1 10 2 https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/39779/archive/files/1517b962f77407823cb2982a13b94ed4.pdf?Expires=1777507200&Signature=tiiYZ8RYbC3PTPaAH0IPWwwssDdB5Tdj3FzMy2qGdiOc%7EXY8z4h0FDAZE1JU17UHaT427nI2npIbseYWiWx0ROia86y8Mtw2JIYtZYFb2CmHaejk07MY5n7LdVaVRXlaBb4cvd7ePhcWmOAsnQfxvDJWgf0Vyw8YWEcRgs02xrqs7QihrfCbRS7MlD-vacwyk7RYDSeKHfqyXffy7SkpG1u53AuD7xw%7ETvIyFAqgujDFxAMmf7%7E1NwN2OPcK0-HK7PuoGl9s3x3-sLdE75ek%7En2p%7EoA0iEpxsckUdE5t2301aputSuJ5uUj5gFLZ3i9z9LULHUWK-x62Xm%7EgfHR2uQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 544dad923dfdb1c885a4f4166a4aa5f8 PDF Text Text TRANSCRIPT – BILL CARSON Interviewee: BILL CARSON Interviewer: KIERAN TAYLOR Interview Date: Location: Charleston, South Carolina Length: 106 minutes KIERAN TAYLOR: All right, just to get us started, if you could tell me your name and when and where you were born. BILL CARSON: My name is Bill Carson, and I was born in Baltimore in October, 1976. KT: How long were you in Baltimore? Was your childhood in Baltimore? BC: About ten years, and then we moved to James Island. KT: I know a little bit about Baltimore, but what part of Baltimore? BC: I lived in West Baltimore in sort of a turn-of-the-century suburb, sort of like this neighborhood. It was in the city, but it was yeah, an old suburb like this. My father was a marine engineer, so he worked at the shipyards there. I had a big family. Well, five older sisters, and so yeah, a pretty nice -- when I visited that neighborhood as an adult, I was struck by how lovely of a neighborhood it is. All together, Baltimore was a rougher town than it is now. I like Baltimore. It has a lot of character. I feel like some places you go sort of seem the same. Baltimore seems like it's different. They have a beautiful accent, which I of course, sort of hated as a kid, or when we moved away. My sisters have it, but I never got it. But now, when I go back, it sounds really lovely to me. But I guess most regional accents sound beautiful to me now. �Bill Carson 2 KT: Right, right, so did -- I mean I don't hear it. Did you pick up any Baltimoreeze? BC: No, I don't have any. I don't think I have any of it. I think I was too young. My parents are not from Baltimore, so they didn't have it. KT: So, I was wondering about that. So, you know, my first instinct, given your musical interests is to say okay, there's -- this is a kind of classis post-war Appalachian to Baltimore migration, but is that not right? BC: Oh, with my parents? No, my father is from a mill town in Massachusetts, and my mother was born in Wilmington, Delaware; though, her family is from South Dakota, Wyoming. So, no, I don't think that anyone I was related to had evenvisited the South. Well, no, I guess that's not true. My father was in the Army and he did his basic training in Louisiana. KT: Now, what was your first musical memory? BC: Well, my sisters are -- my four oldest sisters are ten and more years older than me. So, in my earliest memories, they were teenagers, early eighties, and listening to Boston and Foreigner. And then also, more classic Sabbath, Beatles, Led Zeppelin and stuff, so I guess besides the classical public radio that my mom would have on in the kitchen, those are my earliest musical memories, I guess. And a couple of my sisters took guitar lessons, although not for long, but long enough that there was a guitar in the house that I could play with. KT: Interesting. BC: I do feel like I was fortunate to get a little bit of a classic rock education at a fairly young age because it was around, so by the time I was ten, I was getting hand-me- �Bill Carson down Led Zeppelin, Aerosmith records, which I was in love with, even at that age. That was really magical music to me, and remains magical music to me. KT: So, even maybe before you left Baltimore, your first -- sort of the first genre that you identified with would be what we now consider to be like classic rock. BC: Sure, yeah, like Led Zeppelin, I would say in particular. KT: Zeppelin more than anything? BC: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was transformative for me. I mean it's like a pretty common story I think for boys, especially I think that sort of preteen discovery of Led Zeppelin or whatever else. But it's true, and that's what I wanted to play on the guitar. KT: Start picking out notes to Stairway and -BC: Exactly. KT: Yeah, so -BC: Textbook, sort of. KT: What's that? BC: It's sort of textbook. It's a cliché almost sort of story. KT: Do you remember, was this -- moving at ten, was that exciting, was that disruptive? BC: I was -- well, I guess it was a mix. I was sad to leave friends. I'd never -- we had never moved since I had been born. But also, Charleston was very -- seemed very exotic to me. I can remember stepping out of the -- I guess the first time I came here, we flew, and there wasn't much to the airport, the Charleston Airport back then. Palm trees and lizards, I mean it may as well have been like Tahiti or something. And so, that was exciting. It all seemed sort of exotic to me, so it was exciting in that way. And then I 3 �Bill Carson 4 guess we moved in the summer, and then when I started school, it was middle school on James Island. And I think at ten, you're just a little bit -- you adapt a little more easily than -although looking -- in retrospect, I was experiencing a certain amount of culture shock in terms of -- well, the education system itself, which I went to a pretty nice public school in Baltimore. And then South Carolina public school in the eighties, you know, out in the suburbs. And then culturally, racially, in Baltimore, I went to an elementary school that was probably ninety percent African American. Of course, I had no idea that -- I was a child, so I wasn't really aware of that. And then the school here was -- actually, I really don't know what the proportion was, but even at that age, even with ten, eleven-year-olds, sort of socially segregated. That was unusual to me. And everyone talked in a way that was unusual to me. KT: Now I'm assuming that your -- your father -- it was because of a job move? BC: Yeah, he was transferred. He worked for the American Bureau of Shipping. It's a shipping registry. So, he was transferred to the office here, so he had the same job here. KT: By this point, had you begun picking up a guitar? BC: Yeah, and actually, I think maybe in that first year that we were here probably, I picked -- is when I really started to pick it up. I guess I probably had more time before I made many friends. I had more time by myself. And we lived in a place on James Island where there weren't any kids -- it was a really small neighborhood, and there weren't any other kids, so I needed a ride to go play with kids. Whereas, living in the city in Baltimore, I had -- there were just dozens of kids whose houses, even at seven, �Bill Carson 5 eight, nine years old, I could just walk to. I guess I had more time at home. KT: Well, interesting to think about the timing of you picking up the guitar, you know, right after -- as you're moving into a new setting. BC: And I guess that's sort of a -- I think you're -- ten years old, I feel like your awareness of -- like the things you're sort of interested in or aware of sort of change at that point. I think maybe you become a little bit more thinking about culture, which I think at eight years old maybe, you're not really thinking about culture so much. KT: Now was it pretty -- did other recognize, or did you recognize that you had any particular aptitude for music, or was it more driven by your -- just kind of your passion to emulate the records you were listening to? BC: I guess it was a direct -- it was driven by me. My folks were certainly -- and my older sisters -- supportive for sure. My folks have been supportive of everything I've - just about everything I've pursued. But there wasn't any, "Oh, you're good at music, like you should study music." It wasn't like that. It was just like -KT: Piano lessons? BC: No, I took guitar lessons. We had a piano, too, so I fooled around on the piano a bit, but that never really stuck for me. I don't know why, but -- yeah, I took guitar lessons on and off, but I was never very well disciplined at all at studying, at playing scales and stuff, exercises. I just wanted to try and make the sounds I heard, that kind of thing. KT: When did you get your first guitar? BC: Well, I guess there were a couple of guitars in the house that sort of unofficially became mine when my sisters abandoned them. �Bill Carson 6 KT: I'm assuming these are kind of like off-brand acoustics. BC: Yeah, one of which I still have. It's a Kay, like a three-quarter sized Kay flattop, that's a great guitar. It's like a -- they have such a small, dead sort of sound, plunking dead kind of sound. It's wonderful. Yeah, so -- and then I guess the first guitar that -- well, my parents bought me a guitar when I guess I was eleven or twelve. What year did -- yeah, I just have been eleven. They bought me an electric guitar, a Strat imitation, a little -KT: Practice amp? BC: Yeah, like solid state, like heavy distortion, sort of little amp. I loved that so much. KT: I bet. BC: Yeah, I guess I was twelve probably at that point. KT: This was like 1990. BC: Yeah, well, I think it was '89 -- '88 or '89 because I associate it around the same time as Hugo. KT: Okay, so were you -- was your family affected by Hugo? BC: Yeah, well, we evacuated, but our house is near the water, on James Island. There was about five, six feet of water around the house, but we weren't there. I mean there was a lot of damage to the house, but we could move back in. KT: Were you composing right from the beginning? BC: No, I was -- well, you know, I think at the very beginning, yes. And then I developed enough self-consciousness about it that I didn't. KT: Isn't it interesting? So, composing maybe even before you could play chords, �Bill Carson 7 that kind of thing, or right about that time that you were just learning your first chords. BC: You know, like I would come up with something that I would repeat then when I played, like the next time I played the guitar, but it's not as though I was playing it for anyone else. Although, some of those things -- I mean whenever I interact with a young naïve musician, who's playing, I want to encourage that because I feel like there's some -- I mean there are shortcomings to what -- there are limitations to not having the reference points and the experience and the knowledge of musical structures and stuff like that. But there's also a magic that comes out of that naïve approach to it that is -- it is difficult to recapture later on down the road. I think it's possible, but it's pretty hard. Yeah, so then not so much. I mean I've played -- I just played a lot by myself. There were some kids in middle school that I jammed with a little bit, but -- and then a little bit in high school -- but I was playing a lot for me, I guess. Yeah, learning songs and not really singing either, just playing guitar. KT: Your first band, when was that? BC: We had a band in -- some friends in -- I guess I was a senior in high school. We played at a couple of parties, and we played a mix of some original songs that I wrote the music and my buddy Trey wrote some lyrics to and sang. And then some -- I covered a Beastie Boys song, just because all over, you know. And at this point, it was -- my favorite music was Nirvana and Pearl Jam. KT: Okay, so was grunge, like was that the first genre that you could identify as your own? I mean in the sense that I'm sure, even as you're listening to Zeppelin as a kid, you understand that it's over. That was music from ten years previous. BC: Yeah. �Bill Carson 8 KT: Or even more? What are we talking about it? BC: Yeah, I guess more. Although, that is something -- and this