Tag: Ray LaMontagne

Ray LaMontagne After 20 Years of Trouble

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

In the fall of 2004, it seemed like everybody was getting into Trouble. Even with that major label debut album, Ray LaMontagne managed to keep a low personal profile while maintaining the rigorous pace of a promising new artist. Meanwhile, the title track of Trouble got covered by that season’s winner of American Idol and ended up in an inescapable but kinda cute insurance commercial. Other cuts on the album ended up in films such as The Devil Wears Prada, Prime, and She’s the Man. In addition, Zac Brown Band recorded “Jolene” and Kelly Clarkson often performed “Shelter” in her shows (and recently revived it for Kellyoke.)

Now, LaMontagne is bringing Trouble back around for a 20th anniversary remaster and re-release (which dropped this summer) and North American and European tour dates set for 2026. He’ll be singing every song on the record to commemorate the collection two decades after its release.

“It’ll be interesting to see how my spirit reacts to learning these songs again, to going back and listening to them again in that way, to bring it to people again,” LaMontagne tells BGS. “I’m looking forward to it. And I feel like it’s important to do to mark this moment, because these are the songs that brought people to my music in the first place.

“Listening to it again now after all these years, I’m very proud of my younger self, for having the strength of will amidst all the pressures of the music business at the time, and about my writing and the way I wrote, to make the record that I did, and to leave the songs the way I wrote them and not take any advice.”

What was your day-to-day life like before Trouble was released?

Ray LaMontagne: Well, we lived off the grid. I was already married for six or seven years at that point. My two boys were five and three and we lived on a piece of land I bought in Maine. I had built a small cabin on it and we had a hand-dug well that we used for water. We had an outhouse. It was back-to-the-land living and that was just because I couldn’t stand renting. I wanted to have my own piece of ground. But it was really hand to mouth, and we were broke. And that’s putting it mildly. I mean, we were broke, broke, broke. I was working carpentry, sometimes seven days a week, because I would take anything I could get on the weekends just to get a little extra money, because I constantly was trying to improve the cabin. And I never had a car that ran.

You’d made some independent records before Trouble and I’ve read a couple of accounts of how you got your music in front of Chrysalis Music. How did that actually happen?

Someone heard me at a festival and they gave a disc to a college friend who was in the music business. Then he brought it to his boss. I went out and met with Hollywood Records first. I felt that I was in a room with a bunch of cynical people who made me feel kind of gross. I went back home and that guy called and said, “I think they’re gonna offer you a record deal.” And I said, “I don’t want to do it.” He said, “Are you crazy? What do you mean, you don’t want to do it? They’re gonna give you a record deal!” And I was like, “I didn’t like them. They made me feel gross.” So I went back to being a carpenter again, as I was, and went back to my life.

Then it was close to a year later when that guy called me again and said he had gone to a different company. Now he was with a publisher and that was Chrysalis. He said, “I played your stuff for my boss and he really likes your songs and is interested in you as a songwriter. Would you come out and meet my boss?” I talked to my wife about it and then I said, “Okay, I’ll come out.” I went out and I met his boss and played a couple songs in the office. We talked about songwriting and he said, “We want to help you as a songwriter.”

So, they were looking at you as a songwriter rather than as an artist.

And that’s how I got into the studio to make this record, because I was supposed to go in and make demos. What happened was, Ethan [Johns, who produced Trouble] and I met each other for the first time. We’re very different people and we couldn’t quite read each other. Especially at that time, I was very much a closed book, very much an observer. And he’s a type A personality, big ego, big presence, loves to talk – mostly about himself. And I don’t say that critically, I say it with humor! Anyone who knows Ethan will agree with me!

So anyway, it was this strange thing, but I began to realize as we were starting to record demos or talk about songs, that they didn’t really feel like these songs were finished. They thought they were promising. But I was getting a lot of input coming at me very quickly about, “This song doesn’t have a bridge. This song is just two verses. Is that even a song? This song just has four verses and then it ends. Is that a song?” And it was like that right down the line.

The first demo we recorded was “Hold You in My Arms.” We got to a point in the song where Ethan stopped me and said, “This song is just not finished. It needs a bridge.” He started throwing lyrics at me for this bridge and my shield started to go up. I thought, “These lyrics, first of all, aren’t right…” I was resisting and resisting, and he was getting more frustrated with me. He said, “I’m gonna go make a cup of tea. You write a bridge.” So, he went to make a cup of tea and I wrote an instrumental bridge by the time he got back. I said, “It’s just gonna go into an instrumental bridge and then back into the chorus again.” And he said, “OK. I’ve always been told you gotta do this in the moment. So how many points do you think that’s worth?”

