#love imagining pre-resonance mesa

[pier-monsters]

black mesa inbound

[shemakesmusic-uk]

TRACK BY TRACK BREAKDOWN: Nowhere Sounds Lovely LP by Cristina Vane

The origins of American music are rife with sounds and styles from all reaches of the globe, but over the last century or so, the roles have somewhat reversed themselves with blues, jazz, and mountain music being re-dispersed and re-interpreted by musicians worldwide. Enter resonator-playing, foot-stomping Cristina Vane. Born in Italy to a Sicilian-American father and a Guatemalan mother, Vane grew up between England, France, and Italy, and was fluent in four languages by the time she moved to her fathers’ native United States to attend university at 18 years old. Unlike most of her contemporaries in the music industry, Vane has a taste for pre-war American blues from the likes of Skip James, Robert Johnson, and Blind Willie Johnson. Add a splash of slow western waltzes and haunting Appalachian melodies for good measure and she’s tapped in to the very well from which rock and roll sprung.

Vane’s debut full-length album, Nowhere Sounds Lovely, explores the depths of her new home’s musical history from her unique perspective without ever sounding like a re-hashing of old tricks. Out now, Nowhere Sounds Lovely flows naturally from the album-opening slow-burn blues of ‘Dreamboy’ to the clawhammer banjo driven lament of ‘Will I Ever Be Satisfied.’ Thw album ends with ‘Badlands,’–a haunting and visceral nod to the Dakota’s rocky, windy plains.

We asked Cristina to breakdown Nowhere Sounds Lovely track-by-track to give us more insight into what the songs on the LP are about. Read it below.

Blueberry Hill

Written the summer I first explored the United States more thoroughly-the Midwest and the South in particular-’Blueberry Hill’ is an ode to it’s namesake street in Taos, New Mexico. After staying in Louisiana a week or so, I made the trip through Texas to land in Taos. Between the spirits you can practically feel in New Orleans and the transcendent mystical energy in Taos, I was compelled to try and tie those times where it felt like I was dipping into another realm with the traveling experience; sleeping with spiders and the odd snake and critter, in new spaces and smells. While in Taos, I would walk up Blueberry Hill Road almost daily, and the wild sage hills of the mesa do still linger with me, truthfully speaking.They call New Mexico the land of enchantment and I hope some of that seeped into this song.

Travelin' Blues

I grew up moving around, and we travelled a lot in myfamily, but the feeling of living on the road rather than in a house for the first time is what sparked Travelin’ Blues. While I came to realize there is a fine line between running free and running from your problems, initially, travelling was the ultimate medicine for the existential woes I was going throughwhen I wrote this. I still had people I was missing, people I loved but didn’t loveme, and people who had left me or hurt me, but they felt further and further away from whatever new landscape I was awakening to. Sometimes, though, it felt like I was exploring all of this alone, and that it would have been nice to share it. So I wanted to write a happy blues, a song that admits that there are things that make you sad but ultimately just hops up and keeps moving forward.

Prayer for the Blind

This song is partly woven of a specific story I was told by a Nebraskan couple that I met out camping in Iowa. The woman told me about her mother, who was elderly and suffered from dementia. Apparently, her mother insisted that her husband was cheating on her with a woman with two peg legs, going out dancing and such, and was resolved to wring their necks. She related this story to me while laughing, and the contrast of the comedic aspect of such a heavy thing for a daughter to watch her mother go through hit me pretty hard. The lyrics touch on that story and on the complexity of mother-daughter relationships, even as they relate to my own. I was also eager to write a modal banjo song, as I thought it set a good canvas for these difficult themes.

Badlands

This song was an exercise in trying to capture the energy of a place. Until this record, I seldom wrote about anything besides human emotion and relationships. My first cross-country tour lasted five months, and opened up my experiences to visions and sensations I had never seen or felt. Contemplating a place like the Badlands of South Dakota for the first time inspired me to write a song to do it justice. Out of the flat, wind-strewn setting of the prairie, the Badlands emanate and draw your attention to them immediately, much like the swallows that seemed drawn to my car as I drove through long stretches of the Dakotas (hence, “dead birds”). You are constantly seen, for there is nowhere to hide on the plains. The toughness of the weather and soil year around, paired with the menacing, jutting, mineral rocks are what give the Badlands their name, and they are what birthed this song.