is sort of a tangent, but that sort of fascinates me how I feel like the rate of evolution in rock music has just slowed. I mean compared to the earlier chapters in -- you know what I mean? KT: Say more. BC: Well, okay, so let's think about it. So, 1964, that's like, "I Want to Hold Your Hand," right. KT: Mm-hmm. BC: The next year is like the Velvet Underground. The next year or so is Zeppelin. Then the next year is Sabbath. This is in the course of like four or five years. KT: Right, how do you get from -- yeah, or even within the Beatles, how do you get from "She Loves You," to "Revolution Number Nine" in a matter of months. BC: Yeah, and then like wow, what a ride, yeah. And then so now, I think about like wow, like the Pavement records that came out when I was in high school, still seem KT: Still sound current. BC: Yeah, when that's twenty years old. And so, when I became aware of choosing the music that I would listen to, that's how old Sergeant Peppers was then. KT: Right. BC: I feel like doing that math. KT: What does that speak to? I mean is it just that we exhausted the genre, or did we just keep recycling them at this point? BC: I don't know. I guess there's recycling and I guess maybe it's going outward �Bill Carson 9 in different -- and it's also probably sort of a mistake to think of it as linear anyway. But I don't know. I don't know. KT: But you're right. I teach a pop music class, and that's one of the things that I always -- we spend a lot of time on, thinking of just the rock revolution, how we went from danceable rock and roll to -- within a couple of years, to rock being this unique genre in and of itself that you no longer danced to rock. You listened to it, oftentimes alone in your room, and very intently trying to tease out some sort of deeper meaning. It may or may not have been there, but it was -- and that was so different than the early sixties experience. You look at those -- for instance, I show this to my students -- those musical bills from the shows, from the late fifties and early sixties, where you have black and white artists on the same bill, and there was no distinction made by the young people who were going to the shows. They were just there to dance, to Chubby Checker and Bill Haley and the Comets. It was all rock and roll. And something changes in the -- circa '65-'66 I think. BC: Yeah, although you saw a little bit more of that in the late '60s and '70s though, right, with -- I don't know, Sly and even -KT: A little bit, but I see them as sort of the exception that proved the rule. BC: Oh, really? KT: I think so, like Hendrix. BC: Stax. KT: What else? BC: Like Stax records stuff, I mean like they were sharing bills with -- well, I mean the band was integrated anyway, but again, probably the exception that proves the �Bill Carson 10 rule. KT: No, you're right, Stax is a good sort of -- that is a counter-example, and they were -- and I think they were very deliberate about trying to maintain a kind of -- I think that was like a very conscious political choice, too, from what I know. BC: I think Sly was, too. You mean Stax or Sly? KT: Stax, yeah, yeah. So, we'll get wonky very quick. I will at least. I mean I love this stuff. So, any thoughts about -- you're playing in -- what was the name of the band? BC: In high school, NBC. KT: MBC? BC: Like the television network. KT: NBC, oh, cool. Did it stand for something else or no? BC: I think it was the sort of thing where we came up with many things it might stand for, but it really didn't stand for anything. KT: Yeah, and did you have like a peacock as -- is that NBC or is that CBS? BC: No, that is NBC. No, we didn't go that far. KT: In terms of that you're moving towards graduation, I mean are you thinking -is music fun? Are you ever thinking hey, this is something that I want to really focus on, or what are you thinking as a seventeen, eighteen-year-old, in terms of what you're going to do next? BC: I guess I'm thinking that -- I sort of had fantasies about what it would be like to be in the shoes of whoever I admired at the moment. But I didn't -- I wasn't -- I thought -- they were just fantasies. I didn't think that that was something for me to explore. I don't know why really, I just thought well, yeah, that sure would be fun, but I guess I'm going �Bill Carson 11 to go do other stuff instead. So, I went to the college and I studied the classics and philosophy and then -- I thought I was going to be a philosophy instructor. And then - and still, I guess I was taking -- I took a lot of art classes and music classes, just for fun, just because I was interested in that stuff. But somehow, I didn't -- I wasn't thinking that that's what I wanted to do. KT: Were you doing visual art as well during this time? BC: Yeah. KT: Okay, and that had started before college even? BC: No, I guess in college, yeah, and just from -- and not seriously, just I felt like it was something that I wanted to do as -- at that point, it was just -- I guess I saw it as a well rounded sort of thing like I should paint and draw, too. KT: Tell me about the College of Charleston at that time. What do you remember about the college? I'm assuming as a philosophy major and being kind of around the art students, was there -- I mean was that sort of a unique sort of subset of students within the larger college? BC: I don't know. I guess I feel like -KT: I mean it sounds to me like Bohemian and outcast when I hear philosophy major. BC: Yeah, I guess, yeah. KT: Was there a presence of students like yourself at that point? BC: I had a couple of friends who were -- I had a good friend who was -- he was a year older than me, who was studying philosophy as well as psychology and lab sciences. He is now a professor at Johns Hopkins. And he was also playing in bands and doing �Bill Carson 12 stuff like that. So, I guess -- although for the most part, I wasn't really buddies with the people I was in the philosophy program with. It's funny, I guess at the time, I just -- I sort of thought of that as my job. And then I thought of the arts classes, and the artists I was friends with as my diversion. Although, then I end up in my -- in all of the jobs I've had since then, I've drawn on art history and studio practices, and music, like that's how I've made a living since then. I don't know. KT: Maybe more so than philosophy? BC: Well, for sure, although I guess either one is sort of surprising isn't it? KT: But you know, I think of the college as being -- maybe dominated is too strong -- but I know that like Greek life is -- I mean were you part of fraternities? BC: No, and I guess that was -- I think that was a little bit invisible to me. I mean I guess I kind of knew it was like if you had asked me about it, but it just wasn't really on my radar. And I guess to me, the average college student, when I was there, was sort of a -- like maybe a sociology major with a beard and an unbuttoned shirt, and sandals on. He like smoked grass and probably listened to -KT: Sort of surfer vibe, sort of southern hippie vibe? BC: Yeah, in that Venn diagram, which to me, like it's the Allman Brothers Band. They're like the middle of that Venn diagram where it's hippie and like good old boy. And it's like that was the College of Charleston guy to me. I happen to love the Allman Brothers Band. KT: Now were you -- did you live on campus, or did you commute? BC: No, I commuted. I lived on James Island. KT: Okay, so still living with the folks all through -- �Bill Carson 13 BC: Yeah. KT: Okay. BC: Yeah, yeah, I lived out there the whole time I was in college. KT: Are you becoming aware at this time of a local music scene? I mean are you going out to shows at all? BC: Yeah, there were -- I guess at first, there were the sort of -- the -- at the time, the indie bands that spoke to me the most. So I would -- I would travel a lot to go see shows, then to see -- up to Chapel Hill and to Athens and Atlanta and wherever, to see Pavement and Sebadoh and Sonic Youth, and those types of folks. KT: So, it started, in terms of your musical development or it was -- at least at the time that you started playing music, it was more kind of Pearl Jam, Nirvana, sort of mainstream grunge, but then you moved out into Pavement, Sebadoh, things that are a little bit less kind of mainstream, I guess. BC: Right. Although, I guess I was -- I think this hasn't -- I guess I've always - if I've discovered something that is interesting or just enjoyable to me, in terms of music or something, I want to know what came right before it, or what's the -- where did that come from, or who are those guys friends with? What's happening over there? Of course, you know, like when you were discovering music as a teenager and it's not -- you couldn't go Google those bands and -KT: Right. BC: So, it was all kind of word of mouth, you know, and like there was a decent record store here, but there was kind of a cooler record store in Columbia, so like if we went up there for a show, we'd like go to that record store. So, for me, yeah, so like -- so, �Bill Carson 14 I didn't become aware of Nirvana until Nevermind, which most of us didn't. But so then there's the Sub Pop logo on the Gaffin releases, so I'm like okay, what's that about? And I had some friends who were a little hipper to that stuff, so I was like, okay, I'm going to dig a little bit there. So, that seemed sort of natural in terms of archeologically, I guess. KT: And then I'm assuming at some point, like you're bitten by the -- and maybe I'm -- this is a -- I'm off on this assumption, but like I know depression bug kind of bites at some point. BC: Yeah, although -- yeah, I may have been late to that. And I guess -- so, I'll tell you though, something that was sort of a turning point for me at that time, I guess in a couple of ways, was Jump Little Children. Do you know that band? KT: No, just the name. BC: Okay, so they were -- they were a band who -- they were guys who they all went -- most of them went to North Carolina School for the Arts, started a band there as like a -- playing country blues and Irish tunes, just because that's what they were interested in. They ended up move -- they moved here and became a rock band, but this is in the early 90s -- or I guess probably '94, something like that. And I guess it was '95 -and then they became -- I mean from my perspective, they were huge in Charleston. They played at the Music Farm -- when I first heard them, they were playing at the Music Farm once a week, and it was like sold out every time, and with like really dedicated fans and really vibrant shows, which were in a way that I had -- that I wasn't really used to seeing shows, like you go see Sebadoh, and it's like -- I mean I love Sebadoh, but you know. KT: Yeah, a little ponderous. BC: Yeah, and like if you really like it, you do this. But I walked into this show at �Bill Carson 15 the Music Farm, this band that I had never heard before and people are dancing, and they're playing -- they're like unabashedly performing, and playing really rich music on the spectrum of like somber ballads, to like really fun dance songs and in different styles, too, incorporating country styles and different kinds of folk styles. And I thought wow, this is really something different for me. And I loved it. And it -- I mean I guess around that time there were a few records I heard, too, that kind of opened me up to what music could be like, outside of the type of rock that I was listening to. And also, here they were, they were a Charleston band, like wow. And I didn't stop loving the indie rock kind of bands I was enjoying at that time, but it did open me up to thinking about -- it probably opened the door for the no depression thing to happen for me. KT: I see. And would they have been the first sort of local band that you kind of