An Interview with Tom Paxton

In a career spanning more than half a century, GRAMMY®-winning folk legend Tom Paxton has composed a veritable goldmine of American music. Instilled with an activist’s passion and a storyteller’s finesse, his songs—which have been covered by the likes of Bob Dylan, Judy Collins, and Willie Nelson—resonate with melodies as endearing as nursery rhymes and narratives affirming an intimate conscience.

With his latest album, Boat in the Water, Paxton, 79, continues to articulate his craft in such inimitably empathetic ways.

Can you sense how your songwriting has evolved over the years?

Well, that’s an interesting question. I’ve always likened myself to a farmer with a field, and each year he plants a crop in that field and with luck harvests it in the fall. In my case, I plant different crops but it’s in the same field and it’s the same farmer. So I don’t find that I write different songs from the ones I wrote at the age of twenty-five, but I hope that now and then I write a song that I was not capable of writing at the age of twenty-five. But they’re not that different. They’re still the same sound to them, people tell me.

The writer is the last one to be able to identify his own songs, but they tell me that a song can be recognized as being likely from me. I accept that’s true because I can certainly identify a song as probably written by Dylan or probably written by Leonard Cohen. There’s a style, there’s a sense to it. So, I don’t think I write differently—it’s the same brain, the same right hand—but perhaps there might be a depth to the songs now that there wasn’t then. I don’t know. I certainly don’t try to write differently than I wrote [back then]. I don’t know what that would sound like.

When you’re writing a song, do you have any audience in mind?

Oh, sure. Without being able to put a face to it, it’s the same group of people I’ve sung to for fifty-six years. They’re good people and we see a lot of things through the same lenses, and it’s really primarily for myself as a singer that I write the songs. But it’s also [for] the people that have been with me for years and years and years that I write. If not for them I might just keep it to myself and say, “I don’t have to write it. I already know that.” It is for the people who come to my shows that I write the songs.

Is it disillusioning if the audience doesn’t quote, unquote “get it”?

No, it does not. I feel like I’m responsible for what I do and what I release and I’m not responsible for how it’s received or poorly received. And so, I don’t worry about that. I just worry about getting it right for myself, to make sure it’s clear and musical and I hope entertaining, but at least engrossing; that people know that it’s sincere, that it’s a deliberate work of art. It’s not the work of a dilettante. It’s the work of someone who’s been doing it a long time and cares very much about doing it well.

You are revisiting some of your older songs on Boat in the Water. What was the reason behind that? What did you think you could bring to them at this stage in your life that maybe you didn’t the first time around?

Well, part of it was a conversation I had with producer, Cathy Fink, who’s an old, old friend. She said, “I’d like to hear these songs again.” She’d been listening to a bunch of my old records and she said, “You know, that song ‘Life’ is a wonderful song and I’d like to hear it again. Let’s put it on here.” I said, “Sure.” And I did the same thing with “Evry Time,” [which] is a song I think I wrote in 1962. It’s certainly one of the oldest recordable songs that I have, and I’ve sung it in a lot of soundchecks and a lot of dressing rooms. So I said, “Let’s take another shot at this one.”

Did it resonate any different with you?

Oh, I love the song. To me the song is really an evocation of my early love for the songs that Burl Ives used to sing. He used to sing lots of songs that did not have a steady beat to them, a lot of the old Appalachian songs that he used to sing. It was just kind of my homage to that kind of song and I’ve always loved it. It’s just a very simple song. It only has two verses to it, but it seems like a complete song to me.

In light of some of the songs you write that are critical of certain social or political ills, how do you manage to salvage the compassion and sense of grace and beauty that comes through in some of the other songs you write?

That’s not too difficult, actually. Each song is its own message. Each song has its own parameters. I don’t bring a political sense to a personal song. I also write songs that I hope will amuse a seven-year-old child. You bring the tools to the project that the project requires. And if you’re writing a song to amuse a seven-year-old boy, you include irreverence and a sense of fun, a sense of the ridiculous. You don’t bring a sharply tuned social mind whereas, if you’re writing a song satirizing a president who is an egregious liar, you don’t bring the same vocabulary that you use with the seven-year-old boy’s song. You bring a different vocabulary, a different sensibility. They’re all different songs and I tend to take them as the ideas come to me. The idea will come to me of something ridiculous and fun and rather innocent and I’ll go ahead and write that song and hope that it finds that seven-year-old boy or girl and amuses them. If I’m satirizing the president, I’ll use a different box of tools. Each song has its own perfection that you strive for.