Dreaming of Utah

I wrote this song not long after coming off my five months of travelling and having just moved to Nashville. I woke up having such a strong, almost tangible yearning for Utah-a place I had never seen until a few months prior-and in the cold of my first Tennessee winter, it reappeared to me in a vivid daydream. The majestic landscape of southern Utah is compelling enough to write several songs about, but I was trying to encompass the general sense of awe and magnificence that nature inspired in me that summer. It also briefly points to the way that nature can be comforting when it feels like I don’t have anyone else around me-lovers, or friends-at least I have the mountains. This song is one of those that poured out quite quickly onto the paper, and it also signals the summer I started listening to Hank Williams and country music for the first time, which I think you can hear a little bit.

What Remains

I wrote ‘What Remains’ when I got tired of trying to find love. I wanted to challenge the idea that love is worth the pain, because that’s how I felt at the time. I think it’s a very human trait to pick yourself up after heartbreak and learn to have hope again, but I was feeling very skeptical about it all when writing this. Is love worth the pain? I was sitting in a dispersed campsite in Utah, staring at alien looking green stone mounds that surrounded me, and I didn’t know what to do with all of this freedom that came with a side of loneliness. I don’t think there is an answer to this question, but this song tries to explain the walls that go up when you don’t want to get hurt again, and tries to expose the vulnerability and loneliness inside those walls (I also wanted to channel whatever JJ Cale energy I could find when we recorded this).

Heaven Bound Station

‘Heaven Bound Station’ was written when I was visiting Nashville for the first time and was feeling inspired by the musicianship around me. I was delving deep into fingerstyle guitar, and wanted to write a tune that had the sound of ragtime or piedmont finger picking, and with a classic theme to match. The idea of wanting to die so that you will be in a better place is so central so many genres close to my heart-delta blues, gospel, bluegrass, etc. Faith is a very inspiring feeling to observe in others, and I tried to channel what it must be like to have the confidence to paint your own picture of paradise. I attempted an answer to the questions: what does heaven look like, and how does one get there?

Dreamboy

The premise of this song came to me as a somewhat moody foil to the sometimes saccharine, clichéd lyrics of love songs in the 40s and 50s-I found myself almost wanting to poke fun at flowery terms like dream girl or loverboy that come up so often in that era of music. When I began writing, however, I wanted to see what it might be like re-imagine this trope in the present-who is my perfect, imaginary man-and this song is what came next. The lyrics are a mixture of the best parts of the people I have met and my hearts wildest desires. The result is a Dreamboy tailored perfectly to me, but this is marred by the fact that I’ll only ever see him in my dreams, as he is unlikely to exist.

Wishing Bone Blues

‘Wishing Bone Blues’ is one of the two songs on the record that I wrote while still living in California. I was running with a pretty colorful crowd for a minute when I lived in Venice, and this song was a reflection of some of the things that accompanied them. Addiction was present in my personal and love life, and though I never struggled with hard drugs, I address my own dependencies in the lyrics too. There is also a sense that onecan get lost in time out by the beach, stuck in a cycle of gratification and excitement. There is always something to do, someone to smoke you out, someone to sit with, until you realize that months have gone by and you haven’t done much. I wanted the music to match the drama of how it feels to watch yourself doing something that isn’t good for yourself, and also wanted to work in some inspiration from Chris Whitley, whose playing I had just discovered (and sadly struggled with demons himself). For a place where it’s always sunny, the energy can get very dark by the beach.

The Driving Song

I started driving way later than most people here. I grew up in European cities which mostly relied on public transportation, and didn’t get a license until I was out of college and living in Los Angeles. I’ve had many intimate moments in my car since then, as most of us do, and living in L.A. I had a lot of time to ponder in traffic too. The song was born on a specific drive home, late at night on the I-10, when I was overcome with a general sense of dissatisfaction. A mixture of loneliness, ineptitude, and general worry about where I was in my life was so strong that the opening verse came to me as I drove, and the rest, pretty soon after.I felt tired of trying to carry the weight of several loved ones struggling with addiction. Something about the way that distance, speed and mortality all balance each other every timeyou drive bred a lot of the feelings that are in that song too. 