identified with and followed? BC: There were a couple others, I guess. KT: I mean who was around on the scene at that point? BC: Let's see, there was a band -- I also liked at the time -- I liked a band called The Ferns. They were kind of like a jangly, like a -- they were somewhere between like Reckoning era, REM, and actually probably more like DBs, like that kind -- like that whole sort of crescent of the uplands. And probably like with a pinch of Smiths kind of guitar, but like jangle, early nineties jangle rock. There was a band called The Bell Tower in Charleston at that time, early 90s, who were -- they were kind of fish out of water, I feel like. It was like a dramatic -- it was like -- there's probably -- I wasn't really into these bands, so I probably don’t have like the best reference point, but like -- who were �Bill Carson 16 the bands that were like sort of like -- had elements of My Bloody Valentine, but were poppier though? KT: Okay, so Jesus and Mary Chain? BC: Like maybe Jesus and Mary Chain, but they have a little bit of a blues kind of thing, too, a little bit. KT: Bell Tower did? BC: No, Jesus and Mary Chain. KT: Oh, Jesus and Mary Chain. BC: Anyway, but that kind of -- they were in that kind of vein, you know, so it's like all the shows were all like -KT: A little dark, Manchester Inn. BC: Yeah, Fender Jaguars and like Sixteen Pedals, and a great light show. KT: Yeah, not a real Charleston, not what I think of when I think of Charleston. BC: Not necessarily, no. KT: I don't see the women at the college showing up in droves to those shows. BC: Yeah. KT: What were the venues even? I mean you mentioned the Music Farm, but where would people play out and who was coming to these shows? BC: Well, let's see. Well, the first time -- I went to a lot of shows at the old Cumberland's, which is on Cumberland Street near State Street. How long have you been in Charleston? KT: Just six years. BC: Okay, yeah, so I say the old Cumberland's. I mean the new Cumberland's was �Bill Carson 17 gone by the time you moved here I guess maybe. It was on King Street. Yeah, it was a little bar. There were good shows there though. I mean I guess not really any big -- every once in a while there'd be a big touring act like -- I mean Mike Watt played there a couple times. But it was pretty much -- it was a local, regional sort of venue. And actually the first time I played out at a bar, at an adult establishment, I guess it was playing there. Where else was there? There was a -- there was Cumberland's and the Farm. There was a place called King Street Station, which I think is -- I think there's still a place called King Street Station, but it's just a convenience store now, on King, near Calhoun. KT: Yeah, it sounds familiar. BC: They -- some of the bands in Charleston that I looked up to at the time played there. So, there was Jump Little Children, and then there was a band called Big Stoner Creek, and they were definitely real southern like sort of rowdy country, songs about trains and stuff. KT: I'm picturing Black Crow, Skynyrd kind of cross. BC: No, more like acoustic sort of thing, yeah, like an upright bass and fiddle and guitar, but rowdy kind of -- they would probably be popular now. KT: BR549. BC: Yeah, but not clean like that, like not as -- I don't know, the Truckers maybe, the Drive-By Truckers, maybe they're kind of like that. KT: So, when did you first play out? Was that a solo show? BC: That was I think '94 or '95. I played -- oh, so there was a band in Charleston called the Groovy Cools. KT: The Groovy -- �Bill Carson 18 BC: The Groovy Cools, and they played covers and originals, and it's just like straight up pop, rock. But they were popular and nice fellows, and I guess a little older than most of my friends. I don't know how long they had been playing around. But I played an opening set for them at the old Cumberland's, with my friend Kevin Young, who was not really a musician. But he had a sampler, like an analog sampler, and so we played this -- I mean probably the weirdest set I've ever played with acoustic guitar and some vocals and some sounds and stuff. KT: You were like nineteen? BC: Yeah. KT: Do you remember -- I mean were you anxious going into this? Was it just a lark? BC: Yeah, I was nervous, but I also -- I'd love to go back and watch it, but no reference point as to like what -- how to be on that end of -- picturing yourself, like does what I'm doing fit into this context? There's zero awareness of that. And Jim, who was the leader of the Groovy Cools, a real sweet guy, and really patient, and like patted us on the back, like, "Thanks, thanks for playing guys," you know, but really sincerely. Never got another call, but -KT: Do you remember the crowd reaction or crowd response? BC: No, I mean I think -- I had a couple friends there, just moral support, but no. I don't even -- I couldn’t even tell you how many people were there. There could have been -KT: Yeah, if you're opening, there may have been four people. BC: It may have just been our friends, and then the guys in the other band and the �Bill Carson 19 bartender. It was probably kind of like that. It was probably like 9:00 on a Tuesday or something. KT: I'm wondering about like your proficiency as a musician at this point, like are you -- I mean are you -- can you tell that you're really getting good or not necessarily? BC: No, I don't think so because I don't think I was getting good at all. I don't think I was really -- I don't think I was playing with other -- I think you get good by either being really disciplined in your own development, or you play a lot with other people who are better than you. And it wasn't -- and the first one never happened for me. And the second one didn't happen until later. So, at that point, I was -- no, I was a total hack. KT: So, as a musician, you were a late bloomer in that sense, or you had been as a guitarist. BC: I think so, yeah. I mean I'm hoping to bloom one of these days. Yeah, so then I think it wasn't until a couple years later when I started playing with people more, and I - somehow I was invited to play bass in a band that played a little bit, like they played -we had some shows, and the band was called Bud Collins, named after the tennis player and sports writer. And that was, I guess, my -- that was the first time that I was in a band where it was like we practiced somewhat regularly, and we had some shows. It's funny, we didn't play that much, but I guess some of the guys -- one of the guys in the band was sort of strategic about it and knew some people, so we played -- we played shows where some people came. We opened up for Superchunk at the Music Farm KT: Really. What -- about what year? BC: That was -- oh, you know what, that was later. When was that? That was �Bill Carson 20 probably -- that was like late nineties. So actually -KT: So, about the time you're getting out of the College of Charleston? BC: Yeah, I think that -- yeah, actually, I think that was like my last semester. KT: That was a pretty big deal as a college senior, you're opening for Superchunk. BC: Oh, yeah, I was thrilled. Yeah, yeah, but I guess actually -- so I'm getting out of order. Before that though, I started -- I was -- I made friends with this fiddle player, and she was about my age and a classically trained violinist, but like kind of didn't -didn't love playing anymore, and then she discovered folk tunes, and so she was learning a bunch of folk tunes and the fiddle. And we started playing together, and just guitar and fiddle, and learned a bunch of music together, and we used to play on the street -- on Market Street. I think we probably started playing together in the summer, and like during the summer, we would play almost every night, or a lot. KT: So, you've been playing with her now for fourteen years or so? BC: No, no, I don't play with her now. KT: Oh, okay, I'm sorry. I though you -BC: No, no. Yeah, this was just for a year or two around that time, like when I was in college. KT: What's her name? BC: Her name is Amanda Kapazous. And actually -- and then she moved, and then coincidentally, I met -- I became friends with another young woman who played violin, and then we played a lot. So, that I guess -- before I started playing with any regularity, and I get in rock venues, that's really when I started to get my feet wet as a performer, like getting used to like playing - not only with another -- I mean in a band of �Bill Carson 21 two people, but still playing with other people and in front of people. KT: Yeah, it also sounds like you've got these parallel music tracks that you're following. You've got your electric side, and then also you're playing with --acoustically with fiddle players, busking and that kind of thing. BC: Yeah, and so at that point, I would write some music that drew on both of those. KT: Okay, how about singing? BC: I wasn't singing then. KT: Not even background? BC: Oh, I would sing -- yeah, I would sing maybe like a tiny bit, you know, but no, I was too shy to sing, for sure. KT: Not even when you were alone? BC: Maybe when I was alone -- you know, no, I wasn't even -- no, I was like -KT: You were just playing. BC: I was just playing. I was like -- yeah, I was too shy to sing. Although, I kind of -- I felt like I wanted to write songs, and I would -- I guess I would make up fragments of songs in my head, but I wouldn’t sing them to anyone else. KT: Not even to a vocalist? BC: Mm-mmm, no. KT: Okay. BC: Yeah, I mean it wasn't like -- I guess it was just sort of a little thing, I guess I had in my -- you know. KT: As far as -- so you're moving toward graduation from the college. What are �Bill Carson 22 you thinking about in terms of -- what are you going to do with your life? BC: I'm going to go to graduate school and study philosophy, and be a philosophy instructor. I think that's what I was thinking. KT: Is that something you pursued? BC: No, then I just -- after graduation, I decided I wanted -- I was working at the college at the same time, and so I thought I wanted to get away from being in a school for maybe a year. I got a job at a glass studio, like doing architectural glass -- stained glass windows and stuff like that. I was an acquaintance of the guy who had the shop, and started -- so worked there, and realized that I just -- that I preferred working with my hands to -- making things to being -- to writing papers. I let go of my self-image as an academic and -KT: Was that difficult at all? BC: No. KT: No. BC: I mean I just think I just -- I didn't really think about it too much. Then it turns out I was using all of these -- all the things that I studied in school, just for fun, you know, art history. And then I started playing music a lot at that point, too. KT: So, post-graduation then, music becomes much more serious commitment. BC: Yeah, and still just sort of playing in other folks' bands. At that point, I became -- there was a community of people where we all started playing in one another's bands, like putting little (00:55:20) together. KT: So, who would have been kind of part of that community and -- I'm not going to know these people, chances are, but I think it's important to know who's playing with �Bill Carson 23 who, and what kind of stuff they're playing. BC: Yeah, so my coworker at the time, this guy named Kevin (Hanley?), he worked with me at the shop, and we also -- I think it was within maybe a month or something that we -- that I was in that band and we played that opening slot for Superchunk, and Kevin, he played in the band that night. It was one of the classic -- like the revolving door drummer sort of thing. And so he played drums that night. And then it was maybe -- and then I started working there within a month or so of that time. And so -- and he was writing songs, and so I started