Tag: singer songwriter

LISTEN: Robert Vincent, “I Was Hurt Today But I’m Alright Now”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Robert Vincent
Hometown: Liverpool, England
Song: “I Was Hurt Today But I’m Alright Now”
Album: In This Town You’re Owned
Release Date: February 14, 2020
Label: Thirty Tigers

In Their Words: “We live busier lives, less time for ourselves. Social media has thrown even greater pressures at us, creating lack of personal connection and the loss of self-esteem if we are not rewarded with the right number of likes from our electronic peers. So who knows what anyone is going through in their day? At times we all need help, but still worry more about others’ opinions and forget to help ourselves. ‘I Was Hurt Today But I’m Alright Now’ is a message written from the perspective of someone trapped in their own mind and speaking to that fearful side we all have within us to be stronger, but also easier on ourselves. And to step back into the real world.” — Robert Vincent

Photo credit: Alex Hurst

Aubrie Sellers Lets Her Music Breathe in ‘Far From Home’

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With her new album Far From Home, Aubrie Sellers is living up to its title. Raised in Nashville as the daughter of musicians (Jason Sellers and Lee Ann Womack) and now living in Los Angeles, she absorbed bluegrass and country while still exploring genres with a harder edge. That spectrum of influences is apparent in her new music, which ranges from the softer sounds of the title track to the electrified vibe of “My Love Will Not Change,” a duet with Steve Earle.

Adding another meaning to “Far From Home,” Sellers wrote much of the album in Texas, and she’ll launch her national tour by opening for Tanya Tucker in New York City. BGS caught up with her just before she hit the road.

BGS: You recorded Far From Home at Sonic Ranch in Texas. What made you interested in working there?

Sellers: I was listening to a lot of what I call “desert music.” Tarantino soundtracks and The Ventures and stuff like that. I had taken my camper out to Marfa, Texas, and wrote some of the songs on this record there. I was very inspired by that vibe. My whole family is from Texas, so that kind of feels like my home.

Also I wanted to get outside of Nashville and I loved that idea that the whole band stays there while you’re recording. You immerse yourself in the making of the music. It’s really important for me to focus on making a record and having a cohesive experience. I feel like all that stuff tied together.

Why did you feel like you needed to get out of Nashville, do you think?

It’s nice to have no distractions. It’s nice to have a new environment. Your environment affects what you’re doing and I felt like it was important to have that vibe, since that’s what was in my brain already. It’s just nice to escape and make sure that you’re really focusing on making the record, and focusing on the music, and doing something different.

Is that the reason you moved to L.A. as well?

Yeah, I grew up in Nashville and I’ve been around that scene my whole life. It felt important for me to get out of there and experience some new things, and surround myself with a totally fresh energy. Also I went to acting school growing up and I’ve always wanted to do that. I find the film industry here really inspiring. I tried to come here when I was younger and I wasn’t quite ready, so this time it stuck.

You draw on a lot of influences and genres in your sound, but where do you think country music comes into your musical vision?

For sure I think my songwriting is country. I think it’s a little of that personal touch — and you don’t find that as much in other genres. There’s a simplicity to it, in a good way hopefully! And then sonically, steel guitar is one of my favorite instruments. I don’t want to make a record without steel guitar on it.

I listen to a lot of traditional country but I also really love that era of country with Steve Earle and Dwight Yoakam and Lucinda Williams. I love Buddy Miller — he’s kind of on the fringe of country. Buddy and Julie Miller have been a huge influence on me. All of those, and of course, classic country like George Jones and Merle Haggard. Those were my biggest country influences.

Are you a fan of bluegrass?

Yeah, I play the banjo! I thought for a while when I was in high school that that’s what I was going to do. I love bluegrass. Ralph Stanley is my favorite singer. My dad grew up playing with Ricky Skaggs so I was around it a lot. I’m really inspired by bluegrass. On this record, I did “My Love Will Not Change,” which was written by Shawn Camp, but I knew the Del McCoury version. For me, there’s just a similarity in the intensity and the drive behind some bluegrass and rock and blues music. It’s got a simple, emotional feel to it, to me. All of those things connect in my brain and my heart. I love bluegrass.

What was your entrance point to Ralph Stanley? That’s a big catalog to navigate.

I guess just listening to old Stanley Brothers records. Fortunately I grew up in an era where I could explore all music on the internet, you know? So I would go into a bluegrass rabbit hole and listen to that. And then of course, I love the banjo. I think it’s like the electric guitar of bluegrass.

You co-produced this record, too [with Frank Liddell]. What kind of textures did you hope to capture?

I don’t bring in references or anything like that when I’m making music. I think it’s more important to have a vision in your head and make sure you’re bringing in the right players, putting them in the right environment, and having the right songs. Let it evolve, take your time, and let it breathe.

It’s the same with writing and choosing songs. I try not to make it like a factory. I try to let it happen organically. I think it’s making sure you’re putting together the right people in the right environment. You know, I had four guitar players on this record! Sometime it’s about having someone sit out for a song. Letting everything have room to breathe is my philosophy.

Photo credit: Chloé Aktas

Marcus King: A “Young Man’s Dream” Come to Life

Posted on by Editor

A first encounter with Marcus King’s voice is nothing short of wondrous. The 23-year-old singer/songwriter/guitarist functions less like a singer and more as conduit for raw emotion, his dynamic, melodic singing grounded in soul, rock and roll and a preternatural sense of musical intuition. To boot, he is also one of our best young guitar-slingers, wowing legends and fans alike with his emotive, inventive take on modern, electric blues music.

On January 17, King released his first solo album, El Dorado. Produced by Dan Auerbach, it marks the first time King has offered a full-length project outside of his critically acclaimed Marcus King Band; accordingly, the project feels particularly intimate and honest, with King reaching new heights as not just a singer and player but as a storyteller and lyricist.

