Tag: Honest

Out Now: Sam Gleaves

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Last month, Sam Gleaves released his latest album, Honest, with the intention of sharing his truth. Sam was born and raised in southwest Virginia.

Songs from the project, like “Queer Cowboy” and “Fear,” were written for his partner and detail queer experiences. Lyrics like “Love is stronger than fear” point toward the challenges of being part of the LGBTQ+ community and the need for authentic love. Other songs address his parents, like “Walnut Tree,” written for his father, and “Beautiful” for his mother. Both songs feel nostalgic and share the value of simple things like gratitude and a day outside, under the trees.

In our Out Now interview, Sam shares his current state of mind, his favorite LGBTQ+ artists, the best advice he’s ever received, and more.

What is your current state of mind?

I feel grateful. After years of work, the new record Honest is out in the world! I am fortunate to have worked with a bunch of my dear friends in the creative process. They are all world-class musicians and singers. Hasee Ciaccio and Josh Goforth were the core team in the studio. We arranged the songs together and recorded most of them as a trio. Josh Goforth is a genius producer and his vision really made the songs shine. A number of my favorite musicians and singers guested on various tracks, like Carla Gover, Linda Jean Stokley, Jared Tyler, Jeff Taylor, and Chris Rosser. I’m proud of every second of music we created together.

Why do you create music? What’s more satisfying to you, the process or the outcome?

What a great question! I create music because I need it. I love storytelling. I walk through memories in my writing process. In the songs I selected for my new record, I wanted to honor the people who have shaped my journey: family, musical collaborators, and lovers. All of those people are tied to places etched onto my heart, especially southwest Virginia and central Kentucky. I process grief through my songwriting, because there is great injustice in our world and that affects the people and places that I love. Most of all, songwriting is restorative and the songs become a mode of connection.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever gotten?

To try to laugh or smile when I make a mistake. I feel that applies in my musical life and the rest of my life!

Who are your favorite LGBTQ+ artists and bands?

I have too many favorite LGBTQ+ artists and bands to name! I am grateful for friendships with my mentors, who are also pioneers, like Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, Peggy Seeger, and the members of Kentucky’s own Reel World String Band.

Over the past decade or so, it has been a great joy to see the many roots musicians that are celebrating their identities, folks like Justin Hiltner, Jake Blount, Jared Tyler, Tyler Hughes, Amythyst Kiah, Pierceton Hobbs, Larah Helayne, and many others. The list goes on and on!

For anyone reading this who might not be out of the closet, were there any specific people, musicians, or resources that helped you find yourself as a queer individual?

When I was in my early twenties, I met Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer. Cathy and Marcy have been the two most generous, supportive, and loving mentors in my musical life. Cathy produced my first record, Ain’t We Brothers, and Cathy and Marcy both played on it. Their mentoring helped me to learn to believe in my art and pour myself into it. By being life partners and musical partners in the traditional music world, Cathy and Marcy created space for musicians like me to be part of the community. They are committed to celebrating diversity and advocating for social justice through their music. I think that all young LGBTQ+ people should hear Cathy and Marcy’s recordings, especially Cathy’s song “Names” and Fred Small’s song “Everything Possible.” I am one of many folks who have benefited from Cathy and Marcy’s wisdom and friendship.

Around the same time that I met Cathy and Marcy, I heard Gaye Adegbalola perform. Gaye’s music, her luminous personality, and her openness about her identities made a great impact on me. I was deeply moved to witness an artist so firmly rooted in blues traditions telling her story as a queer Black woman. At that time, Gaye had recently recorded an album called Gaye Without Shame, one of my absolute favorite records. I didn’t realize how much shame I held around my queerness until I heard Gaye sing her brilliant songs with such confidence and verve. From the moment we met, Gaye encouraged me and poured out love. As she says herself, Gaye has a whole lot of mojo to give!

Photo Credit: Erica Chambers

BGS 5+5: Ordinary Elephant

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Ordinary Elephant
Hometown: Austin, Texas (Sort of. We are nomadic, living on the road full-time in our van/travel trailer set up with our dogs.)
Latest album: Honest
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Extraordinary Eggplant (given to us by a musician friend from San Antonio)

What is your favorite memory from being on stage?

It’s hard to pick one favorite, but there was a night in San Marcos, Texas, that particularly stands out. There is a little bakery/coffee shop that also hosts music. Rather than being background music in a noisy cafe though, it actually turns into a listening room environment with people gathering around the tiny wooden stage, you know, listening. Before we started, we met an adorable 70-something-year-old couple, both retired teachers, who were the type of folks that immediately make you feel like you’ve known them for years.

In the middle of a song during our first set I look over to see them sitting side-by-side on a bench seat, like mirror images, on the same side of a table whose width was intended for a single person, elbows on the table top and chins resting in their hands, with grandparent-proud smiles, creating a moment that made me smile with every part of myself and also close my eyes to keep from forgetting the words.

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

Tea. Moroccan Mint or Ashwagandha for me (Crystal) and Pau D’Arco for Pete. Ideally in a ceramic mug rather than a paper cup (or glass). It’s not just having the tea, but the pouring of the water and the waiting for it to steep — the whole process. It’s grounding and calming. Once it’s done, it’s nice having something to hold. Having mug of tea also makes any conversations we have with new people feel more like… conversations.

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

Be true, to ourselves and the songs. Tell what needs to be told. Don’t compromise. Do what we do, and we will find our community.

Which elements of nature do you spend the most time with and how do those impact your work?

We are drawn to two opposite environments — areas full of trees, forests, and mossy dirt paths and the desert (particularly New Mexico and West Texas) — and the mountains they can both have. They are both quiet, but in different ways. Forests have the lack of road and city noise, but the desert is a whole other level. It’s like when the electricity goes out and every background hum stops, but turned up to 11. The quiet lets our brains breathe. I am often hypersensitive to noise and can feel overloaded in a sensory sense in loud situations, so these places let me recharge.

There is more than the quiet though. The life and color in a forest and how clean the air feels–there is just something about being tucked inside this and the trees that feels so comfortable and calming that it’s as if it were a home in a previous life. The sunsets and dark night skies in the desert feel sacred.

We have songs about some of these places (e.g. “Before I Go” and “Thank You” from our previous album, Before I Go), but I think nature most impacts our work by letting us do our work.

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

I think we more often do the opposite. This is a transition from earlier writing though, which I think is probably common–start out writing what you know, your own stories, then expanding to tell others’ stories. We’ve learned to not be afraid of embodying a character that we are not, in order to tell a story how it wants to be told.

Photo credit: Olive and West Photography