I knew nothing about the way these things happen, but in that moment I knew what was going on and I knew why I was there. From that moment on, I was a brick wall. Nothing was changing. I was changing nothing. I’m recording the songs exactly as I had written them and then I’m going home. If you like them and you want to shop them around, great. If you don’t like them, I’m still going home. It doesn’t matter to me, but I’m not playing this game. So that’s what we did. We recorded this record, which is basically the demos the way I wrote them.

How did the recordings go from demos into becoming the Trouble album?

Six months easily passed and the publisher called me and said, “You know, the songs are just… no one wants to sing the songs. No other artists are gravitating towards the songs, but weirdly, record labels are coming forward because they like your voice and they like what they’re hearing, but they like it delivered by you. It works when you sing it, but it’s not working for any other artist.” And that led to the next step of going back and meeting record labels and talking to people about me as a performer, which was not even on my radar.

So it was a whole other challenge. It was like me against my biggest fear. I was much more interested in being a songwriter at that time. So, that’s how it happened. Slowly, and one step at a time, and one thing led to another, and led to another. But again, that’s why, when I hear these songs at this point in my life, listening to it again for the first time, it really hits me, just where that 28- or 29-year-old guy had that strength of will to know at a gut level that what I was doing had value. Just me being me had some value and I wanted to protect that. And it just makes me very proud of him.

It’s interesting to hear that no other artists wanted to record your songs, because when this record came out, a lot of people were singing these songs. What’s the personal reward for you as a songwriter when someone does take one of these songs from the album and makes it their own?

I really like that. It always makes me happy. I think any songwriter would be happy if even one song gets covered by someone else. You feel lucky if one song you wrote even makes it into people’s lives in some meaningful way. If you’re a songwriter and that happens to you once, you’re grateful. I mean, it’s just the truth of it. It’s like any other art form. It’s not easy, and it either will work or it won’t work, because music is a complex language. … It’s probably the same with painters, with dancers, with writers. You just don’t know if it’s going to connect to people, or if people are going to understand what you’re saying, or if it’s going to speak to them in a real way, speak to their spirit in some way. So I’m very grateful. I’m so glad that there are people in the world, all over the world, who understand my language.

Something that struck me about this record, then and now, is that dynamic in your voice. At what point did you become aware of that range, that you could go loud when it when you needed to?

I don’t really know. I feel like I learned to sing just by doing it. There’s some truth to this, that I really didn’t know how to sing even when I went in to make the record. But I was learning by doing it. I had gotten to a certain point where I knew when I was singing incorrectly because I would be uncomfortable or something would hurt in my throat. And I knew that that wasn’t the right way to do it. At some point, I realized you had to really breathe and sing from your gut.

In 2004, before streaming and social media, how did you find an audience?

It was just live shows. I mean, I toured a lot. A lot. And in the beginning, even being signed, I was still just like anyone. I was in a rental car, just me and my guitar, a box of harmonicas, and getting myself from one gate to the next. Those early shows, again, it’s no different than anyone. It’s two or three people and the next year you go back and there’s 20 people and the next year you go back, there’s a hundred people. When people connect to what you’re doing, they will tell their friends about it, and they’ll bring them the next time you come around. But there’s nothing anyone can do outside of yourself to make that happen. It either works – people connect to what you’re doing, to your performance, to the music, and then they’ll tell their friends – or it doesn’t work. But being signed to a record label doesn’t mean anything. It just means they’re investing and they’re gambling. And if you build a career for yourself, then they win that bet, and if you don’t, then they move on.

I’ve read that you saw Townes Van Zandt play a show in the mid ‘90s and I wondered how much of an influence did he have on your writing and your musical direction for Trouble?

I don’t think he had a real heavy influence. I wouldn’t say that, especially at that time. It was too early. I just remember being really moved by watching him play, for a few different reasons. It’s kind of tragic in some ways. He was right at the end, but I could hear the poetry in the songs. That’s what moved me the most, to hear a song and be so close to somebody, eight feet away from him, and hear “Pancho and Lefty.” That story was completely immersive and took me somewhere else. That was really the most powerful thing I took from that particular night. He transported me. That’s powerful. Music can be really powerful if you’re receptive.

To me, your song “Narrow Escape” feels like a spiritual brother to “Pancho and Lefty.”

Yeah, I’m sure it is. I mean, it’s my take on a story song of this kind. They’re very different stories, but I’m sure that’s my “Pancho and Lefty.”

There’s a reference to “Liula” in that song and I noticed that fictional town shows up again, now, as the name of your own record company. So, are you fully independent these days?

I am, yeah. I still have all my same team around me, but I’m making records on my own and releasing them on my own. That’s a natural progression, too, in the way the music business has changed. It was a very different business when I entered it and at this point, especially for me, there’s no reason to be with a publisher or a record label at all. I left my publisher a long time ago, 10 years ago probably, and the record label followed.

I did want to ask about the illustration on the cover of Trouble. It’s not a picture of you. It’s this beautiful image from Jason Holley. What was it about that image that worked for you?