Satisfied Soul

One of two waltzes on the record, ‘Satisfied Soul’ is partly an ode to traditional country music (which I was just discovering at the time), as well as the travelling I had done across the country. I grew up in Europe and moved to the U.S. for college at 18, so I had not seen anything inbetween the two coasts. Each region I discovered, down to the endless tiny towns I drove through for 5 months, was a new flavor. They were also a new lesson in the way people all do things differently, and yet are united by the same things too. Nature is one of those uniting factors, but was so drastically different in various places-from Montana down to Florida, Texas to Arizona, Washington to Iowa-I wanted to write a song in a ballad style that paid my respects to how all of these places had contributed to my satisfied soul.

Photo credit: Alex Skelton

[jeffsalbumoftheweek]

The Bitter Roots Waning Days Interview

As it happens, my would be band, The Bitter Roots will be releasing our 5th Album, Waning Days, on October 27th.  Whenever I put out a new album I like to blog a few words for those lucky few that may have the time or inclination to read more about what went into making the album.  Despite what some folks may believe, it does not take 3 minutes to record and produce a 3 minute song.  An album usually takes me a few years to write and record.  Art is the labor of love.  So if you might indulge me...

This time around, instead of aimlessly ambling on of my own account, I thought it would be fun to do an interview.  With all the fake news floating around out there, who better to trust, who better to conduct this important interview, than my old friend Yale Kaul.   All star drummer, fellow Missoulian, Go Griz, former moderator of the most excellent pre-social media blog Yalestar, and also a frequent contributor to the former Missoula music scene, fanzine, Shat Upon.  So take it away it Yale, give me your best shot.  Order Up.

Y: Congratulations on the new album. What is this, your fourth or fifth one with this band?

J: Thank you.  Yes, this is the 5th full length TBRs record in 10 years now.  I really like to stay busy writing new songs.  I love to make and record new music, and so does Ben.

Y: Where's that on the cover? It looks like Central Washington perhaps? 

J: You have a keen eye.  That photo was taken looking due north off the I-90 overpass at the Templins exit just east of Ritzville.  I took it through the windshield with a cell phone.  I was driving back to Seattle by myself shortly after the death of my Mother in Law as it so happened.  I think the image captures the state of our crumbling and adrift former American Empire rather nicely.

Y: Is our crumbling empire a theme of the album overall?

J: You know, at first it was, because the album started to come together around the tracks Informed Consent, I am Nobody and Cuddly cats.  We had been jamming those out live quite a bit before they went to tape.  They are all pretty dark on subject matter lyrically, heavy rock sounds, and you have to remember this album was recorded in the 1st 6 months after the disastrous election.  But as we added more tunes to the album I think it went more from the Dark to the Light. 

Y: About that baritone guitar: is this the first time you've used one on an album?

J: It is.  For the uninitiated a regular guitar has a 25 1/2" long neck and is generally in standard tuning of EADGBE. The Baritone has a considerably longer neck, mine is 28 5/8" and is tuned to CFA#D#GC.  The main driver for it is to create more space in the mix for my vocal range, which tends to have more contention with standard tuning.  Also tuning down 2 full steps from E to C allows me to appear to have a larger upper vocal range, it is easier to hit the high notes when you tune down.  Led Zep did that for that last big reunion show to make it easier for Robert Plant to sing some of their tunes.  As you age, there is no escape for it, your vocal register tunes lower.

Y: Yeah, your voice definitely sounds lower, especially on the first song. So do you guys play live as a two-piece, i.e. bassless? If so, I'd imagine the baritone guitar can fill in a lot of the lower frequencies?