BGS caught up with King as he was getting ready to perform on Jimmy Kimmel Live to chat songwriting, working with Auerbach, and how it feels to strike out on his own.

BGS: It’s only been a couple of days since El Dorado released. What have the last few days been like for you?

MK: Man, it’s been a bit of a circus. But I always liked the circus when I was a kid. So it’s working out fine.

You had a couple of release shows in Nashville on Friday, too. What was it like getting the new music out to people?

It’s fun, man. Those solo acoustic shows can be a little nerve-wracking, just because there’s no one to share with. It’s a lot more vulnerable. I feel a little exposed during those, in a way. But it makes it that much more gratifying, you know?

Was there a particular song or idea you were kicking around that made plotting the album click into place for you?

It all started with “Young Man’s Dream.” We wrote that two years ago, almost to the day. It was right before I was going in to do [the Marcus King Band’s 2018 album,] Carolina Confessions. We already had plans to work with Dave Cobb, which was a surreal experience. Before that, Dan Auerbach reached out and asked if I could come do some writing sessions with him. I jumped at the chance. That’s the first tune we ever wrote together, “Young Man’s Dream.” Then the theme fell into place for this to be a storytelling album, a coming of age story.

Given that you and Dan had written that one song together and felt strongly enough about it to do this entire project, what would you say makes your creative partnership with one another so special and fruitful?

Working with somebody is a really intimate relationship. Writing is really personal. I had never really co-written before, and Dan was really particular about who we brought in to write with me on this record. He and I were able to write together two years ago and continue to do so over the past couple of years. Our friendship and our writing partnership led to a very organic process in the studio. Writing together [for the first time] is really kind of like a first date. It’s a little awkward and you really have to bare your soul and hope you don’t freak anybody out.

To that point, when you are writing, how heavily do you draw from your own life? Are you the kind of writer who puts it all out there or are you more inclined to share your personal experiences through metaphor and more universal stories?

I pull directly from my personal experience, because I feel like that’s what I want to hear from a writer and from my favorite singer/songwriters. I love a good metaphor and all, but I really enjoy the personal experience you can hear behind the words, and their conviction. If I like a song it’s because I feel a personal kinship to that music. On this record, everything we wrote came from personal experience.

With further regard to your songwriting, you’re such a dynamic, melodic singer. When you’re writing the vocal parts of your music, do you tend to have a melody first or a lyric first? Or does it vary song by song?

The melody comes first for me. Especially if I’m working with a keyboard player, like Bobby Wood, who played on the record. He comes up with these really beautiful, gorgeous parts and I’ll just start humming, and hum more and more until it starts to form words. I just allow my soul to fill in the blanks, as to what those notes are trying to say. I’ve found that to be a pretty different way to approach it, but it’s fun.

When you get to the point when you’re ready to record a song – and I know y’all recorded this album particularly quickly, over just three days – when you go to record a song, do you have a note-by-note sense of what you’re going to sing or are you more likely to follow your instinct, particularly with regards to ad-libs and runs?

It’s mostly on the fly. The only time I would ever change it would be if Dan and I thought it should go a little differently. Then I’ll go back and fix it.

I actually ran into someone last night and they complimented me and said there were a lot of well-thought-out [guitar] solos on the record which, to me, is shocking to hear, because I can’t write a guitar solo or a vocal melody. It just comes. It’s a natural thing. To me, that’s against what I know. I was almost offended – I wasn’t actually offended, obviously – but you know that’s my whole approach to the record, to free it up melodically.

You touched on this a minute ago, but you had an incredible roster of players who joined you in the studio while you and Dan were recording. What was your time together like?

The whole reason we work so well together is that their work ethic and mine really align. The only time I have to wake up early is if I’m working on new music or I’m working on something really important to me; otherwise I’m a late riser. On this record, I would get in around nine and all the cats would already be there. They’re all in their late seventies and early eighties, so they all get up at sunrise. They’d already have had their coffee and would just be waiting on me to get there. We’d get to work around 9:30 and go until 9:30, 10 at night.

Given that they’re all such seasoned players, did you give them free reign to write and play their parts, or did you have a firmer sense of what you wanted each player to do?

We had our work tapes of the writing sessions. We’d play the tape for them and they’d write their charts and give us the chart. We’d play the song and that would be the take. Everyone is writing their own parts on the spot, you know? It’s really a beautiful way to record. The stuff that comes out that way is really beautiful. Everyone added their own part and I never had any notes. The only note I had was at the end of “Wildflowers & Wine,” the outro is a little different. I recommended that change. That’s the only little note I had. Otherwise it was all great.

We touched on playing these songs live solo at the beginning of the conversation, but you’ll have your band out with you on the road in support of the album. What are you most looking forward to about playing these new songs live?

I’m excited to showcase it to people in a way that they’ve never heard it before. I always like to talk about the importance of having a studio version and live version. I think having the live version sound exactly like the studio is almost a farce. We stay true to form; we aren’t going like Radiohead with completely different versions. But we add more improvisation and play a bit with the structures of songs. We also have two horn players, so the songs have a different vibe. Why would someone want to leave their home and come all this way to hear it exactly the same? I like to offer up something different, you know?

Photos: Alysse Gafkjen

LISTEN: Watkins Family Hour, “Just Another Reason”

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Artist: Watkins Family Hour (Sean Watkins and Sara Watkins)
Hometown: Los Angeles, CA
Song: “Just Another Reason”
Album: brother sister
Release Date: April 10, 2020
Label: Family Hour Records/Thirty Tigers

In Their Words: “It felt really good to dig into the potential of two people… the primary goal of this record became to see what we could do when it is just the two of us. The arrangements and the writing were all focused on that. Listening now, I’m really proud of what we did. These are songs that would not have come out of either one of us individually and it feels like a band sound, like this is what we do, the two of us.” — Sara Watkins

The Show On The Road – Dar Williams

Posted on by Chris Jacobs

This week, Z. Lupetin’s conversation with revered singing songstress and deeply wise wordsmith, Dar Williams.