I just thought it was poetic. I saw the poetry in it. You can take lots of different things from that image, but it’s also just a powerful image. And of course, I have always been reticent to have my photograph taken, or to use my photos anywhere. Which, you know, we all have these things. If you’re comfortable doing it, that’s great. If you’re not comfortable, you should feel you have the right to say no.

Other than seeing you in concert, I don’t know that I really saw your face that much back then, when Trouble was out.

I remember telling my manager, “I want to be like the Lone Ranger. I don’t need to be seen and to be known. Just leave them with the music. And that’s it.” You can imagine how that went over. It was really, really difficult, and there were a lot of frustrated people, I’m sure, at the record label and with management. It frustrated a lot of people because they felt like I missed a lot of opportunities that I could have otherwise had. I knew that at the time as well.

But I’ve always felt like I know who I am. I could say no to a magazine cover back then because I know that that’s going to be a day out of my life where I’m going to be miserable, and it’s going to make me uncomfortable. … I’ve never felt like anyone in the press or who had a camera really cares about you as a person. They’re not sensitive to you, and your well-being doesn’t matter to them. They’re just doing their job. And whatever they capture there, they choose what they want. If you have your head in your hands, if you’re doing this, if you’re looking miserable. That’s power and they’re going to use it.

So, I turned down all of that stuff. You lose that opportunity, but I felt, well, I’ll lose that opportunity, true, but you know what? I’ve got a show tomorrow night, and I’m going to sing my ass off, and people are going to feel it. And if they feel it, they’ll come back next time. That’s what’s important, to build a career that is sustainable. And to do that, you need people to fill the seats. If they don’t come out to see you live, you have no career. That’s all there is to it. So that’s the most important thing. And that was then, and it still is.

Photo Credit: Brian Stowell

MIXTAPE: Jeremie Albino’s Songs That Take Him Back

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

The other day I was going through my closet doing some spring cleaning, when I found a box with a bunch of old things that just took me back. One thing in particular was my old CD binder that I used to keep in the first car I ever owned, my parents old Ford Windstar. When I started looking through the binder, it brought me right back to the first time I moved away from home. At 19, I decided to leave the city and start working on a vegetable farm as a labourer. I was really into gardening and growing food at the time. Being out there was a time of many firsts, first time moving from home, first love, first time out partying (I’d always been a homebody).

This find made me think of turning them into a digital playlist, “Songs That Take Me Back.” Something that I could take with me, wherever I may go. Here’s a playlist of songs that somehow take me back to a moment in my life, and I’d like to share them with you. – Jeremie Albino

“Trouble” – Ray LaMontagne

This was the first CD in that CD binder that really brought me back. I could just smell the lilacs in the spring time driving out in the country with my old Windstar with the windows down, blasting this record.

“Sylvie” – Harry Belafonte (At Carnegie Hall)

This song brings me right back to an early Sunday morning when I was a kid. I’d be sleeping in and my dad would throw this on his five disc CD player, blaring records while he’d clean the house. This is probably one of my all time favourite records.

“Dust My Blues” – Elmore James

When I hear this tune, it reminds me of the first open mic I ever participated in. I was probably 15 or 16, I had been so in love with this song and had to learn it. I didn’t do too bad, the audience seemed to enjoy a 15 year old trying to play the slide guitar.

“Only Son” – Shakey Graves

This song takes me back to the summer of 2015 — I was so in love with a fellow farmer who worked at a farm not too far from mine. She was so cool, she had the coolest taste in music. One of the first times I had found someone who liked so much of the same music as I did. The song specifically reminds me of that first date, where we had pizza on a dock and listened to Shakey Graves.

“Harriet” – Hey Rosetta

This song reminds me of the first tour I ever went on. I was in a folk trio with my best friends called En Riet. We went on an epic first tour, drove eastern Canada all the way to Newfoundland, one of the most beautiful places I’d ever seen. We would listen to Hey Rosetta driving through some of the most scenic drives I’d experienced in my life, the music felt so fitting and right.

“Hey Boogie” – John Lee Hooker

The first CD I ever purchased was a compilation record called Blues Legend. It was all John Lee Hooker. I got it from the Future Shop (fellow Canadians, do you remember this store? So good.) when I was 7 or 8. I have no idea why I bought it or why I was drawn to it, I think my parents probably told me I liked blues and brought me to the blues section. I ended up picking it cause I thought the cover looked cool! Turns out it was a good pick and listening to it now, it brings me back to being a kid.

“Shipwreck” – Jeremie Albino

This is the first song I ever wrote. I wrote this one 10 years ago; it’s always nice to look back to see how things started for me. At the time I was having such a hard time writing music, and on weekends I would meet up with some friends and have a kitchen jam session. We’d go in a circle, sharing songs. My friends would always share a new song they’d been working on, and I would just play covers, since I still hadn’t written a full song. After coming home from one of these sessions, I told myself, “That’s it! I’m writing a song.” So I thought about how much of a hard time I was having writing and the line “I’m a wreck” came to me cause that’s what I was feeling when I was writing. Eventually one thing led to another, and I started thinking about what other things are wrecks and long story short, “Shipwreck” was born.

