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Chasing
Parked Cars with Terri Lynn Davis |
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Terri Lynn Davis wrote the song “Times Past,” which showcases her
fabulous vocals, surprisingly so, because she had very limited formal
vocal instruction earlier in life. Yet, those amazing vocals were also
evident on a previously recorded album with, “Montana Love Song.” Davis
is also an amazing songwriter and “Times Past,” paints word pictures,
“river of time,” and the desire to slow everything down “be still my
mind.” The gentle melody is matched by lyrics such as “floating down the
river with you.” You watch a story unfold of two people the first time
they met with the sun glistening on their skin and with their toes in
the sand. Musicians of note on “Times Past,” are Tucker Jackson on pedal
steel, lead guitarist Nick Champeau and rhythm guitarist Jacob Miller.
Ben Nugent keeps time on drums.
Terri Lynn Davis gives credit to her producer Ryan Oxford for assembling
the fine cast of musicians for
Chasing Parked Cars, which also includes Andew Jones on bass guitar.
Michele Linn who appears as a background vocalist as performed with
Terri Lynn Davis for several years.
“I met them the day that we recorded the album in person, but I had sent
those charts, rough recordings and the ideas for some changes a couple
of weeks prior to that. The magic happened in one day at the studio and
before each song I explained what I wanted. The charts were revised,
tempo was discussed and the feel of the song and we applied more
appropriate chords where needed to make the song whole.
The musicians had great attitudes and were very professional.
We brought in Tucker Jackson on pedal steel and let him create on his
own. Tucker and I have been playing shows together for a couple years at
this point, so he was familiar with the songs, but having them
structured and recorded allowed him to try new concepts such as effects.
Ryan and I were both in agreement with bringing in that ethereal feel
and I knew pedal steel was the right voice.
Unlike the first album, I wanted Chasing Parked Cars to be simple
instrumentation and more of the simple traditional Honky-Tonk Country
feel of the ‘70s with some modern elements. I feel Tucker really
grasped that concept.
The final touches for the instrumentals were completed by Ryan Oxford,
who added the catchy guitar riff in “Times Past,” and the organ feels in
“Let Go.” My back up vocalist Michele Linn has been with me from
the beginning and we've toured together,” she says.
If you are a fan of Classic Country music you are going to love Terri
Lynn Davis’ song “My Own Fault,” Davis describes this song as being a
song that has a Johnny Cash feel to it.
“It's a story of two lovers trying to evolve into more than lovers or
move on because life evolves and so must situations. This song was
specifically written about me pursuing a relationship that was
inevitably going to fail. I fell in love with someone who was
emotionally unavailable. The summer that I wrote this song, he and I had
a great love affair that changed me, but it was difficult to tell him
because it was good, real good the way it was. I wanted more. We would
have these loving moments and conversations, but he would always leave,”
she says.
Davis describes her music as being, “eclectic and my influences are old
time Country. I am not really fond of modern Country, but I have a huge
range of music that I love to follow.
Chasing Parked Cars has a lot
of psychedelic stuff in it, so it is like the seventies and sixties. The
way that I write is like a Pop Country. I take all of these influences
and I put them in there. I have a difficult time (putting it in) one
specific genre. It will be interesting to market. A lot of my friends
are like that with their music too. We just say it is a west coast
thing.”
Still talking about the album
Chasing Parked Cars, she says, “There is a lot of movement, which is
a continuation of a theme from my first album. Whether I am traveling or
moving, cars have been a big part of my life.
The songs are about letting go and moving forward with your life and it
is about experiences and relationships, whether it is family, friends or
boyfriends and bands. It is about growing up and going through that
process in life. It is about letting go of the past and looking forward
to the future.