LISTEN: APPLE PODCASTS • MP3

Coming out of the Hudson Valley outside New York City, Williams has released over thirteen albums across a quarter century as one of America’s touchstone folk poets, first bursting out of the famed Lilith Fair folk rock scene in the mid 1990s with contemporaries like Ani Difranco and the Indigo Girls and gaining a devoted following. She has toured with luminaries like Joan Baez and Patty Griffin, written a book about what makes communities resilient, she runs her own songwriting retreats, and has inspired generations of women to fearlessly embrace their creativity and exercise their limitless potential. Z. was able to catch up with Williams in the green room at the historic McCabe’s Guitar Shop before her second show of a sold out weekend in Los Angeles. A new album is on the way.

Best of: Live at Ear Trumpet Labs

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Since 2011 Portland, Oregon-based Ear Trumpet Labs has been blessing the music world with their finely crafted microphones, with their clean, natural sound and designs reminiscent of the styles of the 1930s and 40s. And for the past three years, they’ve been gifting us listeners with beautiful examples of their high quality equipment through their Workshop Sessions, pairing exquisite videography with master musicianship. We’re looking back at some of our favorites from 2019 as we move into the new year, when BGS + ETL will be partnering to bring you more content live at Ear Trumpet Labs!

Jerry Douglas & Tommy Emmanuel – “Choctaw Hayride”

We’re not alone in our love for this session: it was one of our BGS readers’ favorite stories of the year. But really how could it not be? It doesn’t get much better than two masters of their crafts getting together in a workshop and just letting it rip.

Both are using Edwina microphones, and there’s also a stereo pair of Delphinas as room mics.

The Local Honeys – “The Redhead Yodel no. 1 [Mainliner]”

In their unfortunately rare ode to the female traveller amidst a plethora of hobo songs in American folk music, the Local Honeys bring us what they call “a lovey-dovey, yodelly-wodelly one.” Is there anything better than a yodelly-wodelly love song from the perspective of a female hobo? No. Is there anything better than the Local Honeys? No.

Anthony D’Amato – “Party’s Over”

Anyone else still recovering from all those holiday parties?

Anna Tivel – “Minneapolis”

Once the holiday cheer has passed, this time of year can be heavy. Tivel tells BGS this song is about “that stagnant winter sadness that can take over everything until you have to physically move yourself to shake it loose.” This stirring string arrangement may envelop you in those depths of winter, but it just might give you the hope to get yourself un-stuck.

Rachel Sermanni – “Farewell, Farewell”

Scottish folk musician Sermanni’s gentle delivery and sparse accompaniment of this Richard Thompson tune draws out the influence of the British folk ballad even more than the original Fairport Convention release in the late ‘60s. We dare you to not be completely drawn in by this breathtaking rendition.

Jefferson Hamer – “Alameda”

Hamer’s 2018 release Alameda is a collection of “road stories,” its stunning title track a tale of a traveling worker and a lost love.

The Brother Brothers – “Angel Island”

Adam and David Moss’s arrangement of this devastating Peter Rowan-penned story of a Chinese immigrant couple separated and detained at San Francisco’s Angel Island, a regrettably common occurrence during the years of the immigration station’s operation from 1910-1940, is almost unbearably haunting, and for good reason. This is a story that we as a culture shouldn’t soon forget.

Claire Hitchins – Emma

Aside from the beautiful lyrics painting the picture of our leading lady, and the easy, light vocal delivery, the look of pure peace on Hitchins’ face might just be the cherry on top of this session. “We’ll rise with love, my love, I believe we are worthy.”

Greg Blake – “Say Won’t You Be Mine”

Greg Blake brings some bluegrass from Colorado to the Ear Trumpet Labs with this Stanley Brothers classic.

The Lasses & Kathryn Claire – “Here Now”

Amsterdam folk duo The Lasses team up with Portland singer-songwriter Kathryn Claire to create this captivating session featuring violin, guitar, bodhrán, and trio vocals that could warm any lonely heart this cold winter.

 

BGS Top Moments of 2019

Posted on by Editor

If music happened in 2019, but wasn’t a “song” or an “album,” does it make a sound– er… does it warrant real estate in any of the many year-end pieces, wrap-ups, and lists hitting the internet on a daily (sometimes hourly) basis? Why, of course it does! Each year BGS notes Top Moments of roots music — whatever form they may take — as a way of reminding ourselves that the art we each consume, especially of the musical variety, is often at its best when it eschews the formats and media we expect and/or most closely associate with it. What changes about the way we view a year in music when we alter the context as such? First and foremost, we change just that — our viewpoint. Turns out that makes a world of difference.

Speaking of top moments, one of the best for the BGS team took place just last week, as we premiered a brand new look with an updated homepage and logo. A lighter color palate, clean modern lines, and updated fonts usher in a new era for the site, and hopefully a positive reading experience for you, our beloved fans and readers. Not unlike the state of roots music itself, our new look is constantly evolving, but what’s at the heart of it remains timeless. Now, read about more moments that turned our heads and caught our ears over the course of the past 12 months.

Chris Stapleton Creates LEGO Alter Ego

When Chris Stapleton’s music video for “Second One to Know” hit YouTube, I found myself musing, “What are the benchmarks we use to determine someone’s level of notoriety? What are their claims to fame? Owning a tour bus? Having your first number one hit? Being the musical guest on SNL? Having a highway named after you? Or perhaps a proclamation from your local public figures designating a [Named After You] Day?” Seriously, can you imagine getting to a point in your country pickin’ / singin’ / songwritin’ career where your Game of Thrones cameo falls into the background of your music video star LEGO-self?