“Stumblin’” – Jackson & the Janks

“Stumblin’” was a song that was a must-listen when I was on tour with Cat Clyde. I remember the Mashed Potato records compilations had just come out and I started listening to these songs non-stop. With “Stumblin’” in particular, I just couldn’t get over how good it was! I had sent over the album to Cat so she could listen to how good it was, too! So by the time we hit the road together, we probably listened to that song a million times combined, no word of a lie.

“Boxcar” – Shovels & Rope

I remember the first time I heard this song was one of the first times I went to a bar and partied with friends. A local band was covering the song. When I finally got my hands on the record I fell in love with their music, the songwriting and vocals. I had a huge crush on Cary Ann’s voice. After that Shovels & Rope turned out to be one of my favourite bands. Ten years later, we actually ended up hitting the road together for a tour and it was one of my “I made it” moments. I feel very blessed to call them my friends, it’s funny to see how things come full circle sometimes.

Photo Credit: Colin Medley

BGS 5+5: Noah Guthrie

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Noah Guthrie
Hometown: Greenville, South Carolina
Latest Album: Blue Wall

What was the first moment that you knew you wanted to be a musician?

It’s hard for me to pinpoint the exact moment. I have been around music in one way or another all my life. I grew up listening to my dad and stepmom sing in studios and my older brother Ian is a drummer and recording engineer. I guess one of the first times I felt like I wanted music to be more than a hobby was when a band that I was in as a teenager played our first show. We had this blues/funk band called Say When and it was me and my brother and our two best friends, Zach and Alex.

We had a show at this place called the Handlebar in Greenville, South Carolina. It’s no longer around but it was popular back then and that night we were playing a Battle of the Bands contest. (This was absolutely a pay-to-play type of scenario but we got to play for a couple of hundred people so we didn’t care.) I was the frontman of this group and I think I realized then that being on stage performing for people was a feeling that I couldn’t get anywhere else. It was a confidence that I didn’t have in my normal day-to-day. I was a pretty shy teen and never quite felt like I could fully express myself unless I was writing or on stage. I could connect with people from a stage in a meaningful way and I fell in love with that feeling. I have been in love with it ever since.

Which artist has influenced you the most…and how?

I think I hear Ray LaMontagne’s influence the most in my music. I have always been a huge fan of all of his work but in particular, I love his album, God Willin’ and the Creek Don’t Rise. That album found me when I was just starting to write music in high school and it really settled in deep. I am pretty sure that I got the CD stuck in my 2003 Kia Sportage and had absolutely no problem with that. Obviously, Ray has so much soul and texture in his voice that it’s immediately recognizable to anyone that hears it. For me though, it’s his words that really sell it. He has a way of writing elegant and poetic verses that somehow still feel grounded and relatable when you hear them. I think that when I started writing music and began searching for my own style, Ray’s music was a giant impact on me back then and still is today.

What’s your favorite memory from being on stage?

My favorite memory on stage has got to be when I sang with Willie Nelson. I remember getting a phone call from my agent in a hotel in Nashville. He asked, “Do you have any interest in opening three shows for Willie Nelson?” I said, “Why are you even asking? Absolutely!” Willie has always been a hero of mine and it was an honor to open a few shows and share my music with his incredible fan base. On the third night, I met Willie and he asked me to come sing the gospel with them at the end of the show. It really was incredible. We sang “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” and “I’ll Fly Away.” Sharing the stage with Willie Nelson and his entire band of legendary players gave me a feeling that I don’t think I will ever forget.

What has been the best advice you’ve received in your career so far?

So far the best advice I have been given is to stay patient and stay true to yourself. I do believe that every artist has their own timeline and their own path. I think that with social media it can be hard to keep perspective and very easy to fall into a kind of comparison trap. You usually only get to see the good things that are happening to other artists, and not the years of grinding it can take to get to those good things. That is something I struggle with on a day-to-day basis if I’m being honest. I think that the best thing that anyone can do is to stay patient and focus on making art that honors who you are and what you believe in.

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

I’ve spent my whole life in a small town in Upstate South Carolina. Just a few minutes’ drive from the Blue Ridge Mountains. I spend a lot of time wandering trails and birdwatching in the woods here. I have always found that when I feel my most tired and burnt out, the hills, rivers, and lakes of this region always provide the refresher that I need.

The title track of my new album is called “Blue Wall.” Blue Wall is another name for the Blue Ridge Mountains so one could definitely say that growing up so close to that mountain range has had a very big impact on me and my music. I have always wanted to write a song about my home and the beautiful scenery that surrounds it. “Blue Wall” is my first successful attempt at doing that.