J: We have played out as a duo quite a bit, but not in 6 years, because we had bass players.  I have played the baritone out as a trio and it sounds rad.  For the Duo live, the best rig we came up with is an Acoustic brand 100 watt head, a mesa 4x12 slant cab, using just my acoustic guitars which are a '78 Guild F50 and a '87 Guild JF-55. Those are big concert grand guitars, it can be hard to manage the feedback live, but we dialed it in a few times to good crowd effect.  Neither us much prefer the duo live, there is something about needing that separate low end to really lock with the drum kit, we prefer it with 3 pieces and 2 voices.  I also have a lot of harmonies I need someone to sing with me for the full intended effect in the live setting.

Y: The recording itself sounds very pro! You guys did the whole thing in your home studio right?

J: Thank you.  We do the tracking in my studio which is 24 track tape, it is a good sized studio, it takes up the entire basement of my house.  It has separate rooms for guitars and drums as well as a control room.  Then we take the tape and the machine to Studio Litho where we dump it to pro tools and mix it down from 24 tracks to stereo 2 track using Litho's gorgeous vintage API console.  We do no digital editing or correcting, nor do we use any auto tuning.  We master the mix as well at a separate room that is now called Resonant here in Seattle, where final volume level and EQ adjustments are made on the stereo mix down.  The advantage to tracking at my place is that we can do it as many times as we like because we are not on the clock, under pressure, spending money to use another room.

Y: So when we were younger men, back in the Burnin' 80s™, I knew you were big into Hendrix, Bad Brains, Soundgarden. Obviously your music palate has developed over the years. What's turning your crank these days?

J: Excellent Punk Rock Talk question right there.  I try to check out newer stuff as much as I can.  There is a rock band from Scotland, Biffy Clyro, they sell out arenas in Europe in minutes, they are very very talented, and fun to see live too.  There is a band from Bend OR called Larry and his Flask.  They are the craziest punk bluegrass rag time rockabilly thing.  The Rev Horton Heat are big fans of those guys too, we saw Larry open for both The Rev and Fishbone, so that is saying something right there, they do fish style durges too, its super cool.  But with streaming, I have been able to delve deeply into catalogs of one artist or another.  We could not dream of such access as kids when records were 7 bucks, that was a lot of money back then.  Renting at Rudy's was what 2 bucks?  With streaming I can listen to for instance lately in chronological order as I prefer, the entire back catalogs of Steely Dan, Tom Petty, David Bowie, B-52s, REM.  All the Fat Wreck chords bands Strung out and Lagwagon, those are great bands.  Stiff little Fingers, Smiths, System of A Down, Audioslave, Rage and others.

Y: Also, Ben: he and I went to high school together, although I never knew him back then (he's 3 years ahead). Where's he coming from musically? Is his use of the traditional drum grip any indication? [I may have that wrong, but I thought I recalled him using that grip in early Silkworm shows... And is he involved much in the song smithing?

J: Ben has super eclectic tastes in music.  He loves the Rock, loves to play Rock, also a huge Soundgarden fan, Tool, Stone Temple Pilots etc... But he also listens to a lot of classical and plays a lot of classical music on the piano as well, J.S Bach is his favorite, he also follows all the session drummer dudes and he goes to the clinics and demos they do in music stores when they come around Seatown, guys like JoJo Mayer for instance.  He switches his grips depending on his mood or the song, he also switches at will, left and right handed orientation to the snare and hi hat, sometimes in mid tune, he is that good.  In albums past I have gotten some fine keyboard parts and bass parts from him as well, but for this record I did all the music and words and then as always we collaborate on the drum parts, the tempo and the final arrangements.

Y: So the album is called Waning Days, which immediately reminded me of the book "Dark Age Ahead," Jane Jacobs' last book before she died, where she goes deep on five areas where the west (but mostly the US) is pretty much clusterfucking itself into oblivion (culture-wise, financial, higher education, climate, etc). The book is just over 10 years old and it's looking more and more like she was spot-on. HOWEVER: it must be noted that aside from the album title and cover photo, there's not a real pessimistic outlook in the songs, or at least not that I could detect. So I ask you: am I missing some overarching theme of cultural and institutional decline among the songs?

