchingly personal and subtly political music fronting the acclaimed roots group Hiss Golden Messenger.

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With his newest release Quietly Blowing It, Taylor continues to tell stories that are at turns hopeful and devastating — as if deeply examining his own faults and features as a father, husband, citizen and artist can help us understand our own struggles during this deeply strange time. Despite the often delicate delivery of his vocal performances, it isn’t a shock to see that Taylor, who grew up in California before heading to the south, did start in the hardcore and punk worlds before he became one of the faces of the Americana resurgence. While a song like “Hardlytown” feels like a jangly, lost Basement Tapes take from The Band, Taylor mines his own confusion about how broken our once-ambitious country has become. Why can’t we come together to address climate change, gun violence, or systemic poverty? Is he doing enough? While Taylor has been open about examining his own depression and doubt over the last few years, it’s through these songs that we can see a light forming at the end of a dark tunnel.

Maybe it’s the personal acceptance of the confusion and helplessness that makes Quietly Blowing It pack such a quiet punch and seem somehow sonically uplifting. During our conversation, Taylor would be the first to tell you that while folky, slow-burn songs like “Way Back In The Way Back” seem to exalt the healing power of nature while questioning the broken bureaucracies that govern our unique American way of life (“up with the mountains, down with the system!”) he isn’t trying to make a statement. One thing that we all learned to do during our ongoing lockdowns in 2020 and beyond is to think smaller. We don’t have to change everything from the moment we wake up. Maybe it’s about going within and seeing the world just from the scope of your own neighborhood, your own family, your own green, growing, hissing backyard. A song doesn’t have to solve it all in one go.

Gathering confidence from previous standout records Heart Like A Levee (2016), Hallelujah Anyhow (2017) and the Grammy-nominated Terms Of Surrender (2019), it’s clear that while the last few years haven’t been easy for Taylor, he’s reaching new heights creatively. Quietly Blowing It may seem like a defeatist message — but actually its more like laying all the cards on the table. Honesty is freeing. Taylor will be embarking on a rare solo tour coming up, which would be an amazing way to see his intimate brand of songwriting up close.

Photo credit: Chris Frisina

Hiss Golden Messenger’s ‘Quietly Blowing It’ Blends N.C. Warmth With L.A. Glow

Posted on by Editor

When M.C. Taylor decided to make another Hiss Golden Messenger album, he instinctively knew it needed to be done in real time, in an actual studio, in his adopted hometown of Durham, North Carolina. Recorded in the summer of 2020, Quietly Blowing It reflects a joyful spirit even as a fog of anxiety hung over the sessions. And in some ways, Taylor believes that a sense of tension is what this album is all about.

But in contrast to the image of making a million minor mistakes, Quietly Blowing It may be his most accessible album yet. (His prior effort, 2019’s Terms of Surrender, landed a Grammy nomination for Best Americana Album.) As he’s done for years, Taylor asks a lot of questions in his lyrics without filling in the answer. One could say that he positions himself as a moderator who introduces a conversation, rather than an expert who knows everything about everything.

“That’s always been the way that I write,” he tells BGS. “I’ve been talking for many years about this idea of making an album that’s full of questions with no answers. In a lot of ways, I’m less interested in the answer than I am in the question, if that makes sense. Because the answer might change from day to day. I find the question often to be the thing remains steady, more or less.”

Not long before heading back to his native California to finally visit his family there, Taylor caught up with BGS by phone about Quietly Blowing It, releasing June 25.

BGS: One of the reasons I like listening to “Sanctuary” is because you can hear the band in the groove, in the space between the verses. It makes it feel like a band record.

Taylor: I think for the type of music that I make, the best light that it can be shown in is when you can hear everybody working together. The music is a collective music and it thrives on the collective energy of the players. That’s why I was hesitant to jump into making anything totally remotely. If my options were to either record remotely or do nothing, I would have chosen not to make a record because that collective energy feels really important to this music.

The second time I listened to this album all the way through, I really noticed the drums. It’s like its own energy coming through. Did you feel that too?

Yeah, in a lot of ways the record was written around the drum parts. I spent a lot of time coming up with the way I wanted the drums to work, at home, and sketching out drum patterns and drum parts, and layering different percussive elements over that. Then I brought those ideas to the two people that played all that stuff: Matt McCaughan played the drum kit and a friend of mine named Brevan Hampden played a lot of the percussion. It was meant to feel like this churning machine, almost. You know what I mean? A lot of the parts are pretty simple, but they’re sympathetic to the songs. Simple in theory, but very hard to play in a way that swings as hard as Matt and Brevan do.

