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Written by Gregg Shapiro, Staff writer
Nov 4, 2011
Amy Ray. – Photo: Daemon Records
Almost 25 years after Amy Ray and Emily Saliers released their first album under the Indigo Girls banner, they continue getting better. The out duo's new album "Beauty Queen Sister" ranks among their best work. Their trademark folk rock style is augmented by bluegrass and Irish music influences, making for a varied and gripping listening experience.
I spoke with Ray shortly before the disc was released in October.
Gregg Shapiro: The moon figures prominently in four songs on "Beauty Queen Sister." Why do you think that is?
Amy Ray: (Laughing) I have no idea. We didn't even notice, believe it or not, until after we were recording. We were like, "Uh-oh, there are a lot of moons in here. We're being very moony women." Maybe it's our age or something. We're waxing poetic.
Something else that plays a significant role on the album is Luke Bulla's violin.
We met him through Peter Collins when we did our holiday record. Peter heard him in Nashville playing at the Bluebird one night. He plays with Lyle Lovett, and he plays also in a band called WPA. He does the singer/songwriter thing, he sings too. But we met him for the holiday record. He's a blue grass player. He plays guitar, violin, mandolin, everything – you name it. He's a great flat picker, too. But his violin playing is way beyond. Most of the stuff he did on the record is live, like "Yoke." I don't know how he accomplished it. He is special. He's a new addition. Also, the bass player Frank (Swart) plays with Patty Griffin a lot. We just happened on him and we were really lucky, because he had huge input on this record.
Another interesting addition is the backing vocals by The Shadowboxers (Adam Hoffman, Matt Lipkins, Scott Schwartz) on the title cut and "We Get to Feel it All." How did you come to work together?
They're friends of Emily's. She met them at Emory, our old alma mater. They all went there. They graduated from there last year. They were just these guys that started a band. She met one of them at a Seder and she said, "God, your voice is beautiful." He was singing at the Seder. They played guitar together later and he said, "I've got this band." And it all went from there and they opened for us. The band is quite amazing, and their voices are stunning.
I heard the title track to "Beauty Queen Sister" was inspired in part by S.E. Hinton's "The Outsiders." Are you a voracious reader, and what are you currently reading?
I am a voracious reader and so is Emily. She probably reads more than I do. She's quick. I have stacks of books by my bed. You know what I just read that actually has been out for a while but I really got a lot out of it. It's a book called "Zeitoun." Dave Eggers wrote it and it's about a Muslim American family during Hurricane Katrina and what they went through. I was scared that it would be too hard, because it's such an upsetting thing, then I read it and it was told amazing. I read old history books. I like to read books that were written in weird times. Like a book from the 1930s about the Civil War to hear the differences and see what how they looked at it and the difference from now. I just read that biography of Cleopatra that Stacy Schiff wrote. One of my very favorite writers of all time is Louise Erdrich. If you read her last five books, you would just be blown away. She just gets better and more mature.
Not surprisingly politics and social issues make an appearance on the album. With the presidential election a little more than a year away, what are your thoughts on the current state of the nation?
I guess I feel they're so polarized. We all talk about how polarized that they are, but they really are. I don't know which came first – that the media told us it was and we became more polarized, or if the media is reacting to the fact that we really are. I don't like that. It bums me out. I'm patriotic in that way. I really believe it takes all different kinds of people and from all different parties to make things work with lots of different input and ideas and that we need to respect each other, the convictions that we have. If we can have … civil discourse, I really believe we can do better and solve problems. I guess I'm kind of an idealist and that's not what's happening (laughs).
Emily's wedding song "Able To Sing" made me wonder if you have written or been asked to write a song for a same-sex wedding or civil union?
I've never been asked to write a song for a civil union. I have been asked to sing at some, but it's never worked out. Emily has written a song. Her dear friend got married to another woman, and she wrote a song for that, and it's quite a nice song. But no one will ever hear it because it was a gift. But I haven't done that actually. That would be hard. I think it's hard to write a song on command for that kind of thing.
Are you aware of existing Indigo Girls songs that have been used for that purpose?
Everybody says they use "Power of Two." That's the most used song, straight or gay marriages.
ONSTAGE
Indigo Girls play the Barrymore Theatre in Madison on Nov. 10.
