Gillian Welch
Forget that Gillian Welch and David Rawlings live in Nashville. Forget that their haunting songs feature close harmonies and are performed on two acoustic guitars. Forget that their tunes have been covered by such American legends as Willie Nelson and Emmylou Harris. Put all that aside and hear this: “Our music is not folk music. It’s not even country music. And it’s definitely not bluegrass music,” Welch says. “In fact, the bluegrassers think we’re crazy modernists, and rightly so. The chords and sounds that Dave and I make in these songs don’t really exist in country and traditional music.
“How can I explain it?” Welch continues. “Let’s say you’re listening to a rock band and they have this whole wall of sound going on, and it’s completely unhinged and it sounds crazy. If you pulled four notes out of that whole mess and played them on acoustic guitars, that’s what Dave and I do. We’re highly selective deconstructionists.”
Welch, an uncompromising pop renegade with four critically acclaimed albums and a Grammy Award under her belt, is seeking to correct a common misconception that she and her longtime partner, guitarist/co-songwriter/producer Rawlings are traditionalists. “All the songs are original,” she says. “They’ve never existed before. Yes, we play acoustic instruments, so I guess that looks kind of old-timey, and we’ve been photographed a lot in black and white, but I’ve never worn gingham and Dave’s suits come from Barney’s.”
In fact, with its unconventional guitar work, dissonant tones, and forceful simplicity, Welch’s music actually has a similar spirit to work by the Velvet Underground and the Pixies. Though her first two albums, 1996’s debut Revival and 1998’s Hell Among the Yearlings captured a vintage, earthy Americana, it was her third album, 2001’s Rawlings-produced Time (The Revelator) that marked the beginning of her flirtation with roots-rock. “The songs may have been boiled down and boiled down, and pretty much desiccated, but they’ve always been rock songs in my mind,” she says.
On the other hand, Welch considers her most recent album, 2003’s Soul Journey, as “little R&B songs that have been pared down to the bone.” Soul Journey, also produced by Rawlings, is the first to feature drums and electric instruments. The album, with its elegant flat-picking, languid tempos, and flawless harmonies, contains meticulously arranged songs that recall the roots-rock of Bob Dylan and The Band, (“Wrecking Ball,” “Wayside/Back In Time”), as well as autobiographical, minimally adorned numbers (“No One Knows My Name,” “One Little Song”). Upon its release, British music bible Mojo praised Soul Journey’s “compelling, mesmerizing quality: somber, mournful, and melodic,” while the Wall Street Journal noted the music’s “depth and mystery that invites many interpretations.” Overall, the Los Angeles Times has summed up Welch’s charm best: “At every turn, she demonstrates a spark and commitment that should endear her to anyone from country and folk [listeners] to pop and rock fans who appreciate imagination and heart.”
It’s not hard to see, however, why the public has perceived Welch as a traditionalist. She has professed her love for bluegrass legends Bill Monroe, The Carter Family, and Ralph Stanley, the latter with whom she appeared on the Grammy-winning multi-platinum soundtrack to the Coen Brothers 2000 film O Brother Where Art Thou? She and Rawlings also served, along with Emmylou Harris, as the backing band for Elvis Costello when he made his debut in 2006 at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. But the duo’s broader appeal has been underlined by their appearances as special guests on jazzy chanteuse Norah Jones’ recent concert DVD, at the rock festivals Coachella and Bonnaroo, and on singer-songwriter Conor Oberst’s 2007 Bright Eyes album, Cassadega.
“We love playing with other musicians,” Welch says. “Our own stuff is so tightly focused and intense that it’s a real pleasure for us to break out once in a while.” Welch has appeared on records by Ryan Adams, Mark Knopfler, Robyn Hitchcock, Sam Phillips, Jay Farrar, Old Crow Medicine Show, Ani DiFranco, Nanci Griffith, among others, and her songs have been covered by an eclectic group of artists that includes Solomon Burke, Joan Baez, Nick Cave, David Byrne, David Johansen, Jimmy Buffett, Alison Krauss, and New York alt-rock trio Secret Machines. The stylistic variety of all of the above proves that the timelessness and quality of her songwriting shines through no matter what genre it’s filtered through.
Welch and Rawlings have been so busy playing with other musicians that four years have passed since Soul Journey was released. “We’re writing songs for the new album,” Welch says. “We’ll start recording once we have almost all of them written.” The album will be released on the duo’s own label Acony Records, which they set up in 2001 for Time (The Revelator), as a way to own their master recordings and control their musical output. “We’re very independent in spirit musically, and it means that our business is actually in line with our aesthetic,” Welch says.
And what do the new songs sound like? “The stuff is feeling spookier and more panoramic than Soul Journey,” she says. “And I don’t think there will be bass and drums. We’re so used to the kind of space we create with just the two guitars. We’re very interested in what happens in the air after we both hit a note. If someone else is playing, it fills up that space and we don’t get to hear the shit we really like. We call it ‘the bloom,’ which is what occurs just after you make the sound.
“The bottom line is,” Welch says, “we’ll do whatever the music calls for, because we are always slaves and servants of the song.”
(May 2007)