I would be remiss if in this blurb I did not mention another real-ass country singer/songwriter/rabble-rouser who dabbled in alternative visual media this year, too — that would be Sturgill Simpson’s “Sing Along.” More of this oddball, non sequitur energy in country in 2020, please. – Justin Hiltner

Dolly Parton’s America Podcast Finds Common Ground

Epiphanies in the podcast series Dolly Parton’s America are too many to count, as host Jad Abumrad and his team explore the notion that the Tennessee songbird is a rare unifying force in the fractured socio-cultural universe — everyone loves Dolly! But the fourth episode, titled “Neon Moss,” finding the common ground of Dolly’s Tennessee mountain home and the Lebanon mountain home in which Abumrad’s dad (a doctor who became friends with Parton after treating her in Nashville) grew up is gripping on a cultural and emotional level. Bonus: BGS’ own Justin Hiltner and his banjo pop up as a key part of a later episode. – Steve Hochman

Duos, Duos, and More Duos

Were you seeing double this summer? Mandolin Orange, Tedeschi Trucks Band, and Shovels & Rope offered exceptional albums and sold tons of tickets. From the sweeping San Isabel from Jamestown Revival to the intimacy of Buddy & Julie Miller’s Breakdown on 20th Avenue South, roots duos were having their moment. Personal favorites included The Small Glories and Bruce Robison & Kelly Willis, but the true discovery for me was Dravus House, a Seattle duo who delivered an understated and beautiful album that blends Elena Loper’s vocal with Cooper Stouli’s soft touch on guitar to stunning effect. – Craig Shelburne

Del McCoury Turns 80

At 80 years old, Del McCoury has witnessed the rise of bluegrass while still being actively involved in it. (In fact, he’s got a gig this weekend in New York with David Grisman, Jerry Douglas, Drew Emmitt, Andy Falco, and Vince Herman.) An all-star tribute at the Grand Ole Opry provided perhaps the most musically satisfying night of music this year for me, mostly because The Del McCoury Band has still got it (and they make it look like so much fun). Check out their 2019 performance on Live From Here With Chris Thile. – Craig Shelburne

Hadestown Wins Big on Broadway

In an era when Broadway has seemingly been taken over by jukebox musicals that rehash the catalogs of legacy artists, watching Anaïs Mitchell pick up eight Tony Awards for Hadestown was a surreal triumph. For those of us who have followed Mitchell’s career over the past couple of decades, it was truly remarkable to see a grassroots musical that she first staged in 2006 reach the heights of Broadway, earning her a win for Best Musical and Best Original Score. “Wait for Me,” indeed. – Chris Jacobs

Ken Burns Digs Deep into the Roots of Country Music

Ken Burns has a long history of digging into America’s deepest roots, through documentaries like The Civil War, Jazz, Baseball, and The National Parks. In 2019 he took those roots in a more on-the-nose direction, exploring the long and varied history of American Roots Music through his PBS documentary series Country Music, which premiered in September. As the filmmaker himself said in a recent interview, “Country Music is about two four-letter words: love and loss.” Thanks to Burns, who looks unflinchingly at all of the different stories that have shaped this music, we get to see the love, the loss, and everything in between. – Amy Reitnouer Jacobs

MerleFest and IBMA, Rediscovered

After a long break, I made an effort to reconnect with two of the preeminent roots music festivals  in 2019 – MerleFest and IBMA’s World of Bluegrass. With other obligations in Nashville, it had been five or six years since I’d attended either, and both surprised me for different reasons. At MerleFest, I was struck by the caliber and diversity of artists, in particular for landing a headlining set by Brandi Carlile in her breakout year. Five months later, I returned to North Carolina to see IBMA in action, amazed by the way that the city of Raleigh has embraced the musical experience, from the Bluegrass Ramble to the StreetFest with plenty of outdoor stages. North Carolina, I’ve got you in my 2020 vision. #ComeHearNC – Craig Shelburne

“Old Town Road” Can Lead Anywhere

Is “Old Town Road” country? Like millions, maybe even billions of fans, I’m inclined to answer that question with an emphatic “Of course it is!” But I’m also inclined to ask: What else is this song? Is it roots music? Is it folk? Blues? Yes, yes, and yes. That chorus is powerful in its simplicity, and it’s not hard to imagine Doc Watson singing those lines or Geechie Wiley intoning that sentiment mysteriously from some lost B-side, accompanied by a century of acetate scratches and surface noise. Almost accidentally existential, the chorus speaks to an unnamed American melancholy, and it can mean anything you want it to mean and be anything you want it to be. – Stephen Deusner

Roots Music Don’t Need No Man

No, like literally. After 2019 we can definitively say that roots music as a whole does not need any men. From the first albums of the year (say, Maya de Vitry’s Adaptations or Mary Bragg’s Violets as Camouflage), followed by two indomitable women of the Grammys (Kacey Musgraves and Brandi Carlile), then two universally regarded supergroups (Our Native Daughters, the Highwomen), the resurgence of true legends (like Reba McEntire’s Stronger Than the Truth and Tanya Tucker’s While I’m Livin’), to a Newport Folk Fest collaboration that combined nearly all of our favorites, this year in Americana, bluegrass, old-time, and folk has been defined by women. There were pickers (Molly Tuttle, Nora Brown, Gina Furtado), there were scholars (Allison de Groot & Tatiana Hargreaves, Our Native Daughters), there were poets (Caroline Spence, Jamie Drake) — repeatedly this year I found myself in musical spaces that, if all of the men were subtracted, I would still want for nothing. #GiveWomenAmericana – Justin Hiltner

Yola’s Meteoric Rise

Co-write sessions and frontwoman-for-hire gigs aptly prepared Yola for the non-stop successes she’s had in 2019, from sharing stages with childhood heroes Mavis Staples and Dolly Parton to nabbing a whopping four Grammy nominations, including a coveted Best New Artist nod. Kicking off the whirlwind year was her Dan Auerbach-produced debut solo album, Walk Through Fire, a beginning-to-end stunner and a sure sign that Yola’s star power will only continue to rise. The ample steel guitar on “Rock Me Gently,” the countrypolitan charm of “Ride Out in the Country,” and the buoyant old-school soul of a new bonus track “I Don’t Wanna Lie” show off an eclectic roster of influences and a striking vocal range. But the album standout might be its only number written solely by Yola, “It Ain’t Easier,” a slow-burner with a hell of a bridge that pays tribute to the hard work behind even the greatest of loves. On the stage, in the studio, and in everything she does, Yola is putting in the work — and we can’t wait to see what 2020 holds. – Dacey Orr

Joe Henry Surrenders to the Song

Posted on by Editor

Joe Henry is sitting and chatting in the living room of his vintage, Spanish-style home in Pasadena, California. The subject of the note that starts off his new album, The Gospel According to Water, comes up. He looks over his left shoulder and points to the corner.