playing with him. And then we -- and then we started a band, like a sort of noise instrumental -- like noisy jam band sort of thing basically. And we started playing shows like that, and so there was -- so let's see, and the bands at the time -- and so not long after that, within half a year of that time, he and I put together a compilation of local rock type bands. KT: Really. What was that called? BC: The compilation was called The Frisbee Guy Doesn't Live Here Anymore. When we were in college, there was a guy who -- this eccentric sort of guy named Lou, was his name, but he -- everyone knew him as the Frisbee Guy because he went to shows, he always had a Frisbee with him. He was sort of dancing, like jam band sort of stuff, you know, and it's like he's the guy with the Afro and the mustache dancing with the Frisbee. So, he was the Frisbee guy. He also -- he had a sub -- or he had like an alter ego, as if the Frisbee Guy weren't enough, as the Atari Genius. He did this as the opening act for bands sometimes. He would bring -- he would come to the club with a box -- with an Atari and a box full of the games. �Bill Carson 24 KT: Cartridges. BC: Cartridges, and set it up -- if the technology was there, set it up -- if they had multiple TV screens, but at least set up one, and you could -- he would teach you to play a game, and then -- or you could challenge him to a game, and if you didn't know, he would coach you on playing it, and then you would compete. And if you beat him, then he would give you money. But you didn't have to pay to play, but so here's the Atari Genius, so sometimes it would be at Cumberland's, so-and-so with the Atari Genius. KT: Where is this guy now? BC: A year or so ago, I looked him up, and I think he's in San Francisco. KT: Working as a dentist. BC: Maybe, I don't know. KT: I mean that's amazing. BC: He had to either go one way or another, either like he's -- you know. KT: I mean where does someone come up with that shtick? I'd love to talk to this guy. BC: Yeah, I don't know. I mean the Frisbee thing I don't think was a shtick. I think that was -- he just always had a Frisbee with him. KT: How did either of those develop? BC: Everyone called him -- we just called him the Frisbee Guy, and then he moved. KT: Does he know that there's basically a tribute album? Okay. BC: Yeah. I mean it has nothing to do with him. KT: Yeah, yeah, yeah, but I think this is interesting because you're what, twenty- �Bill Carson 25 three, when you do this compilation? BC: Yeah, twenty-two probably. KT: Why did you think there was a need for a -- I mean that’s not really on the minds of most twenty-two-year-old musicians is to think about a compilation of the local music scene. I mean was there a broader objective behind that? BC: No, I don't think so. I think it was that -- I think that it was that -- looking back on it, I think it's that I enjoy artifacts, musical artifacts, and I wanted to make one. KT: I mean that is -- I mean that's an important little -- I mean of course, I've not heard it. It could be absolutely dismal, but it does -- I mean that is an important -BC: It's all over the place. KT: As a historical record of that time and place -BC: I mean and granted it's limited to just who -- I guess to us at the time, it was everybody, but there were plenty of bands who we just weren't friends with. I mean they were just off their radar. KT: But that was your world at least. BC: Yeah, and beyond, too. I mean it was -- it was a couple degrees away from us. I think there were twenty bands on it or something. KT: And you -- I assume -- I mean you have back copies of this? BC: I think I have one, yeah. KT: Really. BC: Yeah, I mean this was -KT: Make sure that gets to an archive. BC: Yeah. I mean consider this is the beginning of CD burning technology, or the �Bill Carson 26 era, so it's like we put it -- we only knew one person who had the ability to put them all on one CD in the first place. It's not mastered or anything. It's just -- and it ranges from cassette deck to some kind of nicer digital recordings, (01:02:08). But there's some good music on it I think. Yeah, and it's definitely a little time capsule. I mean I don't know, I haven't listened to it in years. Yeah, so we did that, and we thought well, we should make up a record label, just you know, because we have this CD, so we called it Chord and Pedal Records, which was a Sonic Youth reference. KT: What's the name? BC: Chord and Pedal. KT: From teenage -BC: Right, yeah. And then subsequently, we - a few of our friends -- when we would release -- when we would make a recording and burn some copies, or sometimes have them made, it was Chord and Pedal Records. It was sort of like a little collective kind of thing. KT: I'm wondering, at this time, are there people -- was there anybody on the scene who had a kind of longer history of being a Charleston -- was there anyone who could -- who might tell you stories of the eighties, or even the late seventies? BC: Then, we -- I'm sure there were, but not that we were friends with. KT: Yeah, because your crew -- I mean the people you hung around with, they were all between nineteen and twenty-seven. BC: Roughly my age, yeah. KT: No kind of oldsters? BC: No, unfortunately, yeah, and without -- I guess without that word of mouth �Bill Carson 27 connection, I feel like there was no evidence of older bands in Charleston, except for maybe like a couple of years before us or something like that. There were like some rock bands that -- local bands that I went to see when I was in high school, I guess, that -- like we would come downtown to see a show. But that's just like five years. They had no idea what was -- like what kind of rock music was coming out of Charleston in the eighties for sure. But you know, I would recommend -- well, when -- a couple of people have come to mind that I think you should talk to. KT: Oh, okay. Oh, good, good, we'll definitely talk about that. So, when do you begin singing -- writing your own stuff and singing your own stuff? BC: Well, I had -- I guess it was around that time I started writing songs, like maybe '99 or so. But it was like maybe I played a couple songs for my girlfriend, and it was like maybe that was -- I was just too -- I wanted to be -- at that point, I thought I wanted to experiment with being a singer, a band. Then so I was -- in 2001, I was going to Italy for the summer. At the time, I didn't know how long. I thought maybe longer, but I kind of thought well, maybe this is sort of the end of this part of my life, where I'm doing this kind of stuff in Charleston. So, I wanted to have -- so, I booked one show and put a band together, thinking -- and like played my five songs. KT: Your farewell show? BC: Yeah, and I thought that was it. But I got a lot of positive feedback from that, and then so I guess when I eventually did come back, then I started doing that more. And still playing with some of those guys, but then within -- like in the early -- like maybe in '03, I became -- I started playing with -- actually, with some of the guys in this band that really inspired me when I was in college, Jump Little Children, and they were touring �Bill Carson 28 less at the time, and had some free time, and like really took me under their wing, and became my backup band, or my band. Not full time because they were playing with other folks, too. I guess most notably, Carrie Ann Hearst, and so -- at the same time -KT: She was already here by then huh? BC: Yeah, we were in college at the same time. She's I think one year behind me. KT: Okay. BC: But so really, at the same time, they really -- they were very nurturing of a lot of music in town, and regionally, but they -- both Carrie and me, I feel like they really took us under their wing and sort of -- I mean I think -- and I can't speak for Carrie, but for sure for me, like taught me how to be in a band. KT: What does that mean? BC: Well, to -- I guess I shed any kind of slacker ideology that I may have been unconsciously attached to, and like they wanted to practice, and they wanted to work on the song, get it really good, and were good at communicating and being honest with one another about -- and being professional. So, that was -- I mean that was just invaluable to me. I feel like they were like big brothers to me in that way. And then I got a lot of shows out of it, and they helped me make a record. That was a big factor for me personally, and I think for Carrie and for some other folks, too. KT: Well, I was wondering about that. What are the ups and downs of being in a band as opposed to pulling together musicians to play your stuff, to being basically a front man with -- do you have one preference over the other? I mean your recordings come out as -- I mean they're under your name generally, right? BC: Yeah. I think I've really always -- I've had a few experiences in groups that I �Bill Carson 29 feel like were really a group, and they have been the most fun. I think that in my experience, both as the front man and as an accompanist, I think that when it's a -- when one person is writing the songs, it's always -- I mean it's not always, but I feel like it's most likely going to be that person and the hired band, even if that hired band plays with them every night for a year, it's still kind of a hired band. And if they're your friends and all that stuff, it's still like you're still kind of on your own. So, I love playing in an ensemble that 's really a group, and I've had a few experiences like that, which have been -- which are my favorite musical experiences, I really feel like it's an egalitarian sort of -like it's a group, yeah. KT: Mm-hmm. BC: I play in a Cuban band now that sort of feels like that. It's for several years, but -KT: So, if you could find a situation where you had people -- where you're all in sync, your preference would be to be part of a band with a larger -- with a group identity. BC: Yeah, and so I have a trio with Ron Wiltrout and Nathan Koci, called The Opposite of a Train. And we've made one and a half records, and we've -- it's been sort of sporadic. We've gone on a couple tours and stuff like that, but it still really feels like a group, like it's definitely -- there's no leader in that group. There's three leaders in that group, and that's -KT: I'm familiar -- Ron as a percussionist is such a strong presence, you know, and I've seen him with the jazz orchestras, really brilliant. BC: Yeah, he's a smart fellow, yeah. I love that, and I think especially over -- I think my drive to sort of -- what I said, like experiment as a band leader, as a singer, I �Bill Carson 30 think I still enjoy it to some extent. I like singing, but it's not -- I'm not like super driven to do that anymore. It's just a little arc in life. KT: Tell me about your first out of town show. I mean is that -- can you remember -- where did you go and who were you with, or what were the circumstances around that? BC: You know what, I don't even --I don't even know. KT: I'm assuming -- I'm just guessing like a Columbia or a -- maybe a Chapel Hill show? BC: You know, honestly, I couldn't tell you where the first time. I mean unfortunately, I actually don't know. So, when I was playing with these guys from Jump Little Children, they took me a couple times on tour with them, and so I would open, and they would -- then they would play. KT: Where were those shows, like how far would you travel? BC: Those were -- we played like in -- I mean the nice thing -- they were already - they were successful and they had fans all over, so we played in nice rooms in Nashville and Atlanta, and we played at the Cat's Cradle, and the other theater type place that's near there, that's near the Cradle. KT: Oh, theater in Raleigh? BC: No, it's in Carrboro. KT: And it's a theater? BC: Yeah, I