To me, “Hardlytown” is about people who are staying the course against a world that’s pushing back against them. Is that pretty close to what that song is about?

Yeah, that song is addressing this idea of the way that we set up the systems in order to live our lives the way we think we want to. And how, so often, what we give feels like more than what we get back. There are many ways to do that math, of course. When I started out being a musician, I spent way more than I made back. That was like the first 15 years of my life as a musician, playing out in public.

However, there’s the whole existential math. [Laughs] Where you start to factor in joy and spiritual payoff, and that becomes another set of equations that start to figure into it all. I was trying to work my way through that, “Hardlytown” being the place where maybe you don’t get back what you put into it, but you keep at it anyway. It’s meant to be a little salty around the edges but it’s meant to be a song of hope. It may not be unqualified hope, but I think the heart of that song is a certain kind of hope.

There’s a line in that song that says, “People, get ready / There’s a big ship coming,” and that reminded me of your love of Curtis Mayfield. Why does his music resonate with you?

He’s the whole package to me. He has an absolute command of groove. His arrangements are so elegant and affecting. He really knew how to make you feel something, and his writing is second to none, in terms of finding that sweet spot between the sacred and the everyday. I’ve said this a lot lately, but he was really good about singing about the potential of hope. You think about the time during which songs like “People Get Ready” were written. It’s hard to imagine there was an abundance of hope for him and the communities that he moved through. But they somehow continued to write these songs that feel anthemic, in the way that they talk about the potential of hope, and how important hope is to carry, even if you can’t fly the flag at the particular hope at that moment.

In the video for “If It Comes in the Morning,” you have Mike Wiley, a Black actor, lip-syncing to your track. Why did that treatment appeal to you?

It’s been interesting to hear certain reactions to that video. First of all, Mike Wiley is a friend of mine that I’ve been doing work with, off and on, for over a decade. He’s an incredible stage actor. And I knew that I wanted somebody to be looking directly into a camera as they lip-synced the words. So, my thought was, who can stare into a camera for the duration of the song without flinching? And not have crazy camera eyes? I can’t do that, I don’t have that skill set. You put a camera on me for more than three minutes and I start to look like George Jones or something. [Laughs]

So, my intuition was to get in touch with Mike Wiley. He’s an expert at that. It certainly was not lost on me that Mike Wiley is a Black actor, so there was going to be added layers of information with that video. And heightened interpretations because of the moments we are living through collectively. I’ve heard some people say, “I don’t get this video. What is this video trying to say or do?” And plenty of people have not commented either way, whatever, they like the song. Other people have been angry about it. But when I see the video, I see my buddy Mike Wiley lip-syncing the words and Mike happens to be an extremely gifted actor who is Black.

What does the word “it” represent in that title, “If It Comes in the Morning”?

I mean, it depends. “It” could be victory, defeat. If things go my way in the morning, how am I going to behave to people that were on my side, or people who were on the other side? If defeat arrives in the morning, how am I going to behave to people that I was working with, or to people who were working against me? I was thinking about how I might behave to someone that might be my adversary in some situation. Would I behave with respect? Or would I kick sand in their face? I like to think the former, but sometimes I think the latter. And that’s a “quietly blowing it” moment. [Laughs]

How would you describe the room where you wrote these songs?

It’s about 10 feet by 12 or 14 feet. It’s pretty small and it’s full of guitars, books, records, and sometimes a drum kit and amplifiers. Depending on my mood, it can feel like an oasis or like a prison cell. [Laughs]

During that time when we were all staying home, I spent a lot of time on the greenway. Did you get a chance to get outside, too?

Yeah, we got outside a fair bit. We have a pretty big backyard. Durham is full of green spaces, so yeah, I found the outdoors to be a balm over this past year. No question about that. We did a lot of camping this year, and that was fun also.

How did you wind up in Durham?