“It’s that guitar right there,” he says. “It’s an all-mahogany Martin from 1922. It was the first guitar they made that was created for steel strings.”

Seeing this small, plain instrument, it seems impossible that it was from this that he conjured the note in question, a sound deep yet brittle, intimately resonant. It’s at once ancient and fully present in the now. And it’s a sound that serves as something of a motif throughout the marvelously moving, affectingly poetic cycle of songs. It was a sound from a specific source that was echoing in his head when he sat in the Los Angeles studio of his longtime friend, recording engineer Husky Huskold, to set a new batch of songs on tape.

“I played him one song from Lightnin’ Hopkins,” he says. The song was “Mama and Papa Hopkins,” a 1959 recording from the point of view of young Lightnin’ getting his feuding parents to see the good they share.

“It was just vocal and acoustic guitar. And Lightnin’ is mostly singing to a single string that he’s playing. And yet the way it’s recorded, it’s so heavy. There’s such a sense of ominous space. And I said, ‘Look. I know I’m not him. I’m never going to be Lightnin’ Hopkins. But listen to what’s going on here. There’s something that’s making this so visceral in a way that I want to hear. Even if this is just demos, I want to hear a sense of drama.’”

You’d think Henry, who just turned 59 last week, would have had more than enough drama. A week before Thanksgiving 2018, he’d been diagnosed with prostate cancer, which had metastasized to his skeletal system. (He is in remission now and feeling hearty.) When he went in to record, it was a week before Father’s Day. All but two of the songs had been written in an unexpected rush of expression that started at Valentine’s Day. He specifically references those poignant holidays when giving the timeline.

As he plucked that first note for “Famine Walk” (one of two songs on the album written during a two-month writing residency at a small art college on the west coast of Ireland, before the cancer diagnosis), he had no idea it would be how he opened the album. He had no idea he was making an album.

He just wanted to get these songs down while they seemed fresh, and that’s all he thought he was doing in the course of two quick days of recording with his son, as well as reeds player Levon Henry, pianist Patrick Warren and guitarist John Smith sitting in on some of the songs, and with David Piltch playing bass on “Book of Common Prayer.” At the end of the second day, he went home to listen to the recordings, sitting in his office with his wife Melanie Ciccone, Levon, and a friend. Only then did he really hear what he had.

“We just listened to the whole thing,” he says. “And it was so obvious to me and to everybody in the room listening back that it felt fully realized. I mean, it’s raw. It’s really spare. But emotionally speaking, I heard it and thought, ‘I don’t know if I’ll get closer to the intention of these songs.”

The only thing added later was the background vocals of Allison Russell and JT Nero, AKA Birds of Chicago, on the songs “In Time for Tomorrow” and “The Fact of Love.” He would have added his longtime drummer Jay Bellerose to some of this, but when he sent the tracks to him, Bellerose responded with a simple voicemail: “Um, not on your life.” His drummer’s instincts of when not to play, though extreme here, were exactly right.

In its sense of space, The Gospel According to Water is a perfect portrayal of the experiences that brought it about, mystifying and mystical in as personal a way as can be. At times it’s as elliptical and elastic as the engagingly playful folk-jazz that’s been a signature of his last several albums. But here that portrayal is stripped down to its essence.

At the center is the natural fragility of Henry’s voice as he lingers over key words and phrases in ways that can be enchanting and startling, sometimes both at once. While it’s instantly recognizable to anyone familiar with his work, it stands apart not only from his previous 14 solo albums, but also from his many production credits: for New Orleans titan Allen Toussaint’s final works (including the 2006 The River in Reverse, a collaboration with Elvis Costello following the city’s devastating flood), Bonnie Raitt, Rosanne Cash, Bettye LaVette, the Milk Carton Kids, Joan Baez’s most recent album Whistle Down the Wind, and Rhiannon Giddens’ and Francesco Turrisi’s stunning there is no Other.

But he winces at this being considered his “cancer album.” He even considered trying to avoid the topic in interviews and promotion of the release. But ultimately he opted for openness.

“Whether it’s fair or not, it’s going to happen,” he says. “I lost a little bit of sleep over that, wondering how I can mitigate that. And then I just realized that I can’t now, more than I ever could, control how people respond to the music — if they respond at all — and rein that in… People are going to hear it like that, and there’s not much I can do about it. It’s an aspect of how this record happened and what it is.”

Indeed, as the music made its way out to the world, friends and fans alike started sending him notes, almost all mentioning his health issues. He came to accept that for the good intentions, too.

“I just believe in the songs enough,” he says. “They’re already moving out into the world without me. They’re going to have to make their own way. They’re going to have to straighten their own teeth, find their own job. I can only do so much and when I go out and perform these songs, I may or may not at times offer any framing context about how the songs occurred or when they occurred.”

He references a comment made many years ago by his mentor T Bone Burnett, who produced Henry’s 1990 album Shuffletown, when discussing his Christian faith in regards to his art. Burnett said that while some sing about the light, he sings about what he sees illuminated by the light. Henry addressed that, in his own way, when he first played a few of the songs in public, in a concert at the Los Angeles’s Largo theater.