feel like it's maybe in that same strip as the Cradle. KT: I think I know -- I think it's like the Performing Arts Center, right, the Carrboro Performing Arts Center? �Bill Carson 31 BC: It's got sort of a generic -- maybe that’s it, yeah. KT: Oh, that's a -- yeah, it's a very nice -- it's a good space. BC: And then I guess -- and then in the Northeast, too. KT: Okay, so what -- do you have any kind of like road stories? Is that difficult? I mean were you piling into a van? How were you getting around? BC: They had a -- well, they called it the park and fly because the first one that they had was from -- was a retired shuttle bus that said park and fly on it, with bunks, and a trailer with all the gear behind it. KT: Really, that's not bad. BC: But that was like a couple upgrades from -- yeah, so I kind of snuck in up a level like that. And beside -- and really all the touring that I've done has been -- has really been like weekend warrior sort of trips, where you are piled into a little car, but you're only going for like four days. I've never toured for more than a couple weeks at a time. KT: Do you have a live moment that stands out among others as just being like -you know, this was a real high, whether it was a particular show or -BC: Well, a few years ago, The Opposite of a Train, that trio, we -- Mark Sloan at the Halsey Institute at the college -- I've done some work for them. I write music for a lot of their video projects, and he asked me to direct a show that was produced by the Halsey, and so it was that trio, we expanded it into a larger ensemble, and then we had several singers from town guest with us. Lindsey, Carrie and Mike, Joe Hamilton, a couple others, and I had total control over -- artistic freedom. And it was a mix of some of the instrumental stuff that that trio does and sort of rearrangements of some of those singers' original tunes, and some other things. And it was just -- I feel like that was the �Bill Carson 32 most creatively successful show that I've worked on. And we're doing it -- this coming -it was on Groundhog Day, and so this coming Groundhog Day we'll have -- we're doing another concert like it. KT: Oh, fantastic, at the Halsey? BC: At the Music Hall. KT: Oh, terrific. BC: Yeah, the first one was at Memminger Auditorium, yeah. KT: Okay. BC: But perhaps you meant as an audience member, or did you mean as a performer? KT: Well, I was thinking more as a performer. How did you become involved -aware of this Johns Island project, and how did that all come about? Say a little bit more about that. BC: So, I had -- I guess through -- well, I was interested in -- I had been interested in folk music of different traditions, American music, and Southern music in particular. So, I was always -- I loved finding out about that kind of stuff, but then I -- but I didn't know much about the music of -- well, I guess anyway, at the library, I stumbled across this record, this Folkways record, Been in the Storm So Long. Yeah, so -- and listened to it, and it just knocked my socks off. Musically and also that -- this music was made like three miles from where I grew up, right? KT: Right. BC: I went to school with kids with some of these last names. KT: Yep. �Bill Carson 33 BC: And some of these people performed at Newport, like in the early 60s, and I had no idea about it. KT: Kids are completely divorced from the richness of that history, even African American kids growing up on Johns Island today. BC: For sure, yeah. I mean that just, in a few different ways, just kind of blew me away. So, I guess not long after that, I got -- a friend forwarded some information for a grant that was coming up, and I had never applied for funding for anything, but I was thinking like that I wanted to do something, like what could I do that's related to this? And so, I collaborated with a photographer, and we thought -- well, this is sort of a portrait of -- it's pretty representational of the island in the late 60s, but now that place is so different, right. So, what if we sort of follow this model, but document what it sounds like now. In retrospect, it's sort of naïve outset of the project, but it was a great learning experience. So, we got a little money, and I got some field recording gear, and we just met people, and plenty of people I knew already. KT: Were most people pretty -- were you able to reconnect with anyone who had been connected to the Carawand’s project? BC: Yeah, so then -- so again, many of those recordings were made at Moving Star Hall. Well, I can't remember the order that all this happened in, but I found out that - you know the Hot Spot Record Store on King Street? KT: Mm-hmm. BC: So, I found out -- I had worked at that point, for ten years about six doors up from the Hot Spot, and I had like gone in there to buy a Coke, you know. And I found out �Bill Carson 34 that that was Esau Jenkins' son. KT: Right. BC: And then I'm like wow, there's all this right in front of me that I just never knew about. And so, I started to talking to James Jenkins. KT: Who I think also had -- he had his own group, right, like a soul kind of thing? BC: Yeah, and he -KT: I've talked to him a little bit about that. BC: He insists that he doesn't have any recordings of them. KT: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I tried that angle, too. BC: So, he said, "You've got to talk to Wyetta." I said, "Okay." The church at this point was in the basement of the Karpeles Manuscript Museum on -KT: Yeah, yeah. BC: And that's his niece, so I go in there and ask for Wyetta, which was a sort of funny exchange because apparently Wyetta -- only family members call her Wyetta, so when I showed up at the door, she didn't answer the door. Someone else answered the door and they're asking for -KT: And they have no idea who you're asking for. BC: Yeah. Well, no they did, but they're like, "Why are you calling her Wyetta?" I'm clearly not family. Anyway, so she is the -- is the steward of Moving Star Hall, which I didn't know that it even was still there. KT: Yeah, yeah. BC: So, I started talking to her, and we decided to hold a concert there. So, at that point, I had recorded some stuff, and we -- and so we hosted a concert there -- free �Bill Carson 35 outdoor concert with sort of a broad representation of this kind of stuff I had recorded out on the island. It was really fun, including -- so, at that point, there was one person from the Moving Star Hall Singers who was still alive, but in a nursing home, and I was not able to meet her. But the hall was closely connected to Wesley United Methodist Church, and so I did visit there. I mean I visited there several times, and have gotten to know the singers there, and I've involved them in a few projects. But that's it, yeah. KT: But then you also recorded some Norteño music as well? BC: Yeah, so that was part of the -KT: Part of this effort to be contemporary and inclusive. BC: Right, and we recorded some teenage hardcore metal band, and then just like some songwriters on the island, like Carrie and Mike. KT: Have you thought of -- I mean is that something you could release as something? BC: Yeah, and I feel like it's just so incomplete, and I mean I'm sure you feel like this all the time with any sort of project like that that you start doing. It's like see what it could be, you know, and how much there is out there. KT: And I was wondering does Candie Carawand know -- she's aware of your project, right? BC: Yeah, yeah, I've -KT: Because I know that they've been -- I don't think Guy [Carawand]so much anymore, but I think Candie visits periodically. BC: She sounded like she hadn't been in some time. KT: In a while, okay. �Bill Carson 36 BC: But we've emailed a bit, and yeah, she was really supportive. KT: I'm sure -- I'm sure they would be. Yeah, well, that's fantastic. BC: So, I actually would -- at time point, I mean we made a website with some portraits. KT: Yeah, I looked at that. BC: Just a little bit of stuff on there, but -- and for a while, I was looking for support -- and Mark Sloan at the college was really helping to try to get -- to turn it into like a book or something -- a book and a CD or something. But at some point it just -- it was -- it felt -- it was too big of a project for me without -- without -- as an outsider, to -KT: Just with everything else you've got going on? BC: Yeah, and then maybe -- you know, I'm just like a guy with a tape recorder, you know. I mean like if I were at the -KT: Well, what you captured I think is just fantastic, and the photographs are wonderful. BC: What I'd like to do is just -- at the least, is to ensure that that stuff ends up in an archive. KT: Well, and we can talk about that because I think there would be some real -have you -- there's a number of unreleased Carawand tapes that are down at the Avery Center. BC: Oh, really, oh. Oh, from Charleston? KT: Yeah, they deposited them down at Avery, and I don't think -- whether they have copies with them at Highlander, I don't know because Highlander has its own archive. But I think they may be -- it might be unique material, and it's -- I think they're in �Bill Carson 37 the process of doing some things with those. BC: I mean every minute of that stuff is like spellbinding to me. KT: Yeah, yeah. BC: The games -KT: Mm-hmm, yeah, so important. Tell me -- like are there -- in terms of -- just thinking back on -- do you have a sense of -- over the -- since 1994, say, do you have a sense of like a kind of ebb and flow to the local music scene? Do you think it's been fairly sort of consistent in terms of its -- I don't know, dynamism, or broader public interest? I'm just curious as to -BC: Yeah, I feel like -- I mean and it's hard to say whether it's just my awareness of it, or whether it's the real change, but to me, there -- I feel like in the -- well, more recently, I feel like in the early to -- the middle of the last decade, I feel like there was a great -- there was a loss of sorts of the kinds of music that was being made here, and just -KT: '05 -- circa '05? Mm-hmm. BC: Yeah, and later maybe. I mean that's probably also - maybe -- that may have been a height of my awareness of what was going on, you know, but I feel like suddenly a lot of creativity and a lot of different kinds of music, and a lot of cross-pollination with -- there was a crop of jazz musicians at the college, who were playing all kinds of stuff but jazz, and there were some really -- some untrained musicians making like really creative stuff. KT: Really. BC: And all of them playing together, and I feel like -- I mean to some extent, that �Bill Carson 38 follows -- I mean it's hard to -- the course of technology has sort of -- it's probably a similar story in a lot of places. Around that time, suddenly, it's like you can hear music from anywhere, and you -- and anybody can record music for next to nothing. KT: Yeah. BC: So, that democratization is -KT: But since that period, you think -- I mean things have sort of slowed? BC: No, I don't think so, but I do -- I mean admittedly in the past -- in the past few years, I'm just a little -- I'm just become a bit more domesticated, and I'm a little out of the loop. KT: You only go to the shows that you're playing, huh? BC: Sometimes I feel like that. It's not entirely true, but I -- especially now, working at an elementary school, I got to wake up at 5:30 every day, so -KT: Oh, my God. BC: And I think another change that I've noticed is maybe around that time, compared to when I was -- say, when I was in college, and when I was starting out playing in a lot of bands, is there were a lot more women involved in the rock -- I mean I'm using rock as like -- broadly, rock and experimental kind of stuff. I feel like when I was starting to be part of that scene in Charleston, there was Carrie. We played together a