Many years ago, I went to grad school at UNC. This was back in 2007 and my wife and I just ended up staying. I don’t even remember what our intention was, whether we thought we were going to stay for a long time or move somewhere else. But this was pre-kids and over time North Carolina just started to feel like home. We bounced around this region a lot. We lived in Chapel Hill first and we lived outside of a small town called Pittsboro. Then we gravitated towards Durham. It’s a perfect-sized down in my opinion. Lots of incredible food, art, music, so this is where we ended up and it feels like home.

Before this band took off, I’m sure you were doing a lot of odd jobs. I think I read at some point that you were selling swimsuits over the phone?

Yeah, I did. That was a long time ago, back in college in California. I didn’t last. I was selling women’s swimsuits over the phone. Like, I was a 22-year-old guy and didn’t know the first thing about anything about that. [Laughs] I had no business answering those telephones. They should not have had me there. They didn’t have me there for long. They fired me after two weeks. They could tell I was the wrong person for the job.

You’ve said elsewhere that you still feel the pull of California. Is that why the video for “Glory Strums” looks the way it does?

Yes, it is. In normal times I would be in California many times a year. California is where most of my family still lives. Like many people, I haven’t seen them since this all started and my kids haven’t seen my parents in almost two years. I’m really pining for California in a way that I haven’t before. Because I’ve traveled to California so frequently, I’ve kept that homesickness at bay. It never affected me because I knew that within the next month or two months I would be out there again. I haven’t been out there for a year and a half and I can really feel it.

It made me think about this article in the New Yorker in 1998 called L.A. Glows. It’s about a native Californian meditating on the light in Southern California. I remember reading it at the time and thinking it was interesting. I understood this theory that different places could have different qualities of light that would affect people that knew that place. But now I can feel that on an emotional level.

How did that video come together?

Vikesh Kapoor is the director and he is someone I have known for many years. Back in 2013 or 2014, I was playing in Portland, Oregon, opening up for Justin Townes Earle, and I was traveling alone. I was looking for someone to sell merch for me, so I put out a call on social media, I think. Vikesh volunteered to do it and we met that night at the merch table, where he sold my stuff. We kept in touch after that. He’s a songwriter himself and he’s made a few great records. And he’s a pretty respected photographer.

I knew that he was living in Los Angeles now and I got this wild hair that I thought Vikesh could make a video. We talked a lot about the light – the hazy, Southern California quality of light that I was missing. I asked him whether he thought he could get that into the video and he did, to his great credit. He didn’t have a whole lot to go on. [Laughs] He made something that is really beautiful and it does speak to the place where the video was made.

During that time when you were touring solo, what did you like most about just you and the road?

I still do that kind of touring once in a while, just to get that feeling again. I mean, there’s something about being footloose out on the road that can be really exhilarating, even still. I’m one of those people that picked up Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and Desolation Angels when I was 17 years old and read them. I was just like, yep, this is the life for me. And the older I get, it’s a complex life, living your life on the road. You’ve got to work to take care of yourself, which I don’t think a lot of those Beat Generation writers did very well. But there remains a romance of just traveling through.

One thing I’ve noticed about this record, though, is that there’s a lot of other voices singing with you. What do you like about that?

I love the human voice as an instrument. Just like instruments, every human voice is different and resonates differently. It affects a microphone differently. I think that voices singing in harmony can really elevate a melody. It adds a very important color to a record, for me. We did have a bunch of voices on this record. It’s a pretty magical sensation to be able to sing in harmony with someone. It’s like an electric jolt is running through you.

Photo credit: Chris Frisina

WATCH: Hiss Golden Messenger, “Sanctuary”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Hiss Golden Messenger
Hometown: Durham, North Carolina
Song: “Sanctuary”
Release Date: January 13, 2021
Label: Merge Records

In Their Words: “Over the past year, I’ve been thinking a lot about how we care for ourselves and each other, and how hard it is to live truthfully in a world that is so tangled. ‘We sell the world to buy fire, our way lighted by burning men,’ says the poet Wendell Berry. The song ‘Sanctuary’ is one small piece of my own personal reckoning with what it feels like to search for some kind of shelter in the storm. Fare thee well, John Prine, AKA Handsome Johnny, a speaker of truth if ever there was one.” – M.C. Taylor / Hiss Golden Messenger

Photo credit: Chris Frisina

‘Color Me Country’ Host Rissi Palmer Finds a Musical Home in North Carolina

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Between caring for her two kids and hosting her brand new show, Color Me Country, on Apple Music Country, singer/songwriter and creator Rissi Palmer has had plenty to keep her busy since the touring industry shut down due to coronavirus. 

