{"id":9920,"date":"2013-05-27T12:22:55","date_gmt":"2013-05-27T19:22:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=9920"},"modified":"2013-05-27T12:22:55","modified_gmt":"2013-05-27T19:22:55","slug":"patty-griffin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2013\/05\/patty-griffin\/","title":{"rendered":"PATTY GRIFFIN"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"PATTY-GRIFFIN-Issue-No26\"PATTY GRIFFIN<\/b><\/h1>\n

The beloved singer-songwriter crafts a melodic tribute to her father<\/b><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was younger, I could dive headfirst into writing about things like I knew a lot about them,\u201d says Patty Griffin. She pauses, then laughs, \u201cNow I realize I don\u2019t know anything about anything.\u201d Considering the singer-songwriter\u2019s poetic and revealing lyrics have led artists like Emmylou Harris and the Dixie Chicks to record her material, many would disagree.<\/p>\n

Her seventh studio album,\u00a0American Kid<\/i>, is dedicated to the memory of her father\u2014a World War II veteran and the son of Irish immigrants. \u201cI didn\u2019t decide to make a record in honor of him,\u201d says Griffin, 49. \u201cBut I think the songs turned out that way. A lot were written while I was getting ready for him to go, and some were written in the aftermath of him going. After a while, I felt like it all went back to him.\u201d<\/p>\n

American Kid<\/i> is composed of all original material save for a 60-year-old song by Lefty Frizzell, an artist whom Griffin fell in love with while driving across Texas\u2019 ocean of open space. \u201cLefty was a bit of a wild child, but he had this tender spot for his parents,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty rare to hear a song like \u2018Mom and Dad\u2019s Waltz,\u2019 which is so vulnerable, from anybody in any time period. It\u2019s amazing to express something that intimate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nearly the entire album was recorded in a week with Luther and Cody Dickinson at Zebra Ranch Studio in Memphis. \u201cHaving never played with me before, the Dickinson brothers nailed things pretty fast,\u201d says Griffin. \u201cI\u2019m not the most rhythmically steady person; I like playing by myself and following my own drummer. But they did great.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most of the songs came together easily in the studio, says Griffin, save one: \u201c\u2018Irish Boy\u2019 lingered. I couldn\u2019t get it, and I was ready to give up, but [co-producer]\u00a0Craig Ross kept pushing me. I finally finished it while we were mixing the record in\u00a0Nashville. Craig called and said, \u2018You know\u00a0it\u2019s St. Patrick\u2019s Day, right?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Seventeen years after the release of her debut album, Living With Ghosts<\/i>,\u00a0Griffin remains a fearless writer. \u201cIt\u00a0took a lot of courage for me, more courage than I had when I started, to keep at it,\u201d she says. \u201cIt meant working when\u00a0there was no sign of anything coming from it for years. It takes courage now\u2014sometimes I find it hard to see how I\u2019ll fit into the future. But I love it and I\u2019m good at what I do. I figured that out, and\u00a0I\u2019m proud of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2013Juli Thanki<\/p>\n

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

PATTY GRIFFIN The beloved singer-songwriter crafts a melodic tribute to her father \u201cWhen I was younger, I could dive headfirst into writing about things like I knew a lot about them,\u201d says Patty Griffin. She pauses, then laughs, \u201cNow I realize I don\u2019t know anything about anything.\u201d Considering the singer-songwriter\u2019s poetic and revealing lyrics have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[6602,6600,6603,2737,6372,4339,6599,2860,10156,6601],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9920"}],"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=9920"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9920\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9923,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9920\/revisions\/9923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}