So, writing a song in which you would satirize the president or critique certain social ills doesn’t compromise the compassion that is required to write the other songs?

No, I never write a song that denies the other songs I write. There’s no underlying similarity. I mean, they all come from the same fella, and I’m not going to write a song that directly contradicts any other song I’ve written. There’s got to be a consistency. Even if I’m writing a funny song for kids, I’m not going to say something in that song that I don’t believe.

Is songwriting a discipline that you return to all the time? Are you always receptive to new ideas?  

Yeah, I find the ideas come pretty regularly. There’s a kind of a receptive frame of mind that I seem to be a little more able to slip into now than maybe I used to be. I know that working with [co-songwriters] Jon Vezner and Don Henry is good for me. We just finished four dates out in the West and shortly before those dates I heard a melody from Jon. I said, “Give me a tape of that.” And I turned it into a song which we put in the shows out in California and it really went down beautifully. And while we were sitting in a dressing room in Berkeley, he was doodling around on the ukulele and he struck a chord and I said, “Whoa, what was that?” He played it again, and I sang a silly little phrase that is turning into a delightful little ukulele song. I’m always on the lookout, so to speak.

Do you ever fear giving too much of yourself away in what you write?

Oh, no. No, I don’t feel that at all. I do write personally but it’s usually not as Tom Paxton. I use the first-person singular a lot because it’s more suitable for songs, I think, to be personal like that. But it’s very seldom that it’s Tom Paxton who’s being personal. It is the narrator in the song who’s sharing, but of course it’s always the writer who is easily identifiable. But I think I just kind of shrink from making Tom Paxton the subject of Tom Paxton’s song. It seems to me to be such an egotistical thing to do. I just thought of a way of putting it: I’m a ham, but I’m not a show-off.

Read on...

An Interview with Von Grey's Annika von Grey

Von Grey: (from left to right: Annika, Petra, Kathryn, and Fiona)

Establishing a style and sticking with it may work for emerging musicians looking to build a loyal following but it can prove stifling for the artists themselves. At least that’s the belief which seems to guide Atlanta’s own Von Grey, who made their debut in 2012 with a critically-hailed eponymous EP of acoustic, string-rich pop and modern folk. In fact, even as they saw the five-song set edge into the iTunes Top 10 on the strength of the vibrant lead single, “Coming For You,” and the visibility afforded by high-profile appearances on The Late Show with David Letterman and Conan, the group’s members—siblings Annika (violin, banjo, guitar, keys), Kathryn (cello, bass pedals, mandolin, keys), Fiona (guitar, violin, percussion), and Petra von Grey (keys, lap steel guitar, electronic percussion), each classically trained—were already plotting a new direction. 

“We played violins and cellos and stuff like that,” Annika explains, “so it was natural for us to gravitate toward more acoustic music genre-wise just because that’s where we had our foundation instrumentally.” 

For their follow-up they composed edgier, more adventurous music with electronic elements and fuller arrangements. “We have a huge range of influences sonically that we pull from,” Annika says, underscoring not only the eclecticism but also the ambition that distinguishes Awakening, Von Grey’s sophomore EP, due out January 21. “Trying to incorporate textures that are a little bit more synthetic is something that we’ve been interested in for a long time.” 

Was there any reluctance within the group about working in these new electronic textures in the sense that you risk alienating listeners who connected with the more acoustic sound on your debut?

A little bit, because I do think when some people have a first impression that can really be the foundation for every later impression. We wanted to make sure that we still sound like we’re being true to ourselves, which we are. But when we’re in the process of writing and recording and getting things to be in a solidified state, we try to make sure that the last thing we’re thinking about is how others will respond to it and more just being selfish and trying to make sure that what we’re creating is a pure and true representation of who we are as artists and what we want to express. 

Are the new sonic directions on the EP also reflective of a new or expanded knowledge of the recording studio? Is that something you all are learning to embrace as well?

We’re starting to really understand and appreciate the power of production, because it can transform a song. We go in with pretty solid ideas of what kind of parts we want to be added to it or just what kind of textures or what vibe we want the songs to embody in their finished state. We’re not at the point right now [though] where we’re completely self-producing.… We’re not completely well-versed in that side of things. It’s something that we’re definitely trying to develop so eventually maybe we can be independent in a studio environment, but right now we’re still collaborating with producers and engineers to make sure that we’re working with people that truly have a grasp and a really deep knowledge of what they’re doing in the studio. We don’t want to take chances just experimenting with things we don’t know very well. 

Is songwriting something that you all have to set time aside for, or are you always aware and receptive to ideas?