“Part of my preamble was to say, ‘Look, I know I’m holding this shoehorn that would help you into the tight fit of a big batch of new songs. And if I have one reluctance to hand this shoehorn over it’s because I don’t want you to think, from what I’m about to say, that where a song comes from is what a song is,’” he says. “A song is not where it comes from. Just because my particular health crisis has invited me to receive these songs in a particular sort of way, that is not what the songs are.”

He thinks back to being with Toussaint, doing interviews right after New Orleans was flooded in 2005, his home among the many destroyed. In interview after interview, Henry saw Toussaint refuse to deliver the “heartbreak” stories journalists craved. Finally, when pushed by a CNN interviewer, he made his point.

“He said, ‘You have to understand something: More than a drowning, this was a baptism,’” Henry recalls. “And talk about something that silenced the room, myself included. I’ve thought about this so many times since this occurrence for me, the fact that Allen wasn’t in denial about what had just happened. He just had the ability to see, that his vision didn’t stop with this trauma. He was seeing beyond.”


Some of that is elusive on the album, found in shadows cast by the metaphorical light. The song “Orson Welles” is a good example, with its arresting chorus: “You provide the terms of my surrender, I’ll provide the war.” He’s still mystified how that one came about, the words written as he and Melanie flew from Burbank to San Francisco.

“That’s just something I found falling off my hand,” he says. “I open my notebook and I literally watched my hand write ‘Orson Welles’ at the top of the page. And I didn’t know what Orson had to do with anything. It’s just one of those moments where it felt spring-loaded. I didn’t believe I was writing about Orson, but I believe that somehow his specter was kind of directing, gesturing me on to something, somewhere I needed to go in that moment. And I just followed, because, you know, who wouldn’t?”

He found himself thinking about a part of Citizen Kane in which Welles’ title character wants his newspaper to have headlines from a conflict in South America that is petering out, so he cables his correspondent there, “You provide the prose poems, I’ll provide the war.” (In real life, William Randolph Hearst instructed his staff, “You furnish the pictures, I’ll provide the war.”)

For Henry it took a different turn, though, with the idea of surrender — certainly tied to his health situation, and the ultimate lack of power over it, but extending far beyond that.

“I feel like I’ve written about surrender a good bit,” he says. “And I don’t mean surrender in terms of resignation, I kind of mean surrender in terms of radical acceptance, which is empowering, which is motivating, as opposed to the idea of collapse.”

Two titles stand out, though, for the clear view of the basics of life, the perspective brought by such things as loss, age, kids growing up and facing mortality. “The Fact of Love” is pretty much self-explanatory, but “Salt and Sugar” really captures it. “Everything is salt and sugar now,” he sings, boiling it down to things that make life possible and meaningful — though too much of either can kill you.

He explains that he and Melanie have been doing some “decluttering” in recent years, having left the large house in which they raised their two kids, and moving twice to subsequently smaller places. But the song definitely shows what he’s seen from the light brought by his health.

“It’s paring things down to salt and sugar,” he says. “Everything. What matters? How do you make a record? How do you express what you want to say? Who do you spend your time with? What do you spend your days doing? All that.”

He recounts many of the changes in his life in recent years, the moves, the attachments and the letting go of attachments. Finally, he sums it up in a way that gets to the heart of what he has done with The Gospel According to Water, and it’s just as on-point as that note he plucked to start the album.

“I mean, just, you know, occupy life.”

Photo Credit: Jacob Blickenstaff

MIXTAPE: The Milk Carton Kids, In Harm’s Way

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“There’s a paradox at the heart of great harmony singing: when voices combine in so elemental a way that they disappear into each other, the effect is dizzying, mystifying, disorienting, and yet by far the most satisfying sound in music. Here’s a VERY incomplete playlist, spanning a few generations, of bands defined by their harmonies, who set my mind spinning with their vocal arrangements, execution, and pure chemistry as singers.

“Full disclosure: my own band is included aspirationally and for the sake of self-promotion. Author’s Note: Sorry not sorry for naming this playlist with a pun.” — Joey Ryan, The Milk Carton Kids

The Jayhawks – “Blue”

That unison in the first few lines is so thrilling cause you know what’s about to happen, and when the parts separate it just feels so good.

Gillian Welch – “Caleb Meyer”

The harmonies and Dave’s playing are so intricate in this song you’d be forgiven for glossing over the lyrics, which tell the story of an attempted sexual assault victim killing her attacker with a broken bottle. Check out the Live From Here version with Gaby Moreno, Sarah Jarosz, and Sara Watkins, and catch the alt lyric subbing “Kavanaugh” for “Caleb Meyer” about halfway through.

Gram Parsons & Emmylou Harris – “Hearts on Fire”

Just one of the all-time great duets. Who’s singing the melody, Emmylou or Gram? Hint: trick question.

Our Native Daughters – “Black Myself”

Do all supergroups hate being called supergroups? I wouldn’t know. Our Native Daughters is a supergroup though, and the power of their four voices in the refrains and choruses of this one are all the proof I need.

Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, & Emmylou Harris – “Those Memories of You”

It’s insane that three of the great singers of their generation just so happened to have this vocal chemistry. Their voices swirl together like paint and make a color I’ve never seen before.

boygenius – “Me & My Dog”

Favorite game to play when this song comes on is “try not to cry before the harmonies come in.” Very difficult. Impossible once they all sing together.

The Smothers Brothers – “You Can Call Me Stupid”

GOATS. IDOLS. Favorite line is, “That’s a pun isn’t it?” “No, that really happened.”

The Milk Carton Kids – “I Meant Every Word I Said”

My band. Imposter syndrome. We recorded the vocals on this whole album into one mic together. It helps us disappear our voices into each other’s.

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young – “Carry On”

For me, CSNY are the pinnacle of that disorienting feeling harmonies give you when you just have no idea what’s going on. I’ve never been able to follow any one of their individual parts and I LOVE that.