Photo Credit: Eli Warren

MIXTAPE: Rising Appalachia’s Love Songs for Blooming Spring

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

This is a collection of the BEST love songs in my life, the heartbreakers and the heart menders. The ones that make your heart burst and bloom. Because hey, it’s spring, and who doesn’t want a damn good love song or two in their lives? — Leah Song, Rising Appalachia

John Prine – “Angel From Montgomery”

This song brought me to my knees when I heard it live at the Kate Wolf Music Festival years ago. A hardened kind of love song, a love long changed and still just barely holding. But still, even the love between John Prine and Emmylou Harris is precious…

The Roots, Erykah Badu – “You Got Me”

I have listened to this song since my teenage years and it is rich, passionate, and real amid the throes of what life on the road looks like. What longing feels like. How to show up.

Hozier – “Almost (Sweet Music)”

The most joyful and epic lyricist around. And such a bright and catchy melody, this one is contagious.

Keb’ Mo’ – “Kindhearted Woman Blues”

Such a rich treatment of this classic. Got that salty form of simple, front porch, storytelling love.

Arouna & Biko – “Doubabu”

Nothing sings to the heart like the sweetness of this melodic instrumental by our dear friends, Arouna & Biko.

James Blake – “A Case of You”

I mean, this needs no additional telling. It just SLAYS.

Ray LaMontange – “Shelter”

The tamber of LaMontange’s voice is so insane, it’s another delicate one, but it reaches into the pain and pleasure of love.

Lankum – “What Will We Do When We Have No Money?”

A gentle, Irish look at love and the long haul. How to piece it together with your beloved when times are tough.

Beyoncé – “Drunk in Love”

Riddles with unapologetic passion.

Jorge Cafrune – “La atardecida”

Classic heart strings, plus the guitar just makes you swoon.

Rising Applachia – “Novels of Acquaintance”

Our favorite love song.

Polecat Creek – “That I Should Know Your Face”

A traditional Appalachian love ballad. “That I should know your face,” the depths of loyal love.

Maggie Koerner – “Shades of Grey”

Simple, open-hearted love song from the young vulnerability of the road.

Trevor Hall – “Chapter of the Forest”

A love song to the divine.

Hypnotized – “Ani DiFranco”

The classic bass line of this song plus the simplicity of the imagery. Sometimes, you are just brought to your knees by the wafting breathlessness of love.

Photo credit: Savannah Lauren

BGS 5+5: Northcote

Posted on by Editor

Artist name: Northcote (Matt Goud)
Hometown: Carlyle, Saskatchewan, Canada
Latest album: Let Me Roar (out October 23, 2020)
Personal nicknames (or rejected band names): Matt, Big Cat, Coat

Which artist has influenced you the most … and how?

I was playing solo shows in cafes while in a full-time hardcore band, that’s how it started for me. When the band broke up I moved out west and during that first year of playing solo I would cover Gillian Welch, Chuck Ragan/Hot Water Music and Brian Fallon/The Gaslight Anthem songs in my set. I remember learning Petty and Springsteen songs to fill my set for when I was singing in tourist bars. You can play “The Waiting” and “Dancing in the Dark” for a long time on a Monday night to help nudge along a three-hour set. The artist that has influenced me the most in the last ten years is Dave Hause. He has taken me on the road many times and I have got to see his energy and passion for the job. He plays with the urgency and respect that it could all go away and I admired that because he was/is right. Gillian Welch is the songwriter I come back to the most often and whose records I feel most at home with. John Moreland in the last bunch of years is like that for me as well. Finally, I was in grade 5 or 6 when Shania Twain’s hit songs began to come out and I did perform them lip-synching in school.

What’s your favorite memory from being on stage?

It must have been 2010 or so, maybe earlier. I was playing on my first release as Northcote and was out east in Saint John, New Brunswick. It is a small city and I think I’ve only been back once since. It’s near Fredericton where we usually stop on tour. The venue that day had an alley entrance with brick walls on either side of the alley. The room had a low ceiling and seemed like a small abandoned store. I remember there were things left behind on the floor like folks had left in a hurry. The walls were white and blue like sky. I don’t remember if there was a PA or not. We were packed in the place about 25 of us singing along as I played through my first EP and the singalongs were quite loud. I was surprised and I felt lost and at home all at once. At that time everyone present was a beginner and we were all just giving it an honest try and that is a very sacred place to be in my opinion.

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

Before bringing my attention to working as a musician I was studying at a religious college training to be a minister. Over the years the sense of poetry from scripture has stuck with me. I’ve gone from the poems of Thomas Merton to Rumi to listening to Ram Dass then back full circle now. In my twenties I explored more angular and art house influences which are still refreshing at times, but less influential these days. I think my answer is religious devotional writing? My god. For more context, my recent influences are Lovecraft Country (TV), Anderson .Paak’s album Ventura, and Miley Cyrus’ “Slide Away.” The two books open on my desk are Teachings of the Christian Mystics and Thich Nhat Hanh’s How to Connect.