I was born in Farmington, New Mexico. We moved all over. My mom was from
California and my dad was from Texas and they met in Farmington. My
brother and I grew up in a rural area outside of Farmington called La
Plata, which is halfway between Farmington and Durango, Colorado. We
move to Colorado, then Wyoming and then back to New Mexico. My dad was
going to be transferred back to Texas, but he didn’t want to go, so we
ended up staying there and that is where I was raised. We spent some
time out in West Texas. Once I graduated from high school I went to
college at New Mexico State. I had the urge to travel so through college
and after college I started moving around. I lived in California,
Montana and Hawaii before I ended up in Oregon. I went down to New
Mexico, so I could be close to my family. It is when I moved back to
Oregon that I committed to playing music.”
As for the title of the album,
Chasing Parked Cars, she explains, “When my brother and I were
(kids) and my dad was working we would be dad, dad and he would say go
chase some parked cars. I always loved that and I thought that was a
great name for an album. My dad would be saying go keep yourselves busy.
That is what I feel it has been like the last few years that I have been
busy in music.”
Terri Lynn Davis is about to get busier. For the first two weeks of
February Terri Lynn Davis is touring with Thomas Hinds throughout Oregon
and they will be performing the song “Tulsa,” as a duet from the new
album, a song that Davis co-wrote with Matt Strachan. They swing back to
Oregon on February 15 th for the album’s office release concert and then
head to California to tour some more.
She says, “It is a lot less complicated working with one other person
than a full band, but I love playing with a band and I hope to have some
future gigs with one. For now I am just doing the solo thing and
bringing in players when I need them.”
Terri Lynn Davis’ previous album Hey Love Hold On, released in 2016 also
had some good songs on it, such as “Montana Love Song,” which once again
allows her superb vocals to shine through.
She says, “The song, “Montana Love Song,” was the first song that I ever
wrote. I went to Montana for the first time when I was twenty and with a
friend of mine. I fell in love with and there is nowhere in the world
like Montana. I would go back there to visit every year. The people are
incredible, it is so vast and it is beautiful there. It is quiet and I
fell in love with it. I moved there and I lived in Helena. Everybody
worked hard, played hard and they were some of the best people I’ve met
in my life.
“Montana Love Song,” came out of driving from Helena, Montana to
Albuquerque, New Mexico.
That was the premise of the song, about me being homesick. I didn’t get
over leaving there for a couple of years. When I moved to Portland I
drove out to Montana every month for probably the first six months that
I was here.
The first full album was written about people in Montana and feeling
homesick and falling in love with all of the wrong guys. That song is
really important to me. The arrangement and the way (the song) turned
out is very different from how it started. It wasn’t a song that we were
going to record, but we thought let’s do one more. “Montana Love Song,”
was really created in the studio. We didn’t rehearse and then go into
the studio to record it. It
wasn’t like that at all. It was thrown in there at the last minute.”
We had to twist her arm a little bit to open up about the song “Blinded
By Gold,” also from the previous album and Terri Lynn Davis did, “This
is a tough one. Do I reveal all of the secrets? It is a conversation
between two people. The gold isn’t money, or diamond rings or the gold
that (you think of), but instead it is the way things are supposed to
be. You are raised to believe that certain things are going to happen
this way and then they don’t. It is one person saying you should be
doing this and this is the way it is supposed to be. The other person is
saying that is not what I want. It is a conversation piece about what
you are doing versus doing what you are supposed to be doing. It is a
continuation of a theme from “Montana Love Song,” about living my life
the way I am supposed to be living it. I went home, because that is
where I thought I was supposed to be. I then realized I gave up things
that I wanted for myself in order to go home to be around the family and
to be in that scenario. I
wasn’t happy living in New Mexico, because there weren’t a lot of
opportunities for the things that I wanted to do.
That is the crossover from this album to the next album. I am recording
it the way that I want to and I am stepping into music life the way that
I want to do it. I am taking control of my life and moving forward with
the way I want to live my life. It has taken me this long to realize
that. “Blinded by Gold,” is an anthem for my life and it is an important
song for that.”
Make sure that you visit Terri Lynn Davis’ website for her tour
schedule, because you do not want to miss out on a very special singer
and songwriter.
Please
visit the website for Terri Lynn Davis.
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Chasing
Parked Cars