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Nichole
Wagner - And The Sky Caught Fire |
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The album And The Sky Caught Fire
by Austin, Texas (by way of Colorado) singer and songwriter Nichole
Wagner opens with the laid-back song “Winner Takes All,” demonstrates
Wagner's ability to create a cinematic landscape with her lyrics, as she
explores both the physical and emotional uneasiness of a relationship
coming to an end.
Nichole Wagner says, “(The song) “Winner Take All” is interesting to me,
because a lot of my songs tend to be very storytelling, so they cover a
large period of time. “Winner Take All,” is about a moment shorter than
the actual song. It is that last few seconds while the sun was setting
on this breakup that I was going through, but that is not when I wrote
the song. I wrote the song a couple of years after the breakup.
Things in your mind get
triggered and you think about what it was like to be in those very few
seconds and if anything could have possibly changed the outcome.
It is a song that came together fairly quickly and I wrote it in maybe
an hour and one-half, which is also unusual for me. I tend to sit around
with songs and work with them instead of just letting them come. There
were a couple of verses that got cut, because they didn’t say anything
new. They just delved into
more of what went wrong in the relationship. It turned out it didn’t
really matter, because the song is not about the relationship, so much
as it is about the last few seconds.”
The second song on the album is simply called
“Dynamite,” and at the risk of a groaner pun, it is
a dynamite song that packs a punch. The song moves along briskly and
Wagner is joined on vocals by her co-writer for this song, Terry Klein.
The setting for the song is Wagner’s hometown of Louviers, Colorado
located in Douglas County, with a population of 269 the last time a
census was done.
After bumping into each other at each other’s gigs, Nichole Wagner
decided to approach Terry Klein about co-writing some songs.
“I do not have a poker face, so he knew immediately when I wasn’t
digging the ideas he was pitching and he would tell me very politely
that he didn’t like my ideas either. After an hour of this we gave up
and he said let’s go back a little bit, we don’t actually know each
other that well and this is probably very uncomfortable, because we
don’t know what we are dealing with. He started to ask me where I was
from and basic getting to know you kind of questions.
It turned out perfect, because the answer to that question was
that I grew up in this very small town in Colorado called Louviers. It
is French and named after the (Delaware estate of the Louviers family).
It was the home of the DuPont dynamite factory.
In Colorado at the turn of the 20 th century, because of mining there
was a great need for dynamite, so the factory was built and it was a
company town. Anybody who
lived in the town up until the mid-1980s worked at the factory. Based on
your position in the company if you got a promotion you would get a
different house and you would move up in rank. In the seventies they
shut down production and eventually they closed the factory. When that
happened they sold off the houses of the people who lived there. It took
some time for people to move away. My family was one of the first
families that came in and my parents bought their house a couple of
years, before I was born. They bought an old dairy farm. It was an
interesting place to grow up, because the majority of the people had
lived there for their entire lives. There is a lot of history there.
Because it was a dynamite factory it was very isolated, but it was only
forty-five minutes to an hour from Denver. It wasn’t growing up rural,
because we still had access to all of the city things. Yet it still felt
like growing up rural, so it was the best of both worlds. The con of
that was there was not a neighborhood structure. There were only one
hundred houses. There were only so many things that a town like that can
support when there is also not a company supporting it. We had a post
office and we had a library that was open twice a week for a couple of
hours. If you wanted groceries or anything else you had to go further
into town.
I am happy to report that Louviers has really come back. There were a
few years when it was a place you would not necessarily want to move to
and things were starting to get run down. In the last five or six years
it seems to have really come back. It is more of a suburb. Nothing is
around it still, but the houses and the park are being kept up. It is
really getting some love,” explains Wagner.
Nichole Wagner’s music can best be described as Americana meets Folk
Rock or Joni Mitchell meets Neil Young and Wagner agrees with that
observation.
“You hit the nail on the head. There was so much available to me. My
parents were huge fans of music. They took me to go see big shows when I
was at a very young age. I was two and one-half when they took me to see
George Thorogood. I had all kinds of influences, my mom loved Joni
Mitchell and my dad liked Neil Young. There is a video of me when I was
a very small and I am running around singing Grateful Dead songs and
listening to Jackson Browne records. All of those seventies Rock artists
were played during my childhood. From there I discovered stuff that was
a little more mainstream. When I was a teenager my rebellion took place
when I got into Fleetwood Mac and The Beatles and the Eagles, which were
more popular. (At the same time) it was hard to pull away from that kid
who went to Bluegrass festivals.
I listened to the Grateful Dead, Springsteen and all of those
(other types of music).”
It would appear that most if not all of Nichole Wagner’s songs are
inspired by personal experiences.
“I have written songs about somebody and then realized that person was
in the room (when I performed it) and maybe they didn’t know it until
that moment that the song was about them.
I think every song on And The Sky
Caught Fire is about a very specific relationship, whether it is
with a person or an idea or in the case of a dynamite town. It is about
relationships between the narrator of the song and somebody or
something. Most songs tend
to be about a relationship otherwise you wouldn’t bother to write songs.
A lot of them are also breakup songs. The breakup songs and then the ‘I
wish I could have you,’ songs at the same time.
Songwriting to me is about gathering parts of the world and parts of
your world. Somebody may say something or turn a phrase or something
that happens to somebody, it is all fair game.
The intent is never to call somebody out for their behavior that
is bad, but just to incorporate that realism into what you are doing.