This week, Palmer will take part in our fifth annual Shout & Shine Online as part of IBMA’s World of Bluegrass conference and festival, performing a song from her most recent album, Revival. BGS jumped on the phone with Palmer to talk about the showcase, the musical heritage of North Carolina (her home for the past ten years), her musical community, Color Me Country, and more. 

(Editor’s note: Watch Shout & Shine Online here on October 3 at 2pm ET)

BGS: The production end of things has felt really different this year, putting Shout & Shine Online together virtually rather than in-person, like the last four years. But I bet being a performer feels pretty different to you in a pandemic right now as well? 

Rissi Palmer: The performance part of it is extremely strange. I’ll be perfectly honest, I don’t like doing livestreams. [Laughs] I do them, because that’s what we have to do, but yeah. Not a big fan. 

As far as the other [aspects], though, I have to say the time at home has been good for getting projects done. I’ll be honest with you, Color Me Country, I had been thinking about doing it for at least a year, but I didn’t have time, ’cause I was out on the road and doing all this stuff. Once we got to be home, once quarantine was happening, I had a little time — not a lot, because I have two children — to start working on it and actually sitting down and focusing. At the same time, with everything that’s going on I found it really hard to write. I’m flooded with a lot of different emotions right now, so I want to be creative, but the easiest thing for me has been channeling a lot of my feelings and frustrations into my show, not so much the music. I hate it, but I’m not being as musically creative as I’d like to be. It’s hard, I’m having a hard time. 

I did want to talk about Color Me Country, because Shout & Shine was created to literally provide a space for othered folks, marginalized folks, to exist within these genre formats and communities that have — whether stereotypically or traditionally or both — been white spaces for so long, and straight spaces for so long, and male spaces for so long. Shout & Shine is a space that’s not owned by any of the above, where we can celebrate the marginalized and underrepresented folks who have always been in these musics. I see you doing the same thing with Color Me Country. 

That’s exactly what Color Me Country is. That’s what I wanted to do. I feel like so many times, as an artist of color in a genre that is predominately white, you’re mostly talking to white journalists. You’re mostly talking to white outlets. A lot of times you are othered. I don’t think people do it to be mean, I don’t think it’s done in malice or anything like that. It just ends up being one of the more interesting parts of the interview, it’s more interesting to ask an interviewee [about identity or race]. For me, in my experience — and I can’t speak for everybody else — I spent most of my interviews when my album first came out in 2007 talking about being Black, not really talking about my art. That starts to wear on you after a while! 

When you’re in a situation where you know that you’re a part of “the system” and you don’t necessarily want to bite the hand that feeds you, you can’t be as honest as you want to be. You don’t want people to be immediately turned off. That’s how I felt as a new artist in a lot of ways. Now that I’m on my own and I’m older, I feel differently about the world and I have lots of opinions. [Laughs] I recognize the power in my platform that I didn’t recognize thirteen years ago. [With Color Me Country] I was just like, there has to be somewhere people can just talk. And not just talk about race, but about music and being a musician. A space free from worrying about alienating anybody or offending anyone. It’s just being honest.

Outside of the fact that I’m Black, outside of the fact that I’m a woman, I’m also a musician. I’ve been in a lot of the same rooms that these other artists have been in. I’ve had a lot of the experiences that they’ve had. So [on the show] we’re speaking to each other as peers. It’s an easier situation, I find. I end up getting stories or confessions or thoughts that people wouldn’t normally share. I think that’s good! I sometimes end up revealing things about myself in these conversations, because we’re being honest with each other. That’s what I wanted, because I didn’t feel like I had an outlet like that. Not that people weren’t kind to me or any of that, I just never felt that safe. 

The local connection of Shout & Shine has been a really important part of our mission, in years where we’ve held the showcase during IBMA’s conference in Raleigh in-person, connecting the show to the legacy of North Carolina’s roots music has been a part every year. The stories of bluegrass and country are tied so tightly to North Carolina, so I wanted to ask you about your connection to the state and what about its musical history and community that resonates with you?