We’re always trying to make sure that we’re in a somewhat creative mode, so if we happen to in our mind hear a melody that we like we’ll be able to remember it and make sure we don’t waste ideas. Fiona and I are always thinking about songwriting, but it is something that now we usually set aside time [to do]. For us, when we have a very focused environment and we’re able to kind of be secluded, it’s when the best songs come about. We get rough, little melodic riffs and stuff when we’re just out and about, but it’s usually a pretty concentrated and focused time when we actually solidify the songs. With this EP, we wrote all those songs within a two-or-three-month period. 

As the group’s lyricist, primarily, is there any apprehension on your part about revealing too much of yourself in what you write? Is that something you run into, or is it just something you work around?

It is something I’ve become increasingly mindful about. Writing lyrics, it’s hard to do that in a way that’s very calculated. You need to make sure you’re being open in a stream-of-consciousness style, and then later you can organize those thoughts and try to figure out exactly what they’re about. Sometimes, when you find that out, it’s something you’re not eager to let everybody else know if it’s a song about something very personal, but as someone that’s writing lyrics for the band the only way that I’ll be able to emote when I’m singing—or that everybody in the band will be able to feel really attached to it—is if it’s something that is kind of genuine and that forces you to feel a little bit uncomfortable. It’s something that I’ve tried to embrace rather than run away from. 


Plus, in a part of your mind you almost have to acknowledge that if you’re writing about someone else or about your response to someone else then you may have to consider that person’s feelings if he or she recognizes themselves in your song. It can be a dicey proposition. 

I try to make sure that when I’m writing—I don’t know if I always accomplish it—I’m doing it in a way that feels human and relatable. It’s not that it’s just my own personal, selfish experience or that I’m exploiting somebody else’s emotions. It’s more taking those feelings as inspiration and trying to write in a way that is all-encompassing, because I do think it’s rare to come across an emotion that no one else has experienced before. So, trying to write about in a way that allows others to partake in the feeling is kind of the goal I try to pursue. 

To what do you attribute the group's work ethic? You all seem completely committed to the idea that whatever success comes your way is something that you have to work for. That is not always the case with people.

From a very young age we were taught that hard work is paramount to success. We started with classical music and we were home-schooled from a pretty young age, so time management was something that was a very important thing for us to learn. We practiced every day and it became something that our parents weren’t forcing us to do. We enjoyed scheduling our time, making sure we were really honing in on what we were passionate about; making sure we understood the gravity of taking something and trying to make it professional...; and making sure that we can also feel a sense of pride in what we’re doing and feel like we’re responsible for it. 

That has helped a lot, especially recently when we’d be touring and then trying to fit in songwriting time and recording things and just trying to present ourselves throughout all that in a way that seems professional…. Creating art is a big responsibility, even if it’s just a personal responsibility for yourself. We want to make sure that we’re not taking anything for granted and that we know we’re surrounded by excellence all the time, so there’s always something to aspire to as far as knowing your instrument and craft. All of those things have really helped us to stay grounded and [to] remember that you always have to work to get what you want. 

Awakening, featuring the new single, “Come On,” is scheduled for release January 21. For additional information, please visit Von Grey’s official site.

Read on...

Good Old War: Getting Better All The Time

If the members of Good Old War share an abiding ambition for the music they make, it’s that each new record should be better than the last one. With their latest, Come Back as Rain (Sargent House), the indie-folk trio — Keith Goodwin (vocals/guitar/keyboards), Dan Schwartz (vocals/guitar), and Tim Arnold (vocals/drums) — nurture the fluent harmonies and shimmering acoustic guitars that distinguish their sound while reflecting an increasingly concerted effort to grow and progress over time.

“Even when there’s no new album to make, we’re still all writing, constantly,” Arnold explains. “We all sit down, look at lyrics, look at structure, look at what chords are being used, what key it’s in, whether it’s going to sound good, what words are being used. And we all get together and work it out and build it with three people.”

The songs that comprise Come Back as Rain had mostly been written before recording sessions began at ARC Studios, an Omaha, Nebraska compound owned by Mike Mogis of Bright Eyes. “Of course when we got there we changed stuff, naturally, added different things,” Arnold points out, adding, “We try and get prepared every time we go into the studio.”

It’s been just four years since the release of Good Old War’s full-length debut, Only Way to Be Alone, but they’ve nonetheless come a long way. Arnold agrees. “We’ve just all gotten more comfortable with each other as musicians,” he says. “If we’re just jamming we know where each other’s going to go; we have signals to subconsciously use on each other to go in certain directions. After a while with playing with someone you just get into a rhythm. It gets easier.”