Sam & Dave – “Soothe Me”

When the chorus comes around and you can’t decide which part you want to sing along with, you know they did it right.

Louvin Brothers – “You’re Running Wild”

The Louvins sound ancient to me. Primal. The way their voices rub against each other in close harmony is almost off-putting but I’m addicted to it.

The Highwomen – “If She Ever Leaves Me”

There’s probably even better examples of the Highwomen doing that crazy thing with their four voices where they become one entirely unique voice, all together, but this song is just so good I had to go with it. And the blend in the choruses is just as intoxicating as it gets.

I’m With Her – “See You Around”

Really an embarrassment of riches in modern music on the harmony front. Hearing I’m With Her perform around one microphone drives me insane with the best possible mix of confusion, jealousy, and joy.

Mandolin Orange – “Paper Mountain”

The melancholy is so satisfying when either one of them sings alone, and then they bring that low harmony and I have to leave the room.

Skaggs & Rice – “Talk About Suffering”

This whole record is a masterclass in two-part harmony. It changed my entire concept of singing. I’m Jewish, but when this song comes on it makes me sing wholeheartedly of my love for Jesus.

The Everly Brothers – “Sleepless Nights”

The absolute masters of both parts of a two-part harmony standing alone as the melody. Credit to Felice and Boudleaux for that, for sure, but the Everlys executed it better than anyone before or since.

Simon & Garfunkel – “59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy) — Live at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY – July 1970

This is far from my favorite S&G song, but this live version especially showcases what geniuses they were at arranging crossing vocal lines, unisons, parallel melodies, nonsense syllables and swirling harmonies. Plus the nostalgic “awwww” from the crowd gives me hope that a sensitive folk duo could one day achieve mainstream success again.

Shovels & Rope – “Lay Low”

This starts out as a song of profound loneliness with just one voice singing, then the harmony comes in and it gets… even lonelier? Harmony is magic.

Boyz II Men – “End of the Road”

I’m a child of the ‘90s, don’t @ me. I never realized at all those 8th grade slow dances that we were subliminally being taught world-class harmony singing and arranging. Good night.

Photo Credit: Jessica Perez

Grace Potter Sets the Scene with Dramatic ‘Daylight’

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Grace Potter possesses one of the most commanding voices in popular music — which is a good thing, because on Daylight she’s got something to say.

Potter co-wrote much of the new solo album with producer Eric Valentine, with whom she fell in love while still married to a member of her band — which is now broken up, too. After their divorces, Potter and Valentine married, started a family, and now live in Topanga Canyon, California.

The overwhelming emotions of these dramatic life changes are channeled into Daylight, with many of the songs written with Valentine, and on occasion, his longtime buddy Mike Busbee, who died in September.

“Love Is Love,” a potent opener to the project, grabbed immediate attention as the first single, but in this interview with BGS, Potter goes deeper into musical pathway that ultimately led her to Daylight.

“Release” is about the aftermath of the breakup. Who was the first person you played that for when you finished it?

Grace Potter: Eric. Busbee actually texted it to Eric but it was only half the song. Our voice recorder cut off before we finished. But he just wanted Eric to hear where we were at with the writing and Eric had to pull over the car because he was bawling listening to it. And Eric doesn’t cry easily. So that was a really important moment and one that I didn’t expect.

That song, I’d started it myself in the bathtub and it had sat in my voice memo bank for like a year and a half before Eric had heard it and was like, “Let’s not sleep on that one. Let’s pursue that and see where it goes.” Obviously it went and went and went and it’s definitely the one that gets under my skin, every time. It’s hard to play live actually.

And you’re setting yourself up as the character that set this all in motion, too.

Yeah. “I know that I caused this pain…” And that really is the full taking ownership and being accountable for your choices and knowing that those choices are not always this self-righteous, “I can do no wrong” thing. Humans are vulnerable. Humans do make mistakes. Humans change their mind. Lives and careers and happiness and financial fortitude – it all shifts and changes over the time that we live. And the more I’ve lived, the more I realize that it’s okay to give yourself permission, to be that vulnerable.

You quoted the opening line to “Release,” and the opening line on “Shout It Out” sets up that song’s storyline, too. I’ve always thought that those opening lines are something you do really well, but I didn’t realize until researching for this interview that you went to film school.

Oh yeah.

So I’m curious, do you think there’s a correlation there? Because when you make a movie, you have those establishing shots in the beginning, and in your songs you have those establishing opening lines.

And sometimes I like to mislead. I like that opening line to take you in, like, a Quentin Tarantino direction. But it’s actually like a Nora Ephron romance. But I really love storytelling. It’s the same thing I do when I’m writing my sets too. Every single song and every musical experience has to take you on an emotional journey. So there’s a launch point and there’s a revelation, which you know, within the first 20 minutes of a movie, you’re always supposed to basically set up the premise of the movie and potentially introduce one twist. For me, my life was full of so many twists while I was writing Daylight that it wasn’t hard.

After the Nocturnals ended, you had to start a band again. What’s an audition process like to be in your band?

I just want to be around people I like first. Then hopefully they’re good at music. For real. Life is too short to be in a band with people that don’t fit into your ethos or feel, or just don’t feel right. You get these feelings, you get a sense when you’re in a room with someone, if they suck the air out of the room and they have that negative energy, it really changes your entire life and your entire demeanor.

You can feel yourself going kind of gray. I call it the Eeyore effect. You know, it’s this “uhhhhh” feeling. So I generally avoid Eeyores. Although an occasional well-balanced, calm person who doesn’t talk all the time is a wonderfully welcomed part of the road because we can’t all be psychotic extroverts. It’s enough with just me and my baby. But I really enjoy finding musicians who specialize in something that’s just one step quirkier than what you would expect.

Busbee, what I loved about him was that not only was he an amazing songwriter, he played the trombone. Just randomly, like, “I studied trombone.” Really? Eliza Hardy Jones, my keyboard player and singer in my band, is a next level, Olympic champion quilter. Quilting is her thing. She’s actually got a huge show in 2020. She’s doing a massive exhibition in Nebraska at the quilt museum.