You have to be careful what you say around songwriters.
Also, on the flip side of that I have said something that ended
up in somebody else’s song and I was hey! It is a lesson that I have to
learn too in the presence of other songwriters.
I have changed lines in songs to obscure their deeper truths, but
I only will do it if it doesn’t change the intent of the song. I will
only use detail if it doesn’t identify somebody. It is the kind thing to
do,” she says.
The sultry vocals of Nichole Wagner and the deep, make you swoon vocals
of Rod Picott combine for the slow and sensual “Fires of Pompeii, (We
Should Walk Away)” co-written with Kristin Kirkpatrick. The song is a
conversation, each trying to convince each other that they should walk
away or perhaps they are trying to convince each other why they should
stay. As he is throughout the album, Will Sexton is elegant on guitar
and Jan Flemming is just as eloquent on keys. Drummer Chris Haulser is
subtle in keeping time. Justin Douglas did a wonderful job of producing,
engineering and mastering this album.
“I was so lucky to get Will (Sexton) on guitar for the entire record. I
sent him a text message and I congratulated him on his marriage. I asked
if he wanted to be on my record. He got back to me almost immediately
and said sure when? I told him the dates and then he (got back to me)
and said I bought a plane ticket. I said okay, cool. We are doing this.
He was so open hearted about this and just immediately said yes. He
knocked it out of the park. I could not have been more fortunate and I
don’t think there is anyone else who could have made those songs sound
the way that he did,” she says.
As for the co-writing process Wagner says, “The song
“Fires of Pompeii,” was the first one that I wrote
that I thought I can play this in front of people and I won’t be
embarrassed. Kristin Kirkpatrick is really good at finding the excess
and pointing it out. With “Fires of Pompeii,” I was struggling to come
up with the right metaphor for what I was feeling about the situation
and about the person that it is about. I was looking for a disaster and
she suggested Pompeii. That is her co-writing style with me to talk with
me and to be a sounding board. She would point out that this part was
cool, but you just said that.”
How did Nichole Wagner settle on Justin Douglas as her producer and
engineer?
“I called up Justin and I said hey could we get some coffee and talk
about your approach to this. When we met I knew he was going to be the
right match for it. He is very no nonsense, but he is also a very good
coach. He is not going to let you do things halfway and I love that
about him. He doesn’t accept mediocrity. I think would turn somebody
away if he felt they were not the right fit for him. A lot of studios,
especially for demos and stuff go come on in and they just cycle you
through. It is not just a cash cow. (for Justin). It is not about let’s
get the next girl singer in here and churn through them.
There was an immediate connection (between Justin and me). The way that
we talked about music and the things that we heard and how he could
translate what I was saying into something that was greater than I was
saying, but still keep the essence. While we were making the record I
didn’t even call or talk to anybody else. Luckily he was cool and he did
not say you are a nightmare.
He is awesome and I cannot say enough good things about working
with him. He gives care and attention to every single person who comes
into his studio.
Demonstrating that she knows how to invigorate those listening to her
music Nichole Wagner cuts loose with the sixth track, “This Kind of
Love,” which is a very quick temple rockier type of song.
“The tracking of the record was done with it very much in mind to press
it to vinyl. “The Last Time,” would end side one and you would have the
great fadeout to close that side of the record. Then “This Kind of
Love,” would come in and pick things up. It would wake you up if you had
drifted off into folk sleepy zone.
I tried to make it like one of Stevie Nicks’ solo records and
make it punchy. I wanted it to be more Poppy,” she says.
All but one of the songs on Nichole Wagner’s album
And The Sky Caught Fire are
original tunes, that lone exception being Warren Zevon’s “Reconsider
Me.”
“I had two Warren Zevon songs and two other songs and I sat with them
for a while. “Reconsider Me,” is a breakup song and (the mood is) why
won’t you reconsider me, because we were great together? I love you and
why don’t you love me back anymore? It is also a longing song. You
didn’t give me the chance that I wanted or the chance kind of floated on
by. If you would just
reconsider you would see that I would be really good for you and you
would be good for me.
It hit both categories of the other songs, “Fires of Pompeii,” and “Let
Me Know,” are very longing songs. I wish I could have you. “Winner Take
All,” they broke up, but they are not angry.
There is a little bit of, as
much as I wish we weren’t in this place when we are breaking up I
understand why we are here and I am sorry to see you go.
“Reconsider Me,” has both of those elements in it perfectly,”
says Wagner.
And The Sky Caught
Fire is
a special album, by a special artist whom Riveting Riffs Magazine
predicts one day everybody will be talking about. Our special thanks to
Nichole Wagner who did this interview with almost no voice and to Peanut
her dog who made a cameo appearance.
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As
to whether or not Nichole Wagner finds it easier to write about those
more personal times, while still sitting with those feelings or if it is
easier once she has a little bit of emotional distance, she says, “It
really depends on the subject matter. There are other songs on this
record that were written very much in the moment. “Let Me Know,” was
written when I was out of town and getting ready to go on an adventure.
I was going out for dinner with somebody that I fancied and I was really
struggling with the feeling. That song was written in the moment whereas
with other songs I need that space for me. If I am acting on a more
immediate emotion of wanting or anger or any of those types of things
then I can write them in the moment.”
Will
Sexton was recommended to Wagner and she also knew him prior to his move
from Austin, Texas to Memphis, Tennessee.