First of all, I have been a North Carolinian for ten years now. I absolutely love it here. I live in Durham and specifically in our community — and I’ve lived in Los Angeles, I’ve lived in Nashville, I’ve lived in New York and Atlanta — I have to say this particular music community is my favorite. I say that because there are so many types of music here! There are so many really ridiculously talented people. I think that has something to do with the fact there are so many colleges here — or there’s something in the water! Really, nationally important music is being made here. Everyone is so open and so giving. It’s one of the few music communities that actually feels like a community. I know for me, being here has made me a better artist.

Being in Nashville, being in New York and being a part of the rat race, you tend to think in terms of commerciality and sales and that sort of thing, monetizing your creativity. Whereas here, mind you we want to make money, I’m always looking for ways to make money, but here it’s more like, “How can you use your art to help your community? How can you use your art to collaborate with these people for this cause?” Everywhere I turn there’s a way to use my platform, my voice, my art to elevate something. That’s really awesome and for me, that’s made my art more global. 

Just look at the art that comes out of here! Everything is extremely conscious, it’s thoughtful; I think that whatever is happening with the artists here, it resonates. Showing people what’s going on here and exposing it [to the world] is really important, because there’s so much good stuff here. 

Speaking of collaborations, your Shout & Shine Online performance includes Omar Ruiz-Lopez on a song you wrote called “You Were Here.” The performance is excellent and exquisite and we won’t give it away entirely, but tell us a bit about working with Omar and the song? 

First of all, I’m super excited to be a part of it! I was so excited when I got the email. Omar and Lizzy [Ross] of Violet Bell are two of my favorite people in the world. I think the world of them. They’re so ridiculously stupid talented. It’s not even funny. 

In 2018 I was a part of an artist in residency for like a week and we were all put in a house, the Oyster House, out on the coast. It was myself, Violet Bell, XOXOK — Keenan Jenkins, he’s local he’s amazing as well. We were there with a couple of playwrights, some artists, and we were in this house for a week. We got along really well, we’d jam at night, that sort of a thing. We all formed such tight relationships between us musicians, so any time we can perform together we try to make it happen. Omar actually played on the record of the song I did for the performance and so when I got the email and knew I was going to do this I knew I had to call Omar. Not only that, I was just chomping at the bit to have another musician in the shot with me!! I’m so sick of playing things by myself! [Laughs] I wanted to make it big and beautiful.

Another thing I just thought of while we’re talking, the song I’m doing is called “You Were Here.” It’s from my new album, Revival, and it’s about a miscarriage that I had in 2018. I had just met Lizzy and Omar and had just found out I was pregnant when we did the residency. The day that everything started happening I was actually in the studio with them — I didn’t even think about that, I was recording on their record. There was no one else I could do this with. 

Omar plays emotionally and that’s what this song needed. I remember when I called him to track on it, he did it in about two takes. We were sitting in the studio just bawling while we were recording it. He did an excellent job. I couldn’t imagine sharing this moment with anybody else. 

Photo courtesy of the artist.

Hiss Golden Messenger: Hope, Joy, and ‘Terms of Surrender’

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To make his eighth proper album as Hiss Golden Messenger, M.C. Taylor left his adopted hometown of Durham, North Carolina, and went… everywhere? He booked studio time in Nashville, tracked songs in New Orleans, and headed north to upstate New York, where he recorded at the studio owned by The National’s Aaron Dessner. There might have been even more cities in that list, but logistics and time cut his traveling sessions short.

“I wanted to make a record anywhere other than Durham,” he says. “I felt like I needed a change, and it felt like the songs were asking for a change. This is a wandering record. It just felt like the songs were wandering around a little bit. So I felt like maybe I should, too.”

Travel is a major theme of his music, both as inspiration and consequence. Working as a musician means touring; providing for his family means leaving them. Out on the road, however, he finds new reasons to make music. Taylor peppers Hiss Golden Messenger songs with place names, references to home and elsewhere. For Terms of Surrender he decided he needed to make that part of the creative process, which meant recording wherever he landed.

Taylor’s wanderlust extends to the music, too, which draws from a range of roots traditions: psychedelic folk and rural funk, southern soul and classic rock, American primitive guitar and ‘60s frat rock, J.J. Cale and the Staple Singers, Neil Young and composer Harry Partch. The result is a sober but hardly somber album that surveys America at the end of the 2010s, during a moment that is — to say the very least — tumultuous.

BGS: Place always feels so important to your music, so it made me wonder if getting away from a place was as important as getting to a place. Could you have made this record back home in Durham?

