johnfoyle
09-20-2005, 02:28 PM
( scanned from print edition)
Dublin Event Guide , 7th-20th September '05
Laura Cantrell, Nashville native and New York resident, has caused something of a sweetly troubling stir in music since she left her job on Wall Street to pursue her true passion a number of years ago. Her debut album ‘Not the Tremblin’ Kind’ (2000) reached out beyond the confines of traditional country music - to an international audience who embraced her strangely beautiful stories and her deeply, emotionally but never overly-sentimental hold on life, love and everything else. Her second album, ‘When the Roses Bloom Again’ (2002), was one that gilded an otherwise golden ascent, gaining her passionate fans in Elvis Costello and the sadly missed John Peel, who nurtured a friendship with her, and for whom she did five Peel Sessions. She is also a great DJ herself and her show, ‘Radio Thrift Shop’, has gained a cult following and various awards. Her third album, ‘Humming By The Flowered Vine’ (produced by JD Foster) was released in Juné this year to critical acclaim and is a particularly subllime blend of extraordinary songs, both crafted and caught. She tells Siobhan Kane about her own extraordinary journey.
You gained a lot of early interest in Scotland and support from Radio Sweethearts’ Francis McDonald. How did that come about?
It’s a really long winding story, but here’s the condensed version - some of my friends were friendly with Francis and through those friends he became aware of me — and he had set up Shoeshine, Spit and Polish Records by that time. Anyway, a tape that I had made also got sent to him and he was really interested in getting something and done and I’d never been to Scotland before, so......
You seem like the adventurous type! The New York Times said you have a ‘sweetly troubled voice’. What do you think of that?
I have had some nice descriptions of my singing voice and in this rerd I can understand what they mean. I try to be direct, not elaborate and let emotions come through, and so when something is coming through it is true, and I sing it directly, but maybe with complex emotions.
Much has been made of your Wall St. work [Laura eventually became a Vice-President in Equity at the Bank of America] and how you juggled it with your creativity. Was it truly incompatible or was there some satisfaction in it too?
Ultimately music is so close to my heart and kept getting closer. I knew from the beginning that I wasn’t going to end up on Wall Street forever, but I had found a kind of financial security and through the job I found strengths that I never knew I had. I also made friends — I mean I worked there for eleven years!
It was so busy, though, and because music is my passion, there became a sense of urgency — the whole thing calibrated and, as I say, I knew that the job was always temporary in my heart, which is probably why I was okay with it. I wasn’t so organised with my music at the time either and the pressure kind of helped me to make more and to make the move. It focused me, I felt like ‘okay, now is the time, you’re saying it, you feel it, so get on the table’ and I had this attitude that I needed to create more, as I did, but it was a long process.
You present the award-winning ‘Radio Thrift Shop’ programme on WFMU from Jersey City in New Jersey. You have done it for ages!
A long time [laughs]. The radio show is truly a part of me. It also develops my point of view in terms of musical reference and it’s a good excuse to listen to lots of records — old and new, and it is also useful to me as a performer. It is lots of fun! When there were periods were I was more at home — I appreciated having to go in to do the show — it was a good focus, and it is really creatively fulfilling.
This brings me on to my favourite DJ, John Peel (who sadly passed away last year). He was so much part of musical consciousness — and you ended up doing five Peel Sessions with him. Missing him gets harder, he left such a hole in culture and our hearts — he had that comforting rebellious thing going on.
It is so strange. You’re right; it doesn’t seem to get easier. John was a Luddite who was particularly talented at relating to people as a broadcaster and he always knew the right thing to say. He was a rare talent in all and people loved him with all their heart.
A year ago, I was at John’s sixty-fifth birthday party and it is devastating to think that there won’t be a sixty-sixth birthday party. I have been to his house many times, spent time with his lovely family and was privileged enough to watch him work. I very often have moments of overwhelming sadness about him. He supported my music and I never dreamt that he would champion it. He was a good friend, it was wonderful, he was wonderful.
You are from Nashville, but moved to NYC years ago. What is the musical culture like for you in both places?
Nashville has changed a lot for the better. It used to have, simply, establishments. Now the underground has bubbled into the mainstream, the grass roots and local bands are staying and reclaiming it as their place too. There are some healthy local live clubs now, having some success with a loyal following — it is like a growing cachet. Steve Earle and people changed Nashville music and the local music community, to a degree. It wasn’t much of a live music town before, but now you have bands like Lambchop and a younger generation living and working there. There is a comfort and quality of life and they get to produce music — that is what has changed.
In terms of NYC, well it has always had a great history of fans of country music and, although the local clubs and radio are small relative to the size of New York City, a healthy audience goes to gigs and there is this renewing fan-base. I don’t feel part of a ‘scene’ as such. I mean people probably put me down as alt-country or neo-country folk or something like that, but the idea of scenes is overrated and the exercise reduces the process of how people do what they do. And to that end, I just keep doing what I do.
Country music has a really rich history - it is telling stories and we appreciate that in Ireland, as it is part of our musical culture too. Tell me a bit more about the idea of the ‘song catchers’ and your relationship to country music.
Stories are central to country music, they are the roots of it, and they are its heart. Other music is getting more fragmented, but country music has this direct, but deep-rooted meaning. It has a long history of connecting into that wider tradition of music. Song collecting or catching developed in the era of song in the 1920s/early twentieth century. It happened when the idea of recording stories that were sung came about. Basically they were ‘collected’ or ‘caught’ and written down and archived. There was a massive drive to do this in writing. There was conservation of very old songs — and an attempt to preserve a lineage. My families have a history of collecting all kinds of things; my Granny collected Antiques and my Uncle collected old ‘78’s — so I collect, create and pass on songs. You see, it’s in the blood.