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

When we were making Let Me Roar, each morning before I took a shower I would put on the album Trance Friendz by Ólafur Arnalds and Nils Frahm. After that I went to the yoga mat to do some work then made coffee and had a few cigarettes. We had boiled eggs most mornings with bagels. After the work day we made dinner together in the kitchenette and watched the hockey playoffs or a lesser-known horror film. During one film the lead character ate a chicken wing out of the fridge after finding a deceased person. The character said, “Honey garlic, I love it.” From then on in the studio, after describing something we would say, “I love it” in honor of the horror film character.

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

I was invited to perform at the Alianait Arts Festival in Iqaluit, Nunavut, a few years back. I wasn’t feeling very good those days and the opportunity to go up North was a bright light for me and is a precious memory that I will never forget. One night up North there was a dinner party hosted by folks in the community. There was a spread of local food and I can’t remember what all was served, but I tried some and enjoyed the warmth and hospitality. There was boxed wine on the rocks and we saw the evening sun. One of those nights some people from the festival invited me to a hall where musicians from the festival were sitting in a circle singing and laughing and telling stories. Since that trip up to play the festival, my wife and I have moved, I quit drinking, we made the new Northcote record and I found meaningful work at my day job in Victoria.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6Ha8VdD55SEGNJcKWiUAhM?si=IkUWvU1GR6OGDOnMt8ul1g

Photo credit: Matt Postal

3×3: Gabrielle Shonk on Joni Mitchell, Mustard, and Mac ‘n’ Cheese

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Gabrielle Shonk
Hometown: Born in Providence, Rhode Island / Raised/Living in Quebec City, Canada
Latest Album: Gabrielle Shonk 
Personal Nicknames: Shonk, Gab, Gab Shonk, Shonky, Shonky Shonkator, The Shonkinator

What song do you wish you had written?

“Both Sides Now” — Joni Mitchell

Who would be in your dream songwriter round?

Tracy Chapman, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Ray LaMontagne, Feist

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

The Beatles

 

 

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How often do you do laundry?

Every two weeks maybe? I’d love to do it more often, but I’m never home!

What was the last movie that you really loved?

Dunkirk

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

Probably go back to third grade and not give up my piano lessons! 25 and 27 were two pretty awesome/crazy years that I loved. My music career really took some positive turns around then, but I still wouldn’t go back. I’m just so excited for what’s coming up next!

What’s your go-to comfort food?

Vegan mac ’n cheese

Kombucha — love it or hate it?

Absolutely love kombucha … It’s my coffee!

Mustard or mayo?

Love mustard. There are so many varieties!

Photo credit: Norman Wong

3X3: Peridot on the ’40s, FOMO, and Frank Sinatra

Posted on by Amy Reitnouer

Artist: Peridot
Hometown: Los Angeles, CA
Latest Album: Peridot
Rejected Band Names: One time, a producer told us we should change our band name to “Hillary’s Unicorn” or “Hillary and the Man” — both were appropriately discarded. 

If you could go back (or forward) to live in any decade, when would you choose? 

Definitely the ’70s — but I would also say the tail end of the ’60s, as well — so let’s say 1965-1975. Also the late 1930s/early 1940s when Sinatra was getting started and dance orchestras were the thing.

Who would be your dream co-writer?

Tom Petty, John Mayer, or Ray LaMontagne.

If a song started playing every time you entered the room, what would you want it to be?

It’s a tie between “Gimme Some Lovin” by the Spencer Davis Group or “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys. The best song for leaving the room would definitely be Frank Sinatra’s version of “I’ll Be Seeing You.”

What is the one thing you can’t survive without on tour?

It’s a tie between good coffee and a real pillow. 

What are you most afraid of? 

I have major FOMO — “Fear of missing out”

Who is your celebrity crush? 

Sting 

Pickles or olives? 

Pickles 

Plane, train, or automobile? 

Plane — depends on the airline. Train — depends on the country. Drive — depends on how many people are in the car and how long the trip is. For now, we’ll say plane. 

Which is worse — rainy days or Mondays? 

Mondays

3×3: William Wild on Blues, Bluegrass, and Blink 182

Posted on by Amy Reitnouer

Artist: William Wild
Hometown: Knoxville, TN
Latest Album: Steady Now
Rejected Band Names: Newport Plain Talk. It’s the name of a paper in a neighboring city where my parents are from. The paper told me I couldn’t use the name, but now that I think about it … I should have used it.

What was the first record you ever bought with your own money?
Blink 182, Enema of the State

How many unread emails or texts currently fill your inbox?
A cumulative four messages — I’m on top of things these days!