J: Perhaps.  Track 1 Informed Consent is a song about sexual assault and in particular the demise of Bill Cosby, and Trump pussy grabbing, so there is that.  Track 2 I am nobody is about how as you age and your youthful self aggrandized importance in society wanes, as you just become another average Joe going to the mall and getting loaded too often, the lament of many as you grind into middle age and realize, yup, this is it, this is living, this is all there is.  Whatever you make it or can afford to make it.  Track 4 Cuddly Cats is a direct statement against the music business and the music business in the internet age, where music itself has become window dressing after thought for other commercial ventures, where kitties get more attention than actual artists trying to convey a meaningful message, where fake and sexy imagery is all that matters, trying to sell you stupid crap you don't need anyway.  Those messages are there in the lyrics, however subtle.  So there is some darkness but on the whole the message of the record is counter.  Yeah we are in some Waning Days, but there is hope and light, all is not lost.

Y: You've been at this a long time. Inasmuch as you're able to say, what are some of the lessons you've learned about navigating the music industry, especially now as a man in his 40s with a job and family and so forth? Obviously until about the 2000s people still made a living playing music, but now that number is vanishingly small, and those people make most of their money playing live shows and slinging merch. But at least nowadays it's easier than ever to at least get your stuff out there, right? So what's a person to do?

J: I have never had a record deal, never had a manager or an agent, and although I have played a ton of shows and used to promote out of town shows even in Missoula back in the day, recorded now 11 albums, I never felt like I was part of the music industry.  I have never made any real money from music. I think of myself the same way I am pretty sure most of my good friends think of me too as just an artist and a huge music fan, a recording artist. 

There is no budget in the music industry anymore.  Floyd, our Mix and Master friend of many years now, he is one of 2 guys left in Seattle makes a living just recording people as a hired engineer on a project.   There is no investment in new talent anymore.  Way way back for instance, Journey put out 3 records before they got Steve Perry and then became huge.  Today no record company would give you budget for 3 records in the hopes you hit on the 4th one, no way.  You would be surprised how little playing live pays these days as well, even for artists with hits in their back catalogs.  There are only a few corporations that control nearly every live venue of any size in the entire country who book pre-paid package tours at venue capacities of 250 all the way to 40,000 people.  These companies take a lions share of the revenue, especially in the smaller rooms.  It is corporate parasitic control of the medium and the media, fuck them all.

Despite the relative ease of self publishing these days, It may surprise you that It is not really easier to 'get your stuff out there' anymore because of the complete information overload now, music is just 1s and 0s just like all other commodified information, entertainment and or otherwise.  It is just not worth much anymore because there is just too damn much of it out there, new and back catalog alike. A small needle in a million haystacks.  You can have the #1 record in America buy selling a mere 50k copies in a week.  To contrast, when Nevermind came out in the weeks to follow they were selling 100K an hour, dig it.

So the thing to do is just to be your creative self and do it because you love to do it, because it is a part of you, and be glad you don't have the pressures of an industry telling you what you should sound like.  If you don't get famous in your 20s, chances are, you are not going to get famous playing rock music, so just don't worry about it, don't quit, keep playing, keep creating.  As Tolkein said in the beginning there was light, and there was music.  We are of light and music.  There will always be new songs to write and share.

Y: Well yeah, by  'get your stuff out there' I meant anyone can put their entire creative output somewhere where 3+ billion people could potentially get it, and with very little upfront capital outlay, but then of course it's effectively commodified. And whether anyone ends up giving a shit... that's another matter of course. It's a paradox of unforseen consequences.  

J: Totally.

Y: Well hell, I don't have any other specific questions other than the usual "what's next for the Bitter Roots?" So what's next for the Bitter Roots? Any other hard-fought wisdom you'd like to impart to other independent artists, or to the world in general?

J: What is next for us is more songs and more recording.  We have already started in on a new set, probably take a few years to put out.  No shows planned at this time, maybe in the future, who knows.  I don't have any profound words of wisdom other than, as an independent artist trust your own judgement and don't worry too much about external validation, cause these days the state of shit is as hollow as Facebook.  Stay positive, Trump's days are numbered and we the good, the meek, the thoughtful, the artistic and domestic alike will rise again and steer us all toward a more equitable future in the fashion of MLK and Obama.