Taylor: Yeah, I could have made it in Durham. Definitely. But it would have a very different character. I try not to think of the records as the final form of the songs. I think of them as snapshots of the songs, snapshots in time — a documentation of the tunes as they exist among a certain group of people on a certain day in a certain city. So this particular version of Terms of Surrender is a document of that particular time in my life.

Given that these are wandering songs, and given that you’ve talked about the album coming out of a very hard year, how did that inform the music?

The trials and tribulations I was experiencing are obviously threaded through the songs. Some of that is maybe obvious lyrically, and some of it is a little more coded. It’s something that is obvious only to me. I was dealing with those issues in the composition of the songs, but the making of the record was pretty joyous. Actually, the writing was, too, because it’s always a cathartic experience.

So I can’t really say that I went into the writing of the songs in a tortured place and came out with all the answers. The songs were just a way for me to speak about that stuff, to process it in a way that made me feel like I was evolving emotionally. Not that I was solving my problems, but I was at least beginning to understand what they were. We don’t find an answer in an instant, but we can identify the issue and over time find ways to address it.

To what degree can you talk about the events that informed this album?

It’s a tricky question, because it was something that was part of the fabric of my life for the last year or two. It’s something that comes up in the one-sheet because every record has to have a story, but then when it comes time to talk about it, it’s tough. You never know how much you want to reveal, you know what I mean? I’m a pretty open person but there’s this curtain between all of the stuff that I make public and all the stuff that I keep private.

So I’ll just say that I had some personal problems with someone that I worked very closely with. It felt like over the years they had become an emotionally abusive person. I couldn’t even put a name to the things I was feeling because of that relationship. I thought I had lost my way a little bit. Over time I came to understand what was going on and was able to extricate myself from that relationship. That was important. And then to have all that against the backdrop of the way our country feels right now… it was a lot. I’m a sensitive guy, I guess.

That definitely seems like something that informs these songs, but it’s not a political record. It’s more about living at a certain time when these things are encroaching on your mental health.

And I want to be clear: I’m one of the fortunate ones. I’m a white man in this country. I’m living on Easy Street compared to people of color, queer people, women. But that was a question that came up on the last record, Hallelujah Anyhow. That wasn’t really a political record either, unless you realize that everything is political. The personal is political; the emotional is political. But that record and the new one were made a different times, so the relationship to hope is different.

That’s something I picked up on: this sense of optimism as well as something like joy. That’s not necessarily a word that I associate with this time in history, but it comes through on a lot of these songs.

On Hallelujah Anyhow joy and hope seemed like these bright, sharp things, a nice glinting in the sunlight. They could cut through just about anything. But they work differently on this record, I think, because you realize that we have to work at them every day. If we don’t, they’ll become dull and unwieldy.

And hope and joy are things that I have to work at. Some of these songs are reminders to myself to work at these things that bring me hope and joy. You have to keep that bright thing sharp. It’s like marriage: If you stay in a marriage long enough, you realize that it takes a lot of hard work to keep it going. I’m pretty sure that that’s the way forward for me if I want to survive.

Is it difficult to get into that mindset when you’re writing, to remind yourself of these larger goals?

There are days when I wake up and think, I don’t want to make this music anymore. I don’t want to make any music anymore. This isn’t something that’s making me happy anymore. There’s too much competition, too much saber-rattling, which is all so superfluous to what we all actually do. I guess I’m interested in people who have been making music for a long time, because I want to be in this for the long haul. How does their language change over time? How do they adapt to survive in the world?

You mentioned that you wrote these songs as reminders to yourself. Does that change how you relate to them on the road, when you have to perform them night after night?

That’s why I try to approach records as snapshots. I know the songs are going to change every night, because of the emotional content in them. That changes the phrasing of how I sing certain things. Part of that comes from my emotional understanding of the songs, you know? The other part of that is that my favorite songs are the one I write without totally understanding. Usually I’m not very satisfied with them when I get them down on paper, but eventually I realize that if I live with that dissatisfaction, it’ll becomes something different.

It’s like there’s a hand that is guiding this stuff. It’s not God-like; it’s more an unconscious feeling that it’s okay to feel that way. It’s OK to feel like, “OK, this is as good as I can do right now. I don’t have the time or the emotional capacity right now to make this any better.” And then you just leave it. It’s like planting a seed. It grows even though the words on the page don’t change.