That’s not to say it’s gotten easy. With a headlining tour now underway and showcase performances scheduled this week at the SXSW Music Festival in Austin the stakes continue to rise. “We’re very hard on ourselves when it comes to the live stuff,” Arnold insists, stressing that such consideration occurs well before they take the stage. “We go into the studio and if we have a song, we’re like, ‘It needs to be able to be played acoustic and sound just as good. Let’s not put too much stuff on here, keep it kind of simple so when we do play it live it’s not going to be a huge departure from the record.’ We’ve got to keep that in mind the whole time.”

As with any other musical group in which each member has an equal say creative disagreements are bound to happen, culminating in some rather heated moments. “There is definitely tension,” Arnold concedes, “but for the most part we trust each other. We lean on each other sometimes. And when someone has a very strong opinion on something, it’s usually like, ‘Fine. If you really feel that strongly about it, then let’s do it.’ And it usually works out.”

Read on...

Album Review: The Little Willies - For The Good Times

The Little Willies never set out to be a big deal. If anything they’ve aspired to maintain a low profile, perhaps as an antidote to the mainstream attention their most conspicuous member, Norah Jones, tends to attract with her solo releases. They reflected as much on their laid-back 2006 eponymous debut and, in its assortment of covers and well-suited originals, an earnest affinity for classic country music.

The group’s latest, For The Good Times (EMI/Milking Bull Records), is even more steeped in country, and it's all the better for it. Traditional honky-tonk along the lines of Lefty Frizzell (“If You’ve Got The Money, I’ve Got The Time”) and Hank Williams (“Lovesick Blues”) complement moments that are at turns sentimental (“Remember Me”) and contentious (“Wide Open Road,” “Fist City”) in respectful, refreshing performances.

A seasoned, playful chemistry exists among these musicians—Jones (vocals, piano), along with Jim Campilongo (guitar), Lee Alexander (bass), Richard Julian (guitar, vocals), and Dan Rieser (drums)—invigorating some of these old gems, especially the obscure ones. “Diesel Smoke, Dangerous Curves,” in particular, finds Julian behind the wheel singing lead as Jones accentuates its sensuous subtext, her voice an echo conjuring images not of some perilous highway but rather of far more risky, erogenous terrain.

Read on...

Album Review: Emmylou Harris - Hard Bargain

Few artists can render a song with as much unaffected grace and sincerity as Emmylou Harris.

It’s a gift she’s conveyed time and again as an interpreter, covering Texas troubadours (Townes Van Zandt, Rodney Crowell) and Nashville traditionalists (Harlan Howard, Billy Sherrill) with equal conviction. And that authenticity highlights her extensive catalog, one which has not only challenged her audience throughout her singular career but has also expanded the vernacular — if not the very definition — of country music.

It’s only natural, then, that the same qualities she invests in other artists’ compositions would also inform her own sensibilities as a songwriter. Though not a role she’s undertaken too often, in the instances when she has put pen to paper — “Boulder to Birmingham” and “Michelangelo” come to mind — she’s shown that her relative lack of writing experience comes not from any lack of talent.

A compelling case in point is her new LP, Hard Bargain (Nonesuch Records), on which Harris penned nearly all of the songs and delivers them with the same deference as any definitive cover in her repertoire. “My Name Is Emmett Till” is harrowing, not just for what Harris recounts and reflects upon — in 1955, Till, a 14-year-old black boy, was savagely murdered in Mississippi after he’d been seen talking to a white woman — but also for the dignity with which she eulogizes the young victim and his enduring legacy.

Assuaging some of the more solemn observations are moments of rambunctious, rockabilly spunk (“New Orleans,” “Six White Cadillacs”) and bittersweet laments (“Goodnight Old World,” “Lonely Girl”), giving the album an overall-eclectic dimension.

Then there’s “The Road,” a poignant yet musically rugged requiem to Gram Parsons. Coming from anybody else, serenading the Flying Burrito Brother could seem like a means to exploit his legend. Harris knew the man, of course, and anyone who has mourned the death a loved one can empathize with her still-palpable grief, knowing that an hour of darkness is just a metaphor for a lifetime.

Read on...

Album Review: Cowboy Junkies - Demons

The original plan was for the Cowboy Junkies to make a record with their longtime friend, folk artist Vic Chesnutt. Tragedy intervened, however, when Chesnutt, 45, died by his own hand on Christmas Day 2009. And so what had been conceived as a collaboration ultimately took shape as a tribute, with the Junkies covering an album’s worth of Chesnutt’s songs for their latest LP, Demons.