If your life were a movie, which songs would be on the soundtrack?
"Dreams"  — Fleetwood Mac
"Pink Moon" — Nick Drake
"Nevermind" –­ Nirvana
"City Lights" — Thomas Dybdhal
"Care of Cell 44" — The Zombies
"Pardon Me" –­ Incubus
"Dogs" –­ Damien Rice
"Be Here Now" — Ray Lamontagne
Heartbreaker –­ Ryan Adams (entire record)
This is silly … I could go all day.

What brand of jeans do you wear?
Raw … as can be.

What's your go­to karaoke tune?
"Livin’ on a Prayer" or "Enter Sandman"

If you were a liquor, what would you be?
I really like to drink whiskey.

Poehler or Schumer?
Schumer, although sometimes I feel awkward.

Chocolate or vanilla?
Vanilla

Blues or bluegrass?
For some reason I want to say blues … but bluegrass!

Natalie Merchant and the Power of Reflection

Posted on by Editor

Natalie Merchant was only 18 years old when she first joined 10,000 Maniacs back in 1981. A handful of years later, the politically inclined folk-rock ensemble was taking the world by storm as part of a generation of musicians who used their art as activism. When Merchant departed the band in 1993, it was to find her voice … which also happened to be the voice of her generation. Finding it, becoming it was something she accomplished right out of the gate with 1995’s Tigerlily.

In the 20 years since that stirring solo debut, Merchant has mined Shakespeare, traditional folk music, environmental concerns, parenthood, and more to create a discography that is equally potent and poignant. This year, she turned her gaze back to Tigerlily, reworking the old compositions and releasing the new collection as Paradise Is There: The New Tigerlily Recordings. She also made a companion documentary that serves as a visual memoir, tracing her footsteps back from here to there and bringing us all along for the journey.

The first thing you say in the documentary is about, essentially, do-overs — what they mean and if they are even possible. The premise is that, if you could do anything differently, the butterfly effect, everything after it changes. Though it wasn’t exactly a do-over, what have you gleaned from this experiment?

Well, I just made a record of everything I’ve gleaned over the last 20 years about these songs. The catalyst for the whole project was the string arrangements that I’d had written over the years for some orchestral shows. People really enjoyed the orchestral versions, so we decided to adapt them to string quartet and put them on the album. And then the 20th anniversary came up and it seemed like the right time to release the record.

If you had to pick one word to describe how the process went, how it felt revisiting these songs, what would it be?

Educational.

Even working off those arrangements, were you and the players able to go in without any other preconceived notions about how the songs have always been? Sort of deconstruct and rebuild them anew with your more mature musical vocabulary?

It’s interesting because several members of the band weren’t even born … [Laughs]

[Laughs] I was thinking that as I watched the documentary, actually.

[Laughs] They were in diapers when this record was made. And they had never listened to it before they started playing with me, so they had no preconceived notions of the songs, which was great. They may as well have been brand new songs. Then there were some of us in the band who have played them for years, like Gabriel [Gordon] who has been playing with me for 17 years, so he’s been here for almost the whole ride.

I think we sort of reinvented the songs over the years every time we went on stage and played them. They’ve evolved into the versions we’re doing now. A few of the songs, like “Where I Go” and “I May Know the Word” and “Jealousy,” had been sort of left by the wayside years ago. And it was actually fun to rediscover them, especially “I May Know the Word.” That was kind of an illumination. It was a song that I never felt I completely captured and then I left it behind. I think it turned out to be my favorite song on the whole project.

“Beloved Wife,” in particular, hits me that much harder with 20 more, or maybe fewer, years on my relationships clock. Was that a similar thing for you? It’s tricky, because you’ve been with these songs all along, but …

When I wrote that song, I was observing my grandfather’s grief. Since then, I’ve lost my parents and other people I had decades-long relationships with, so I understand death now in a different way. I’ve sat with many people who died. It’s just part of the age, I think, and experience. My father actually just passed away in September. And, since it was his father I wrote the song about, it made the feeling in the film different for me — seeing that photograph of my grandfather, having just watched my father pass. It makes the circle complete, in a way.

Right. How do you process having touched so many people with your songs, especially “Wonder”? Is that something you can get your head around, or your heart?

It continues to astound me, how many people have been impacted by that song. I think it’s also — it’s a powerful song — but it’s also such a scarce topic. There aren’t a lot of songs about children, to begin with. [Laughs] If you were to make a bar graph of how many songs are about break-ups, initial romance, and sexual craving … and then when you got to what all that leads to, which is children … [Laughs] Nobody has anything to say about that. Maybe they’re too busy picking crumbs off the floor, but …

[Laughs] The romance is gone, at that point.

But the romance, for me, really began with my child. The greatest love of my life is my child. And, to write a song about a child with special needs, takes it into an even scarcer part of the graph with a fraction of a percentage of songs. [Laughs]

[Laughs] Yes. Exactly one song. We can probably safely say there’s just this one song.