Is there a particular song in your catalog that changed or grown like that?

I would say most of the songs that are in live rotation remain in the set list because there is that element of discovery from day to day or week to week. “Blue Country Mystic” [from 2012’s Poor Moon] is a good one. And there’s one on the new record called “Down at the Uptown,” which is about this dive bar where we all used to hang out in the Mission District in San Francisco. This was many years ago, late ‘90s. It was a formative place for many of us.

I knew that I wanted to write about that time in my life, and I did the best I could. But it felt clunky. I thought, I’m just going to leave these words here and hope that if something better does come along, it’ll be better than what’s on the page now. But the process of singing it in rehearsals has made me realize that no, this is really good. Not a great song, but for me it’s good. It does the thing that I needed it to do.

That one did stand out because it seemed like a very specific reference to a very specific place. I thought it might be in North Carolina, but I was on the wrong side of the country.

I don’t even know if the Uptown is still there. When my friends and I moved to San Francisco in the late ‘90s, we found this bar on the corner of 17th and Capp in the Mission District. It was pretty scuzzy, you know. But the Uptown was this little hidden waystation where all of us learned to drink. There were a lot of promises made at that place, some of which we kept and some of which we didn’t. It was a clubhouse. And the jukebox was very educational. Lots of stuff on there was way above my pay grade. That’s where I heard Patti Smith’s “Horses” for the first time. I’d be lying if I said I loved it immediately. But all of my favorite music is not something that’s immediate.

I was an adult, but I was still a child in a lot of ways. I was out of the punk rock phase of my life — at least musically, not spiritually. I wanted more, but I didn’t know how to do it. It was a time when I was discovering all of the music that has continued to inform my life. So Patti Smith, but also the Silver Jews, Johnny Paycheck, Merle Haggard. All of that stuff was coming into my life at that time, and it was overwhelming in the most beautiful way.

That discovery of oneself is thrilling. It’s exhilarating to find a formative record one day and the very next day it’s another record that brings a similar emotional resonance. It happens less now because I’ve heard more. But every time I have that feeling, it’s wonderful.

That gets at something I’ve been thinking about regarding Hiss Golden Messenger. You’ve got eight albums in ten years, which is very prolific. How do you manage to keep things fresh for yourself?

Just trying to remember why I started doing this in the first place is usually the best way. I try to make sure what I’m doing feels vulnerable and genuine. Whether or not it feels fresh to other people? I don’t know if that’s something that I necessarily feel I should concern myself with. I hope people continue to find things in my music that moves them, because I’m still discovering new things in the music.

Photo credit: Graham Tolbert

LISTEN: Violet Bell, “Juliana”

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Artist: Violet Bell
Hometown: Durham, North Carolina
Song: “Juliana”
Album: Honey in My Heart
Release Date: October 11, 2019
Label: Rainbow Woman

In Their Words: “In the shiny world of social media, it’s easy to get stuck comparing yourself to other people’s perfect images. The truth is, hard times are part of any process. ‘Juliana’ is a song about the power of practice and sticking with your dreams when the going gets tough. The interplay between fiddle and organ give this tune a funky exuberant feel, and Carter Minor on harmonica brings a rowdy vibe that reminds us of Blues Traveler. As silly as it sounds, ‘Juliana’ was directly inspired by an online yoga instructor (Juliana at Boho Beautiful) who has kept our spines in line over 350+ tour dates in the past three years. Inspiration strikes where it will — somewhere between downward dog and baby cobra, this song wrote itself!” — Violet Bell

Photo credit: Kendall Bailey

Traveler: Your Guide to Raleigh

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Coined the "Research Triangle," the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area is a hotbed of creativity and invention located in the northeast central region of North Carolina. As one giant “college town” encompassing North Carolina State University, Duke University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Triangle has nurtured indie rock, punk, hip-hop, metal, and, of course, roots music. Historically, North Carolina has played a key role in the long-standing tradition of bluegrass and old-time, which makes it the perfect setting for the World of Bluegrass homecoming.

Getting There

Just 20 minutes from downtown Raleigh, the Raleigh-Durham International Airport is the main airport serving the Triangle. Ground transportation is provided by the airport tax service, the Triangle Transit Authority, and local shuttle companies. Cab fare is an estimated $30, but hotels typically offer their own shuttle services to and from the airport. For non-flight options, try Amtrak or Megabus.