The second installment of the band's four-part “Nomad Series,” following last year’s ambitious Renmin Park, Demons is both a masterful exposition of a gifted storyteller and, at its essence, a riveting Cowboy Junkies album.

While no strangers to taking considerable liberties with the works of others—think “Dead Flowers” (Rolling Stones) or “Sweet Jane” (Velvet Underground)—here the Junkies resist straying too far from Chesnutt’s original arrangements. 

Instead, they embellish upon their sound, adding a surge of guitar or an organ refrain as texture to their often-acoustic foundation like stuccoing the brick walls of a house. As such, moments of rustic, folk-influenced rock (“Strange Language,” “Wrong Piano”) complement ones touched by more of a somber, gospel grace (“We Hovered With Short Wings,” “See You Around”), eliciting altogether unique contexts and emotional dimensions. Lead singer Margo Timmins is intoxicating, her vocals on noirish, sweeping ballads like “Betty Lonely” and “Square Room,” in particular, assuming a dark and otherworldly allure. The final cut begins with a live excerpt of Chesnutt himself, the artist engaging his audience with a bit of off-the-cuff humor before the track segues into the Junkies playing “When The Bottom Fell Out” like a requiem. The juxtaposition is jolting, at turns recalling the source but also the poignancy behind these collected works.

“We felt that we owed him something,” Junkies bassist Alan Anton said last year of Chesnutt and the band’s wish to make a record of his songs. With Demons, they’ve done their old friend proud.

Read on...

Album Review: Dar Williams - Promised Land

I’ve always had a soft spot for descriptive lyrics, especially the kind that yield esoteric insights or observations yet resonate in universal and often strikingly personal ways. Considering this, I really should’ve caught on to Dar Williams a long time ago.

It’s not like I’d been unaware of the singer/songwriter’s music altogether. I’d heard bits and pieces over the years, but mostly on tracks written by other artists. Her cosmic, quirky cover of David Bowie’s “Starman,” for instance, initially piqued my interest, much like her duet with Ani DiFranco on Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb” did a few years later.

Yet it was her rendition of “You Won’t See Me,” from This Bird Has Flown: A 40th Anniversary Tribute To The Beatles’ Rubber Soul, which intrigued me the most, with her unassuming vocal and loyalty to the lyric’s point of view belying any trace of irony or artifice.

And so it was a burgeoning curiosity that invariably led me to Williams’ most recent album, Promised Land. Invested with picturesque and pensive narratives on the human condition, it’s a beautifully stirring work. Moreover, Williams doesn’t forsake a good (memorable) melody to tell a story here, but rather she crafts a balance between her words and music. From the feisty opener, “It’s Alright,” through more tempered (though no less engaging) tracks like “The Easy Way” and “Troubled Times,” she reflects a storyteller’s perceptions, enriching tales of emotional hurdles and lessons with empathy in her voice.

Williams is at her most affecting, though, when she leans toward introspection. As in “You Are Everyone,” which finds her remembering an old flame who still weighs heavy on her heart, conceding as if in a soliloquy, “You are everyone I ever trusted/ Who never made a fool out of me.” As well, on “The Business of Things,” she achingly resists the apathy (if not the cruelty) she sees others purveying—“It’s the way things are done,” she concludes in dismay—by the strength and will of her own compassion. In both cases, Williams taps into such unguarded, unnervingly honest thoughts and feelings—and marries them to equally poignant music—in such a way that makes the listener feel viscerally connected.

Perhaps such is the hallmark of all great songwriters, but Dar Williams has nonetheless made that kind of impression on me with Promised Land, making me now want to work my way backwards through her catalog to discover more of what I’ve been missing.

Read on...

Album Review: Jessie Baylin - Firesight

If you heard her playing in some downtown music club, you’d have a hard time believing that Jessie Baylin is only 24. Her honey-soaked voice and melancholic inflections impart maturity beyond her years, underscoring why her new album, Firesight, resonates with such warmth. On this, the New Jersey native’s major-label debut, the music yields a mélange of styles to include elements of folk, soul, and, at its best, jazz.

Baylin fares particularly well on “I’ll Cry For The Both Of Us,” “Leave Your Mark,” and the piano-laden strains of “Lonely Heaven,” all of which accentuate her vocal versatility to poignant effect. Firesight is an eclectic, ambitious effort that should not only serve as a foundation for this promising young artist but also as encouragement for her to further explore her creativeness.

Read on...