Yeah. There’s one song. And I wrote it. And people have radar for that. They are looking for their own experience in art. When they see it and recognize themselves, it’s powerful. And it’s positive.

That’s the other thing: So many people with a special needs child feel like they are the object of pity. And they really feel their experience is so much more than the challenges. There’s so much joy and connection … and achievements. Incredible achievements. And they are made even more profound and more powerful because of the challenges. I think they are valued more. I think those kids, when they do achieve … like in the film, when Kate and Kelly graduated from college, I was there. It was a massive accomplishment for them to get those bachelor’s degrees. They would have agonizing nursing care, sometimes eight hours a day, and they were still able to write the papers and study for the exams. And they both graduated with honors.

Wow. Those kinds of stories certainly put so much into perspective. Not to belittle anyone else’s strife or compare people’s pains …

And that’s the thing that Kate and Kelly used to say to me all the time: “We don’t quantify pain around here. Pain is pain.” I would always say, “Oh, you don’t want to hear about my problems.” And they’d say, “We don’t put it on a scale. We understand pain, so you can talk to us about it.” [Laughs]

If In My Tribe or Blind Man’s Zoo came out today, how do you think those would be received? “Gun Shy,” “Jubilee,” and “Hateful Hate” … they are just as relevant and could all certainly stand a comeback right now with everything that’s happening.

I don’t know. The music industry is a very mysterious creature these days. There’s an artist like Adele who can sell millions of records in a week, and artists like myself who used to sell millions of records and now … It’s just harder to reach the audience. I don’t know. I don’t know how receptive the culture is to more serious pop music that examines the soul or examines society.

I came up with 10,000 Maniacs, R.E.M., Tracy Chapman, and Indigo Girls as my influences and idols. And I’m not sure I see the same kind of art as activism pouring out of younger musicians these days. Do you feel like the upcoming generation has that in them? Or is your group still carrying the flag for now?

I recently met Aloe Blacc and I think his music is definitely of the same character as Tracy Chapman’s or my music. I’ll be honest with you, I’m not as aware of pop music as I used to be. But someone like Ray LaMontagne is out there making thought-provoking music.

I think there are certainly singular examples, but it felt to me, back in the late ’80s and early ’90s, that there was a whole class of artists who were in the same vein. But maybe I was in a little bit of a bubble.

There’s also someone like Billy Bragg. He really remained true to his principles and became very active in politics. I can remember the first time I saw Billy Bragg. I was playing a club in Brixton with him and he was passing a bucket for the miners who were on strike. I’d never seen that before. It felt like something from the Woody Guthrie days.

Is it safe to say that artists like Mavis Staples, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Joan Baez, Buffy Sainte-Marie … are those elders some of the artists you look up to? Because they are all still going. They all have new projects.

Yeah. I’m hugely influenced by them, especially Joan Baez. Talk about someone who has remained true to her principles since day one. She’s a powerhouse of integrity. When Pete Seeger died and everyone said, “No one will ever take his place!” I was like, “What about Joan Baez?” [Laughs] She’s still playing in prisons.

Yeah. They’re still carrying the flag, themselves. Considering all that’s going on in the world, is your perspective at all different whether you’re looking at it as an artist, an activist, a parent, or a woman? Does one of those identities feel more or less pressure to step up? Or are they indistinguishable?

I think that, over the last six years, my activist facet of my work and life has become much more pronounced. It’s a result of feeling older and more responsible and more experienced — knowing how to accomplish things like organizing big benefit concerts or making films about something. I made a film about domestic violence and I was really involved, for four years, in the the campaign to have fracking banned in New York. We succeeded and everyone credits the film we made, and I was the person that decided we needed to make that film, that we needed to have that concert and have those filmmakers collect the film and photographs that presented evidence and the testimony of people whose well water had been contaminated in other states where hydraulic fracking was already happening. I just didn’t have the skill set and the confidence to do that [when I was younger].

And the film about domestic violence was the same thing. When I was in my 20s or 30s or, even, 40s, to have the wherewithal to contact special prosecutors from two counties and have them at the table with me and say, “I need to know what the statistics are in our region.” And say, “I want to create an event and a film around that that’s going to be moving and motivate people.” I just didn’t know how to do that then. The music, as in making albums and going on tour and promoting my own work, has taken a back seat to the work that I’ve done trying to use music as a tool for advancing social justice.

And, yet, two records in two years from you.

Yeah … [Laughs]

[Laughs] Fertile time or fluke timing?

I feel like the domestic violence film and the campaign around that was the moment … When I finished that, I realized, “I need to make a record again.” [Laughs] I really hadn’t made one since Leave Your Sleep in 2010. It’s funny because people would say, “Oh, you’re not very prolific.” And I’d say, “Well, for somebody who’s not prolific, I feel like all I do is work!” [Laughs] But the work that I’ve been doing is more community organizing and creating these multimedia protest pieces and being a mom.

Photo credit: Dan Winters