Our new drummer, Jordan West, was working for Roland demoing the audio equipment, but actually was hiding in plain sight for so many people. I was looking for a female drummer who could sing, or a female bass player who could sing, or a female guitarist who could sing. I just wanted two female voices that could do all the Lucius parts. So it was fitting the puzzle pieces together for me. Instead of auditioning a bunch of people saying, “I know exactly what I’m looking for,” I just waited until I found a flow of people that felt right. And if they happen to play an instrument I needed, then you’re hired.

Kurtis Keber, our bass player, who’s been with us since last year, came into our world through my previous drummer, Matt Musty, who is now out with Train. We miss him all the time, but these happy accidents happen where you find your people. I saw Kurtis the other day. I was like, “Kurtis, what are you doing? Are you in the studio?” He goes, “No, no, I’ve been building. I’m helping do some carpentry.” My longtime guitarist [Benny Yurco] is now becoming obsessed with recording and becoming one of those crazy studio guys — from the humble beginnings of not even using one guitar pedal to this mad scientist lab they have in Burlington, [Vermont] now.

I like jack-of-all-trades people who like doing lots of things. Those are the things that attract me to people. Their strangeness. Their idioms, their specific obsession with just the tiniest little thing. You know, loose leaf tea. You can talk for an hour and a half about loose leaf tea? I’m in, count me in.

I read the lineup of your Grand Point North festival this year and you did an acoustic set on that Sunday night. What is it about that presentation that you enjoy?

Well, Warren Haynes from Gov’t Mule has been a longtime collaborator and it’s been something that we have talked about doing because we share a joy of being musical and not really knowing what’s going to happen. And not having the stakes be so high that there’s an entire band behind you train wrecking. You know what I mean?

Usually you have to rehearse and really gain a mastery over every single song and arrangement, but when you’re doing an acoustic set, there’s so much freedom to explore. Warren’s musicality and my musicality are complementary to one another where we can take it in a lot of different directions and kind of wring out the towel different every night.

We’d done it a lot backstage and not in front of people, but we felt like it would be a cool thing to share because so many musicians, they just get out there and they run the Ferris wheel, they crank the thing up and they do the same show night after night. There’s been nine years of my festival. People have seen me play with my band. They’ve seen Warren play. He’s played three times in my festival. So I really wanted to treat the audience to a different experience.

Is part of that perspective because you went to a lot of festivals growing up?

Yeah. I came from the jam band world. Warren really ushered me into it. I was very much standing in the shadows of some amazingly talented people who paved the way for me. The festival circuit is really the only way that I was able to break out on my own and be noticed and stand out. I think it’s because of those festivals that I have the sense of diversity. I can take it in a lot of different directions and it’s more fun that way.

And if you’d go to a music festival, you’re going to hear seven, eight, ten genres of music in one place and love every single one of them. I think my instincts took me in that direction, to continue on in my career through creating in the moment, more than creating for a forever thing. …

I think none of my records have ever done my musicality justice because it’s like a high school photo album. It’s this one moment — and maybe it was a very manipulated moment that isn’t even the real reflection of what I was feeling in that moment. So Daylight was the opportunity to completely break that down, take away that premise, take away this idea of having to bottle lightning, and package it and sell it to the world. And instead have an experience. Be vulnerable and open to it and see where it takes you.

As you were talking about festivals, I was wondering, did you ever get an ear for bluegrass?

Absolutely. I grew up listening primarily to Appalachian and Celtic music, which have so many deep connections. And from my family’s record collection, I was obsessed with traditional English, Irish, and Scottish songwriting because the storytelling has these archetypes in it. It’s like the Brothers Grimm. There’s these really intense, very dark stories of women that are shape-shifting and there’s these evil goblins, and then they turn into a beautiful woman. This is a combination of fantasy and reality and love and lust and danger and war. There’s all these amazing cinematic storytelling moments in those songs.

So I grew up around that, but then bluegrass came into my world because in the festival scene, there was so much crossover. I got to meet and be in a songwriter circle early on in 2006 with Béla Fleck, Chris Thile, Jim Lauderdale, and Buddy Miller. It was such a cool lineup, pulling all these people together from all these walks of life and just playing. And it was very humbling. It made me realize I got to get my shit together, my instrumentation, because these guys know how to hold it down.

I understand that you’ve moved from Vermont to Topanga Canyon, which must’ve made your inner hippie very happy.

Oh man! My inner hippie became my outer hippie. I walked to the store two days ago in a pirate shirt with a Burberry trench coat, sweatpants, Doc Martens, and a flower crown. And I didn’t even think about it until somebody sent me a photo of it and I was like, “I did what?” That was just my usual day-to-day getup. That’s Topanga. I live and breathe that lifestyle and those people really get me.

It’s a real community too. It’s a small, small group of people. And again, I think the thing I’ve been finding that I want in life is accountability. And in a big city like L.A., you can hit someone with your car, drive away and never see them again and not really ever worry about getting caught. But if I, or anyone in town, sees anything out of the ordinary, we check in on each other. That’s how tight-knit we are, and how much we care about one another. And it’s a really, really wonderful community to be a part of.

What do you hope that fans will take away from the 2020 version of Grace Potter on tour?

You know, everything about my life has been unexpected, even to me, so I certainly can’t tell people what to expect yet because I just — every bit of it has been this ride. And as I’ve gone on as a musician, I realized that my favorite part of being a musician is inviting people into that ride with me. Instead of presenting them with a packaged thing, that is what it is, I don’t know what it is! I don’t know how this is all going to work. I’ve got a baby now and my life has fundamentally changed in so many ways. I can’t wait to see how it manifests onstage. I guarantee you there will still be headbanging, that’s for sure!

Photo credit: Pamela Neal