lot, and I'm sure there were other women, too, but I feel like not as many. That's been a nice change. And I think that -- well, it also, I think just follows the -- I think what I've seen as a trend in whatever you call it, college rock, whatever, compared to in the 90s when it was -- like we were saying, like if you were really into it, then you nodded your head. Now they're like -- there are bands who play and people dance, like I go to shows �Bill Carson 39 and people dance, and they're wacky and stuff. KT: Which I'm sure is the purpose of your Cuban group, right, I mean -BC: Totally, yeah, yeah. KT: It's a dance band. BC: It's a dance band, yeah. So, that's refreshing. KT: Mm-hmm, the return to dance. BC: Yeah, or the return to, I think, just like fun in music. I don't know. I mean the bands that you only nod your head to, they were fun, too. KT: Is there -- in thinking about Charleston of the last twenty years, is there something that you think kind of -- for you that characterizes the scene, that makes it -- is there anything distinctly Charleston about the local music scene? BC: I don't really know. I mean -- well, it's hard to say because I feel like it's been my only experience. It's like kind of describing your family or something. KT: But we could say something about like Chapel Hill and what, the late 80s, early 90s, we could say something about Athens in the kind of pre-murmur REM. There was a particular sort of sound, but is that even -- is that possible with Charleston over the last twenty years, or has one sound tended to predominate over other kinds of trends? BC: Not a sound that I have recognized, but what I hear from people who -people from elsewhere, or people who have -- live her now, but used to play music elsewhere, over and over again, over the years, is how refreshing it is that the artists are so mutually supportive, and that apparently it's not like that everywhere. I don't know how true that is, but I hear that as a defining -- as a defining characteristic of music in Charleston, that -- you know, people saying, "Wow, you mean you play guitar in his �Bill Carson 40 band, too, and you like those guys," and you play -- you know, that sort of thing. KT: Yeah, yeah. BC: So, I don't know. I mean I'd like to think that, I like to see that. That's definitely been what has made -- that's what's made it really fun for me. I've had the fortune to play in a lot of different kinds of bands, and play with really great jazz musicians and classical musicians, and like totally untrained noise makers, and totally like naïve songwriters, and different combinations of all that. That's wonderful. So, I feel like it -KT: Any accounting for that? I mean what -- if Charleston is distinct in that regard, what do we make of that? BC: I don't know. I don't know -- I can't imagine it's that distinct in that regard, but I don't know, maybe it's the -- maybe it's just the right size. I don't know. I don't know, I'd like to hear some more insight on that. Yeah, I don't know, do you hear a sound? KT: No, but I don't know that I would hear a sound today in Athens, or today in Chicago or Seattle. I think it's -BC: Well, are some of them -- is some of that -KT: Maybe a certain label can have an impact on that, but beyond that, I don't know that you -- do we have distinct sort of regional sounds that are emerging, at least when we're talking about kind of white, rock, pop? BC: Right. KT: I suppose you still do get -- I think probably you do have kind of rap and hiphop sounds that are still regionally distinct. �Bill Carson 41 BC: Oh, right, yeah. KT: I think I'm safe in saying that. BC: I think that's -- yeah, I think that's true. KT: But I don't know that -- on the white side of the equation, you still get a -and some of that, I just -- I've not thought a lot about this, but I guess it's this question of accessibility that -- I'm just amazed by my students' musical libraries because in six hours, they're able to assemble a library that took me my adult life to try to figure out who these different artists are, and to locate the-- but they have immediate access to all kinds of -- more information than they can handle. So, I think in some ways, that break -I think what that does to -- it's a -- I guess it's a threat to regional distinctiveness. BC: It's sort of like what happened -- maybe analogous to what happened with radio a century ago. KT: Mm-hmm. BC: Just sort of on a different scale. KT: Yeah, yeah. BC: So, where do we go, like the -- the Lomaxes went to prisons hoping that those people didn't listen to the radio. KT: Well, like you're sort of -- your response it so like, you know, turn to home, is to rediscover Johns Island traditions. I think that's really interesting and healthy, and an important work. BC: Yeah, I mean I think it's definitely -- it's compelling you know, just because it's right here, you know, and there's so much to find right here, but I think wherever you are or whatever you look at, yeah. �Bill Carson 42 KT: Tell me, is there anything that we touched on that you wanted to elaborate upon, or is there any -- like some part of your life, either musical or otherwise that I just - I haven't even asked the question? BC: I don't know. We've actually uncorked a couple of things I'd forgotten about. I guess -- I mean there are like details of places and artists that I guess I didn't really talk about, but I guess -KT: In terms of like tracing this kind of genealogy in the community you mean? BC: Yeah, you know, and -- yeah, I don't know how important that stuff is. KT: Well, it is, and maybe one possibility is that once we get the transcript back, we can also add -- I mean we can do this again, if we think that there's -- identify themes that are kind of worth spinning out. The other thing that we could do is -- and I think this might be good in that regard, is just if I could get you to maybe pull together just kind of a couple-page sort of addendum, which would just lay out a few things in paper, just basic -- just things that you pull from memory, you know, who were the important musicians, who were important -- what were important venues, and that kind of thing, and then when we -- all of that can be included as part of this oral history package, but that might be the way to handle that. And then you also said you have some suggestions for me of people to talk to, so we can -- we'll use that as sort of a map to begin to fill out this larger picture. BC: Okay, yeah, it sounds good. KT: But thank you for -- I have no idea what time it is, but -BC: It's quarter to six. KT: You're probably -- you need to get ready to teach tomorrow pretty soon. �Bill Carson 43 BC: Yeah, they're long days, but I think my wife's making dinner tonight, so -KT: Yeah, but thank you for subjecting yourself to this. BC: Absolutely, thank you, it's fun, go down memory lane. KT: Yeah, great. End of recording. ML October 17, 2016 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource The oral histories in this collection were produced by The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel. Founded in 2008, The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel seeks to deepen understanding of the Lowcountry’s rich history and culture through the gathering and presentation of recorded memories from area residents.<br /><h3>Search Tips</h3> Interviews may be browsed by scrolling to the bottom of this page and selecting "View all items".<br /><br />When using the search bar, we recommend putting quotations around your search term, and selecting the Boolean search option, as illustrated here:<br /><p><img src="https://gdurl.com/aYPj" alt="aYPj" /><br /><br />To view interviews of a specific theme, please see the search tips in each series below.</p> <h3><strong>The Citadel in War and in Peace<br /></strong></h3> With generous support from the <a href="http://www.schumanities.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Humanities Council of South Carolina</a>, The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel collected thirty interviews with Citadel alumni regarding their experiences during WWII. Journalist and historian Jack Bass conducted the interviews during the Fall of 2008.They serve as a powerful testament to the veterans' experiences and their critical contributions to the war effort.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:</em><br /><ul><li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- World War II"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- Korean War"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- Vietnam War"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- The Second Gulf War"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- The War in Afghanistan"</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Working Charleston</strong></h3> Working Charleston documents the on and off job experiences of the longshoremen and lawyers, the bartenders and carriage drivers, hospital aides and high tech workers who make Charleston among the nation's prime tourist destinations and vital centers of global trade.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:</em><br /><ul><li>"Working Charleston"</li> <li>"Charleston City Workers"</li> <li>"Lowcountry Foodways"</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Charleston and the Long Civil Rights Movement</strong></h3> <span><span>These interviews explore how community activism continues to shape modern life in the South.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:</em><br /></span></span> <ul><li>"Charleston and the Long Civil Rights Movement</li> <li>"Civil rights movement--South Carolina"</li> <li>"African Americans--Civil Rights--South Carolina--Charleston"</li> </ul><a target="_blank" href="https://citadeldigitalarchives.omeka.net/items/show/193" rel="noreferrer noopener"></a> <h3><strong>Las Voces del Lowcountry</strong></h3> <span><span>This project is designed to raise the profile of the Hispanic/Latinos who call the Lowcountry home and to promote a rational and humane conversation regarding immigration, education, and employment policies.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:<br /></em></span></span> <ul><li>"Las Voces del Lowcountry"</li> <li>"Latin Americans--Southern States"</li> <li>"Hispanic Americans--Southern States"</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Women in World War II</strong></h3> <em>*To search this series, type "Women in World War II" into the search bar, using the Boolean search option.<br /></em> <ul><li>"Women in World War II"</li> <li>"Women--Employment History"</li> <li>"World War, 1939-1945--Participation, female"</li> </ul> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Kieran Walsh Taylor Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Bill Carlson Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 1 hour, 46 minutes Location The location of the interview Charleston, South Carolina Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral History of Bill Carson, interviewed by Kieran Walsh Taylor, 4 September, 2013 Subject The topic of the resource Music--Social aspects Musicians--Training of Musicians Description An account of the resource Bill Carson was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in October of 1976, and when he was ten years old his family relocated to James Island, South Carolina. It was around this time that Carson become interested in playing guitar. Carson talks about his formative years, the music that inspired him, and the people who supported him. He reminices how the Jump Little Children’s band members trained and nurtured him and describes them as being “like big brothers” to him and many other young local musicians. Despite participation in a band during his senior year of high school, Carson did not have plans to pursue a music career, and enrolled at the College of Charleston to study philosophy and art. After graduation, Carson began work in a glass shop, but continued playing in different bands in his free time. He remembers his first show, an opening for the band The Groovy Cools which drew a laughably small audience, and his first serious show with a band called Bud Collins. Carson recalls some of his best experiences playing in an ensemble, especially his participation in the Groundhog Concert Day at the Halsey Institute, which brought many of his favorite local musicians together. When asked whether he thought Charleston had a special sound, he stated that he considered Charleston to be special due to its sense of community. Carson recalls the instrumental trio he formed with Ron Wiltrout and Nathan Koci, known as The Opposite of Train, and his 2011 project to document indigenous music on Johns Island. Today, Carson is known for a vast career that includes writing, recording, and performing music, as well as for his collaborative projects and commissioned productions. He also finds time to be a full time elementary school teacher in his community.