Dublin Event Guide , 7th-20th September '05
Laura Cantrell, Nashville native and New York resident, has caused something of a sweetly troubling stir in music since she left her job on Wall Street to pursue her true passion a number of years ago. Her debut album ‘Not the Tremblin’ Kind’ (2000) reached out beyond the confines of traditional country music - to an international audience who embraced her strangely beautiful stories and her deeply, emotionally but never overly-sentimental hold on life, love and everything else. Her second album, ‘When the Roses Bloom Again’ (2002), was one that gilded an otherwise golden ascent, gaining her passionate fans in Elvis Costello and the sadly missed John Peel, who nurtured a friendship with her, and for whom she did five Peel Sessions. She is also a great DJ herself and her show, ‘Radio Thrift Shop’, has gained a cult following and various awards. Her third album, ‘Humming By The Flowered Vine’ (produced by JD Foster) was released in Juné this year to critical acclaim and is a particularly subllime blend of extraordinary songs, both crafted and caught. She tells Siobhan Kane about her own extraordinary journey.
You gained a lot of early interest in Scotland and support from Radio Sweethearts’ Francis McDonald. How did that come about?
It’s a really long winding story, but here’s the condensed version - some of my friends were friendly with Francis and through those friends he became aware of me — and he had set up Shoeshine, Spit and Polish Records by that time. Anyway, a tape that I had made also got sent to him and he was really interested in getting something and done and I’d never been to Scotland before, so......
You seem like the adventurous type! The New York Times said you have a ‘sweetly troubled voice’. What do you think of that?
I have had some nice descriptions of my singing voice and in this rerd I can understand what they mean. I try to be direct, not elaborate and let emotions come through, and so when something is coming through it is true, and I sing it directly, but maybe with complex emotions.
Much has been made of your Wall St. work [Laura eventually became a Vice-President in Equity at the Bank of America] and how you juggled it with your creativity. Was it truly incompatible or was there some satisfaction in it too?
Ultimately music is so close to my heart and kept getting closer. I knew from the beginning that I wasn’t going to end up on Wall Street forever, but I had found a kind of financial security and through the job I found strengths that I never knew I had. I also made friends — I mean I worked there for eleven years!
It was so busy, though, and because music is my passion, there became a sense of urgency — the whole thing calibrated and, as I say, I knew that the job was always temporary in my heart, which is probably why I was okay with it. I wasn’t so organised with my music at the time either and the pressure kind of helped me to make more and to make the move. It focused me, I felt like ‘okay, now is the time, you’re saying it, you feel it, so get on the table’ and I had this attitude that I needed to create more, as I did, but it was a long process.
You present the award-winning ‘Radio Thrift Shop’ programme on WFMU from Jersey City in New Jersey. You have done it for ages!
A long time [laughs]. The radio show is truly a part of me. It also develops my point of view in terms of musical reference and it’s a good excuse to listen to lots of records — old and new, and it is also useful to me as a performer. It is lots of fun! When there were periods were I was more at home — I appreciated having to go in to do the show — it was a good focus, and it is really creatively fulfilling.
This brings me on to my favourite DJ, John Peel (who sadly passed away last year). He was so much part of musical consciousness — and you ended up doing five Peel Sessions with him. Missing him gets harder, he left such a hole in culture and our hearts — he had that comforting rebellious thing going on.
It is so strange. You’re right; it doesn’t seem to get easier. John was a Luddite who was particularly talented at relating to people as a broadcaster and he always knew the right thing to say. He was a rare talent in all and people loved him with all their heart.
A year ago, I was at John’s sixty-fifth birthday party and it is devastating to think that there won’t be a sixty-sixth birthday party. I have been to his house many times, spent time with his lovely family and was privileged enough to watch him work. I very often have moments of overwhelming sadness about him. He supported my music and I never dreamt that he would champion it. He was a good friend, it was wonderful, he was wonderful.
You are from Nashville, but moved to NYC years ago. What is the musical culture like for you in both places?
Nashville has changed a lot for the better. It used to have, simply, establishments. Now the underground has bubbled into the mainstream, the grass roots and local bands are staying and reclaiming it as their place too. There are some healthy local live clubs now, having some success with a loyal following — it is like a growing cachet. Steve Earle and people changed Nashville music and the local music community, to a degree. It wasn’t much of a live music town before, but now you have bands like Lambchop and a younger generation living and working there. There is a comfort and quality of life and they get to produce music — that is what has changed.
In terms of NYC, well it has always had a great history of fans of country music and, although the local clubs and radio are small relative to the size of New York City, a healthy audience goes to gigs and there is this renewing fan-base. I don’t feel part of a ‘scene’ as such. I mean people probably put me down as alt-country or neo-country folk or something like that, but the idea of scenes is overrated and the exercise reduces the process of how people do what they do. And to that end, I just keep doing what I do.
Country music has a really rich history - it is telling stories and we appreciate that in Ireland, as it is part of our musical culture too. Tell me a bit more about the idea of the ‘song catchers’ and your relationship to country music.
Stories are central to country music, they are the roots of it, and they are its heart. Other music is getting more fragmented, but country music has this direct, but deep-rooted meaning. It has a long history of connecting into that wider tradition of music. Song collecting or catching developed in the era of song in the 1920s/early twentieth century. It happened when the idea of recording stories that were sung came about. Basically they were ‘collected’ or ‘caught’ and written down and archived. There was a massive drive to do this in writing. There was conservation of very old songs — and an attempt to preserve a lineage. My families have a history of collecting all kinds of things; my Granny collected Antiques and my Uncle collected old ‘78’s — so I collect, create and pass on songs. You see, it’s in the blood.