{"id":3090,"date":"2011-08-03T15:55:08","date_gmt":"2011-08-03T22:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=3090"},"modified":"2011-08-05T16:36:07","modified_gmt":"2011-08-05T23:36:07","slug":"indigo-girls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2011\/08\/indigo-girls\/","title":{"rendered":"INDIGO GIRLS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/h1>\n

INDIGO GIRLS<\/h1>\n

Staring down the challenge of a live album together<\/strong><\/h2>\n

When the Indigo Girls began compiling Staring Down the Brilliant Dream<\/em>, their first live album since 1995\u2019s 1200 Curfews<\/em>, Amy Ray and Emily Saliers were pretty sure they knew what wouldn\u2019t be included: their signature hit, 1989\u2019s \u201cCloser to Fine.\u201d They were looking for lesser-known gems and newer songs. But then they stumbled on a performance of the song featuring guests Michelle Malone, Jill Hennessy, Julie Wolf and A Fragile Tomorrow\u2019s Sean and Dominic Kelly. It deftly summed up the warm, cooperative feel their live shows have always offered. \u201cWe grew up playing in a bar, with friends joining us on stage,\u201d Saliers says. \u201cWe\u2019ve been doing that since we started, and I think this live album is an extension of our sensibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

After two decades of major-label success, last year the Indigo Girls released their 11th studio album, Poseidon and the Bitter Bug<\/em>, on their own IG Recordings, partnering with Vanguard Records for distribution only. \u201cThere\u2019s more freedom\u2014we think of things and then decide to do them. It\u2019s not a big process,\u201d says Ray of their return to independence. \u201cIt\u2019s not that a label wouldn\u2019t want us to do a live record, it\u2019s just that it\u2019s hard to make things happen when you\u2019re part of a big machine.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the midst of their many projects, including an upcoming holiday album and a stint on this summer\u2019s Lilith Fair 2010 tour, the Girls spoke to us about revisiting their last few years on the road.<\/p>\n

Why release another live album now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

AMY RAY: It had been 15 years and we were between records. In order to do a live record, you need quite a lot of time to listen to things, and sort out what you want to use, and mix. We saw a gap of time, and it seemed like a good time to go through all these recordings and see if we had a live record in there.<\/p>\n

EMILY SALIERS: Our front-of-house sound man, Brian [Speiser], recorded all our live shows from 2006 to 2009 and came up with some really, really good sounding recordings, even before they were mixed and mastered. So given the fact that the\u00a0fans liked 1200 Curfews<\/em> so much, we thought this was a good way to present\u00a0a little slice of our history. Since the recordings were good, we had a lot to choose from.<\/p>\n

How did you select the tracks?<\/strong><\/p>\n

SALIERS: Brian put together a huge list of tracks that had come out really well, and we made a list of things we were looking for, more obscure tracks and a few different things. He went through all of his recordings and presented us with the first round. We vetted our own songs first, which was a way of saving time at the outset. Then we spent hours listening and making notes\u2014and then chose the songs together. There are a lot of songs on this record! We had to put the brakes on eventually.<\/p>\n

RAY: We would pick three or four versions of a song and compare those, and whittle it down until we had the shape of something that felt right, that covered the territory, songs that we hadn\u2019t put down live. Then we looked at what songs felt good, sounded good and didn\u2019t have mistakes in them.<\/p>\n

Aren\u2019t mistakes part of the charm of live performance?<\/strong><\/p>\n

RAY: Mistakes are charming when it\u2019s live in the moment, but it wouldn\u2019t be charming to hear over and over on a record. (laughs<\/em>) So we try to balance that. If there\u2019s a small mistake that doesn\u2019t distract from the song, we don\u2019t worry about it.<\/p>\n

Did any particular tracks leap out immediately?<\/strong><\/p>\n

SALIERS: \u201cI Believe in Love,\u201d which we didn\u2019t play that often with the band, and we don\u2019t play it with just me and Amy, because it\u2019s really a band song. I play the ukulele on it. When we got a good take of that, it was like, \u201cWow, I can\u2019t believe we got this one.\u201d And that became a no-brainer. Other songs had a lot of very good versions, like \u201cDon\u2019t Think Twice\u201d with Brandi Carlile. We did look for a lot of band tracks.<\/p>\n

RAY: A song we do acoustic a lot, but I\u00a0felt like the band version was always better, is \u201cThree County Highway.\u201d It\u2019s kind of a\u00a0slow country song, but the drummer has a good feel on it. There was also a\u00a0recent show that, after we played it, Brian said, \u201cThat whole show could be a live record.\u201d So we knew to mark that to\u00a0listen to.<\/p>\n

Which guitars in particular do you usually take on the road with you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

SALIERS: I play Martins on stage. I have\u00a0a D-45 that only 50 of them were made,\u00a0and I love that guitar so much. It\u2019s very different than my J-40 Martin, which is\u00a0kind of like the workhorse. I primarily play that J-40 on Amy\u2019s songs, and I play the D-45 on mine. The J-40 is a little bit\u00a0more muscular.<\/p>\n

RAY: I play a Martin 0-18 from the \u201940s that I\u2019ve had since high school, and a Martin J-40, which is kind of the utility. I play a D-35 on Emily\u2019s songs. My favorite guitar right now is a Gibson J-45 from the \u201950s. A Martin has more upper mids, but on the Gibson every spectrum is represented very well, so it\u2019s very versatile.<\/p>\n

How have you changed as a live act over the years?<\/strong><\/p>\n

SALIERS: I don\u2019t think we\u2019ve changed so much in terms of spirit. Obviously we try to get better. (laughs<\/em>) We try to hone our craft and become better players, and we\u2019ve picked up more instruments along the way, which keeps it more interesting for us and the fans. Fifteen years ago, we didn\u2019t have the ukulele or bouzouki or harmonica or banjo, so I think adding those instruments has been positive growth.<\/p>\n

Do you feel like Indigo Girls is at its most pure live?<\/strong><\/p>\n

RAY: I used to feel that way. But we do things in the studio we probably wouldn\u2019t do live, just because we have other players with us, and we have the time to develop the vocals in a different way or try things that we can\u2019t necessarily repeat live. It\u2019s a different arena. It\u2019s important to capture the energy, but it\u2019s also important to take advantage of the ways that the studio is different.<\/p>\n

When you\u2019re playing live, it\u2019s a mutual exchange with the audience. When you\u2019re in the studio, your involvement is with technology and equipment, and the way a microphone sounds.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the secret to your longevity?<\/strong><\/p>\n

SALIERS: There are a lot of reasons. Our families grew up together, and we\u2019ve known each other since we were little girls. Also we have healthy independent lives, so when we come together, we\u2019re not bored. It\u2019s a beautiful thing.<\/p>\n

RAY: One big thing is that we write\u00a0separately. That gives us our own little creative space. But also, we know that\u00a0what we do together is the thing that we can\u2019t do alone. Musically, it works. We\u00a0got lucky.<\/p>\n

\u2013Katie Dodd<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

INDIGO GIRLS Staring down the challenge of a live album together When the Indigo Girls began compiling Staring Down the Brilliant Dream, their first live album since 1995\u2019s 1200 Curfews, Amy Ray and Emily Saliers were pretty sure they knew what wouldn\u2019t be included: their signature hit, 1989\u2019s \u201cCloser to Fine.\u201d They were looking for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[2294,623,970],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3090"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3090"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3090\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3093,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3090\/revisions\/3093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3090"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}