<br /><br /><h3><a href="http://lcdl.library.cofc.edu/lcdl/catalog/lcdl:142282" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"><strong>Listen to the audio on the Lowcountry Digital Library.</strong></a></h3> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available The Citadel Archives & Museum Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2013-09-04 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Materials in The Citadel Archives & Museum Digital Collections are intended for educational and research use. The user assumes all responsibility for identifying and satisfying any claimants of copyright. For more information contact The Citadel Archives & Museum, The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina, 29409. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context https://citadeldigitalarchives.omeka.net/items/show/442 Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Working Charleston Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Charleston (S.C.) https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/39779/archive/files/ea2eeb13a4a884db3b264e50d0305fa9.pdf?Expires=1777507200&Signature=isUx5ZsAVQhykqPyQQdh1cSE16DIxK-VnjFBTh73rb-taulAnpMqVn6MMIvmPgR5hL45WzbWQLTXUGAED%7ECEU0CJR47JqfOEE-zuXBc21jkdzq1%7ESeR98Gmoud27tFKfneFpyTDC7TC6wHEIhxR5XQzRGJZtsHX4J8o8iH4Of15qmpViYzKBCZl0AE94%7E5wRaETp7nb4yhK25r9NjehVsFQ%7Er%7Ed5p9IMdem6rmgfLdobf8nHqLPN9uF5LrRT4bGHNfj0-7A-sIrjqgaRRfQvlJBfZXpcm9xLH87JcTGEVJcXutwqS9hQezbWIRLS3qA6Uuofk%7EA%7EpmQBTJ6a7ajpBA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM b3b7e75472d36875d9c71f061ea72c23 PDF Text Text 1 TRANSCRIPT – LINDSAY HOLLER Interviewee: LINDSAY HOLLER Interviewer: KERRY TAYLOR Interview Date: March 30, 2013 Location: Charleston, South Carolina Length: 119 minutes LINDSAY HOLLER: Looks like an alarm clock. KERRY TAYLOR: Do what? LH: Looks like an alarm clock. KT: Do you have a portable digital equipment that you use, or you use a Zoom or anything? LH: No. No, I really don’t have a lot of recording equipment. I’m not a gear head. KT: Yeah, that’s good. Let others lug it around. LH: Yeah, I mean I lug around other people’s stuff, but I have no compelling desire to collect more stuff. KT: What about you have an idea and you play three chords, and you want to remember then, what do you do? LH: This is me adapting to technology. I use my iPhone now. KT: Okay, which is perfect. LH: It was funny, that was one of the things that prompted me to go ahead and make the change to that type of phone. I thought, oh, that’s too much. I don’t really like the phone to begin with. Then I thought about all these other things that came along you know, and that kind of thing. It’s come in handy with rehearsals, when you’re in a �2 rehearsal and you come up with an idea. And sometimes it’s really hard to either maintain that or remember it later, so that voice memo is such an easy little gadget. KT: Is it a Belkin attachment, the mike that you put on, or no, it goes right into it. LH: I mean I’m not going for quality. I’m definitely just getting like a little glimpse of whatever. KT: The quality is actually probably pretty good. I just had an earlier version of an iPod once, and now it’s probably all built right in. There’s a condenser, I’d imagine. LH: Not bad, but yeah, it’s worked out, and we’ve had to play back before in a rehearsal, and say oh, that’s it, good thing we got that down. It’s huge. KT: What’s your first musical memory? LH: I feel like I blocked out a lot. I remember trying to work my dad’s stereo system when I was younger, to listen to music. And it was kind of complicated, and it was in some sort of thing with a glass door and it always felt dangerous, like I don’t know if I’m allowed in here, but I wanted to work with tapes because I was a little nervous about records. I thought I’d scratch it or something like that. But that was kind of my first memory, and I remember exactly where in my living room, everything was situated. I’d just kind of sit there and listen to what I wanted to hear. But as far as performing goes, I guess my first singing experiences were in church. Yeah, probably. KT: Tell me where and when were you born, and what church? LH: I was actually born here in Charleston. I’m from Moncks Corner, or if you want to get even more specific, Pinopolis--a tiny, tiny little community. And I was born in Charleston September 11, 1976. And yeah, I grew up my whole life in the same town, there was no moving or anything like that, which was I guess kind of nice. I didn't have �3 to deal with that kind of issue. And I was raised Presbyterian. KT: Okay, so family been in Pinopolis a long time? LH: My mother’s side had been in the Moncks Corner area for a long time, and my dad grew up in Columbia and kind of Myrtle Beach. Those were like his primary areas where he grew up. We were all local as far as the state goes, definitely within the south. But my mom’s side of the family was more over there in Moncks Corner. So, that was good for her, yeah. KT: Do you know how they met? LH: Oh, wow, I want to say it might have been a blind date. Both by parents had been previously married, so they had been divorced from their first spouses. And my mom had had my two brothers. So, I think it was kind of cool that my dad you know, was like, you know, didn't faze him about other children or anything like that. But I think it was a blind date if I recall. And my mom had just moved back to Moncks Corner, and my dad, I think he’d moved there to start a law practice. So, they were just kind of settling down their roots there, and I think they met as friends. KT: And the church was important to the family? LH: You know, it was. Most Sundays, we would go to church, and you know, we would say grace during formal meals and that kind of thing. I mean religion wasn’t as prevalent as it could have been. At least with my mother, the older she got, the more important that became to her. But I mean you know, we went to church on Sundays, and my brothers and I probably complained about it, having to get dressed up, do all that kind of stuff. KT: But it gave you the opportunity to sing. �4 LH: It did. Well, I could sing. I’ve always been able to. I can’t remember the first time I ever tried. It was just something I’ve always been able to do. My family has always been very supportive of it. And I don’t come from a musical family. At least my immediate family. I’ve got an aunt and you know, some other people that are musically inclined, but nobody in my family immediately can do anything musically. And they were always encouraging me very strenuously, you know, you can sing. You need to go sing. Go do the choir. I was like okay. KT: I mean you must inherit somebody’s voice because it’s very distinct--even your talking voice is so distinctive. LH: Yeah. I think my dad said on his side, there’s an aunt or somebody who was an opera singer, or a cousin, like a third cousin, something like that, so there’s some music I guess, a couple of steps away. And with my mom’s side of the family, they were all concentrated in the Moncks Corner area, more of a rural south area. And they, from what I understand were really into stringed instruments, guitars, banjoes, mandolins, that kind of thing. And it was frustrating because I realized the older I got and the more interested I became in that, I said well, where are all these instruments now? Where have they gone, because those people are long gone, and I don’t ever remember seeing any of them. So, I wonder if, you know, somebody’s got an attic full of just amazing stuff somewhere, possibly. That was way before I was born, so I was never around that. I just heard stories about that. Now I’ve got an aunt who is a very good piano player, and it’s very interesting because she’s in her late eighties or early nineties, and she just plays by ear primarily. Although, she’ll have sheet music up, she claims she can’t read it. And she �5 almost approaches the piano as a jazz musician. She’s got her independent base line going with her left hand, and she’s doing all kinds of things up here. KT: That’s interesting. LH: She always disregards her talent. She’s like, “Oh, I can’t play.” And I think, you actually are doing something pretty amazing, that a lot of people could never do, generate just kind of a dialogue without really sticking to what’s in front of you. It was funny because she’d always wear these long fake fingernails, and so they would tap. So there was an accompanying tap that was not necessarily in the rhythm, it was just amazing. KT: Her own percussion, huh? LH: Yeah, a really weird auxiliary percussion, her independent charm right there, but she would never acknowledge that she had any kind of talent really. She just enjoyed doing it. KT: What did you listen to as a child? LH: First of all, from my parents. I remember my mom really liked Anne Murray. I had to hear a lot of that. You know, they did okay with the music. I think there was some Motown, and maybe some beach music. I didn't have some spectacular musical epiphany listening to my parents’ collection. KT: So, it sounds like they’re listening to what I might expect a family from Moncks Corner to listen to, just American pop, a little bit of regional beach music. LH: Nothing earth shattering, and my musical taste really started to develop when I was in middle school and high school and all that, I was right there with everybody else, as far as whatever anybody was listening to. I have two older brothers, and the middle �6 one, who I was really close with, or still am, he started trickling down his music to me. And that’s where my taste really started to form and I started to make an effort to go out and seek stuff out, which was probably in high school, I guess. I was a little late to the game I guess. KT: And he was listening to what? LH: He loved the Black Crows, loved them. And got me onto them for a long time. And he also checked out other stuff, but that was a really big thing with him. This is something I always loved to talk about with people, especially in defense of musicians playing covers. I mean I loved to write songs, and that’s an important part to me, but I’ve discovered so much good music through the covers that bands choose, that I like, and I investigate. And the Black Crows really did a huge favor to me by turning me on to Gram Parsons. That’s how I first discovered Gram Parsons, is they would cover a lot of his songs. And they also covered Nick Drake. KT: I didn't know that. Did they ever record any of that, or was that just in live shows? LH: It was in live stuff, and I mean via my brother, we would get in deep to live shows, B-Sides, all kinds