Lodging

Outdoor lounge area at the Umstead Hotel and Spa

The Umstead Hotel and Spa is technically in Cary, North Carolina, just five minutes from the Raleigh-Durham International Airport. Set on 12 acres of land with a lake and wooded gardens, this is a luxury option for travelers looking for some R&R in their down time. For something more affordable, an Airbnb search pulls up over 300 listings in the Raleigh area, ranging from historic homes to downtown condos.

Coffee

A delicate pour at 42 & Lawrence

Located in the new Skyhouse building in downtown Raleigh, organic coffee bar 42 & Lawrence is a must. This inventive coffeehouse comes complete with a row of taps and a juice rail for pressed juice on-site. Some of the tap offerings include kombucha, cold brew coffee, nitro cold brew, and experiments like the “draft latte” (a mixture of cold brew coffee, Jersey cow milk, and housemade vanilla syrup) and a “Black and Tan” (cold brew coffee combined with the draft latte).

Food

Dining room at Death + Taxes restaurant

Since moving to Raleigh, Chef Ashley Christensen has carved out a niche refining Southern comfort food. Each new venture she opens is even more anticipated than the last, so it’s worth stopping by any of her establishments while you’re in town. Opened back in 2007, Poole’s Diner was one of downtown Raleigh’s first restaurants, while Joule Coffee + Table combines Durham-based Counter Culture coffee with moderately priced Southern fare. If you’re looking for a fine dining option, one of the latest offerings from AC Restaurants, Death + Taxes, is your go-to. It’s a culinary playground where octopus is an appetizer and “foraged and ‘fought for’ mushrooms” soaked in sherry and brown sugar is an entree.

Drink

Front room at the Raleigh Beer Garden

The aptly named Raleigh Beer Garden is three stories high and boasts the world’s largest draft beer selection in one restaurant. With over 350 beers on tap, there’s a sizable amount of North Carolina craft beers. A large tree extends to the ceiling in the front room, so you get that natural feel even from indoors. But it wouldn’t be a beer garden without an outdoor space and, with a patio and rooftop, there’s plenty to go around.

The brand new Whiskey Kitchen in downtown Raleigh’s Nash Square specializes in — you guessed it — whiskey. But there are beer and wine offerings, too, along with a dinner menu. The site of an old automotive shop, the bar has large garage doors and an open kitchen. Exposed brick walls and ceiling pipes, along with a wall-spanning mural by local artist Taylor White, lends the space an air that’s one part industrial and one part Southern comfort.

Shopping

Mid-century seats at Father & Son Antiques

Whether you’re on the hunt for designer steals or kitsch novelty, Father & Son Antiques has you covered. The West Hargett Street shop has become a destination for locals and out-of-towners alike, notorious for its stock of highly coveted mid-century modern furniture and accessories at moderate prices. It’s chock full of other goodies, too: vintage clothing, books, and, most importantly, records.

Music Venues

Koka Booth Amphitheater in Cary

While North Carolina is a breeding ground for roots music, it’s also home to a wider array of genres from hip-hop to punk to metal. In order to accommodate all of this diversity, the Triangle is equipped with venues of all shapes and sizes. As far as larger, outdoor venues, there’s Red Hat Amphitheater in downtown Raleigh, Walnut Creek Amphitheater, and the picturesque Koka Booth Amphitheater in Cary. For a more local vibe, check out the Pour House Music Hall in Moore Square Art District in downtown Raleigh, Cat’s Cradle in Carrboro, or the Pinhook in Durham.

Local Flavor

The pools at NCMA

The North Carolina Museum of Art (NCMA) is a behemoth of artistic innovation in itself. This month, it was selected as one of the top 125 most important works of architecture built since 1891 by Architectural Record. This free admission museum is home to contemporary art, works from the European Renaissance, Greek and Roman vases, and American art from the 18th through the 20th centuries. It also hosts concerts, films, classes, and performances. In the midst of a $13 million expansion, the museum’s outdoor park boasts 164 acres and is accentuated by landscaped sculpture gardens, courtyards, and reflecting pools.

Lede photo: Durant Nature Preserve. Photo credit: rharrison via Foter.com / CC BY-SA.