of hidden little gems. And Rich Robinson, the guitar playing side of those brothers, he was really into Nick Drake because of the open tunings. He used a lot of open tunings after Keith Richards. So I think like that Nick Drake stuff came up a lot in sound checks and reference points in interviews, and that kind of thing, were like oh, his melodies or whatever . But it led me to go check out Nick Drake, and he’s amazing. KT: So, Nick Drake as a high schooler, or not as a middle schooler. �7 LH: No, that was high school, and that was probably like towards the end of high school. Middle school, I was--you know, whatever was going on. KT: A middle schooler. LH: Yeah, totally. KT: But you didn't sing in like school performances, I mean were you recognized for your voice? LH: In high school, definitely. In middle school, the thing that kind of threw me, because of course, I mean elementary school, you’re not doing a whole lot of stuff. I mean I did whatever any class was required to do. In middle school, my school didn't have a choir. They had a band. There was no singing opportunity in middle school, so I took up the flute. I didn't particularly care for it that much, but I thought it looks easy to carry, why not? I was okay at it. I mean I could get a pretty good tone out of it. Never got to first chair. I got to second quite a bit. I was limited to opportunities. There weren’t a whole lot of opportunities in Moncks Corner, and I wasn’t traveling yet to Charleston to do anything. I just kind of went with that as a musical outlet, and I also took piano lessons. Yeah, my parents started me on that at a very young age. I was lessoned out. I had dance lessons, piano lessons, yeah. And actually, I did a lot of dancing as a younger child. I think they started me going at five, and those are interesting memories. I really just remember costumes more than anything else. And we even had some of our recitals at the Gaillard, which I keep thinking why? Why were we in such a big room? I need to sit down with my mother one day and try to fit the pieces together. KT: Someone had a connection or something? �8 LH: It wasn’t that big of a deal. I don’t know, like a program, a dance program. And they had several classes, and that’s just where they would hold their annual recital, or biannual recital. And my mom loves to tell the story about how we were off to the side getting ready, and she asked me if I was nervous, and I said, “What is nervous?” You know, and so she thinks oh, you’re ready to go. I just didn't know what words meant at that point. I was too young. What do you mean, what is that? So singing didn't really take off for me until I got to high school. And our high school had a pretty substantial choir, chorus situation. KT: This is which high school now? LH: Berkeley. Went to Berkeley Middle, Berkeley High, Berklee College of Music, which was strange. I was going on a Berkeley track, you know, all over the country. But yeah, high school, I really got to get more in-depth with singing. I kind of put the flute down. I started taking lessons, which was a big deal for me. KT: Voice lessons? LH: Yeah. There was a woman in Charleston, my high school choir director, chorus director. My parents approached him and said, “We want to get her lessons. Who do you recommend?” So, he gave my parents some names. And first we tried a lady in Summerville, and it was okay. She was more of music theater. That was definitely more of her thing than singing. And I really wasn’t into theater that much, that aspect of it really didn't appeal to me. She sent me on one audition, and it just terrified me. I thought oh, my God, this is not for me. I don’t even want to be in the theater, you know, I just want to sing. So, we tried another name that was given to my parents, and her name was June �9 Bonner. And she was amazing. She kind of put me on a path. She taught her lessons outside of the Dock Street. And she was a retired opera singer, had done a lot of stuff up in New York, that’s what she did was she taught singing. I mean like she would encourage you if you wanted to go do musical theater, but that was what she did. So, I would go there once a week, I guess it was probably an hour. And she was great. She was just such a strong lady. And she took me on my first trip to New York when I was 13. No, I might have been younger than that. No, I guess I was like 13, and one of her other students, Quiana Parler, was ten--real young. Do you Quiana? KT: No, no. LH: She’s a local jazz singer, jazz and R&B, amazing--she’s been on American Idol and done a lot of stuff. So, June took Quiana, myself and one other girl to New York for a long weekend. We were going to go see a Broadway show, and she’s like, “We’re going to go to this Italian restaurant, and just do the whole New York thing.” And it was amazing, you know, we just had a ball. KT: I bet. LH: Yeah, went and saw Jelly’s Last Jam, which had Gregory Hines and Phylicia Rashad. And I kept thinking that is not Mrs. Cosby because she was a siren. So, when I got back, I kind of fell in love with New York a little bit, and I was like, oh, man, that’s where I want to go. And my parents were not really happy about it, like what are you talking about? But yeah, my singing definitely took off in high school. KT: But do you remember a moment when either somebody told you that you were different, or that you realized, “I have a gift here?” LH: It probably would have been in high school. I mean I always knew I could �10 carry a tune. I mean I could hear that I was in pitch. KT: Harmonize. LH: Yeah. Well, I probably hadn’t messed around with harmonizing that much. It had just been more of kind of getting a hold of my voice and learning what it could do. And that was something that June Bonner really worked with me, was like getting control, doing the fundamental things, like breathing and all the stuff that’s boring. I want to come in and sing songs. Well, you’ve got to do other stuff. And that other stuff has contributed countlessly later, you know, and I can never thank her enough for that. KT: I can imagine yeah, that it sustains you. LH: Yeah. I mean I’ve got a lot of control over my voice, and that’s something that a lot of people comment on, and that was developed then with her. And just also, when it was time for me to pick a college, I had some really, really great choices. I was really lucky enough to have that, and she was very helpful with making the right choice, and yeah. KT: For guitar and songwriting, when does that start? LH: Didn’t start writing songs until real late. Probably after I’d left Berklee College, that’s where I really got exposed to people writing songs. I mean that wasn’t really happening a lot in Moncks Corner. I mean there were a couple people I knew that played instruments, but not a whole lot. There wasn’t like a band scene or anything like that. It’s such a small community. So I really didn't have any kind of experience around that. And then I got to Berklee, and just my mind was blown about possibilities and all this kind of stuff. And that’s where I started thinking about oh, maybe I can write songs. Maybe that’s �11 something I can do. And then guitar just seemed like an easier option than a piano, and I didn't have a piano, and it took me a long time to actually deal with a guitar. Like I had one sitting around for probably two years, that I would just kind of look at, and not put the time in. KT: But you didn't really start concentrating on the guitar till you were like say, nineteen? LH: Yeah, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, yeah. I was not in a rush to play it. It wasn’t some passion thing for me, like oh, give me the guitar. It’s a crutch kind of, a little bit, like I like to have something to do. It’s not something I’m just bullying people to let me do, like I want to play the guitar. That’ll never come out of my mouth. KT: So, when do you go off to Berklee? LH: Right out of high school. KT: So, that’s ’95? LH: ’94. KT: ’94, yeah. LH: Yep, I knew one person in Boston. KT: What was that like going from the small town to the big city? LH: Amazing. I was ready to go to college. I was ready to go to college, probably my sophomore year in high school. KT: Do you remember high school fondly? LH: It was kind of a drag, yeah. I mean I always felt like I thought differently than a lot of the people around me, and yeah, it wasn’t something I felt like oh, this is where I want to be. I’m going to live and die in high school. I was ready to go. �12 KT: So, you were ready to move on. LH: Yeah, and every college choice I had was pretty far away, I knew nobody in any of these choices. But yeah, I went straight from Moncks Corner to Boston, and it was just eye-opening, just a complete 180, not only the environment, I mean obviously with every eighteen-year-old, the freedom, you know, wow, I’m in Boston, and my parents aren’t anywhere. I’m in this extraordinarily prestigious music school, and everywhere I turn, there are just people playing music, you know, just like where am I? KT: Smart, amazing talented people, too, right? LH: Yeah, yeah, definitely. You know, I was okay with that. It wasn’t like pressure. It was like good, let’s do this. I lived in a dorm definitely. And it was right downtown in kind of the Back Bay area of Boston, and that was an interesting experience because it was a boy and girl dorm, like even with the floors. Like, you know, my neighbors were boys. And thankfully, my roommates were girls. And I had an interesting roommate situation. There was a girl named Rakia Diggs. And she was from New Jersey, like I think Orange, New Jersey, or somewhere just like really tough. And she was very conservative, like extraordinarily conservative. Then there was this girl named Cary, and she was from northern Maine, like above Bangor Northern Maine. It was just a crazy mix of people, and then I met some great friends there, and just got exposed to all kinds of stuff I never would have gotten exposed to anywhere else. It was so unbelievable. KT: Was that when you first started playing in a band? LH: No. KT: You didn't play in a band then? �13 LH: Mm-mmm. KT: I mean there must have been constant like pickup sessions. LH: Oh, there were, and I would go and sit and listen. I didn't participate. I’ve never felt the need to jump in. No, not even now. Even now, when I go see some friends play, and they’re like, “Hey, you want to come up and sing a song?” It makes me a little nervous. KT: Really? LH: Yeah, absolutely. I really enjoyed sitting back and just watching a rehearsal, and watching how people interact when you’re not doing a song, and the dynamics. And then I just enjoy watching people play, like that’s what I did primarily my whole year at Berklee. I mean I had my own individual lessons, but I’m not an in-your-face kind of person. Yeah, so I was just kind of absorbing everything, taking it all in. KT: I mean I don’t know. I would just imagine everybody’s like chipping in, that’s it’s almost like a hootenanny sort of spirit. LH: It is, and it was. KT: Or it could be, but you chose just to not worry about it. LH: That’s just kind of my natural inclination is to kind of hang back a little bit, and it weirds people out a lot. It does. They get offended a little bit. I’m like, “Look, it’s nothing personal, I don’t know.” Yeah, it’s weird. But I took in a lot, which was almost more helpful than just ah, look at me, I’m singing. I mean I really observed a lot, and I tried to expose myself to a lot of different style that I’d never come across. I went to my first--I don’t know if you would call it punk or hardcore show, or something ever, when I was up there with a friend of mine. And it was just eye-opening. I was like, “Yeah, let’s �14 go.” They didn't think I wanted to go, and I said, “Sure, I want to go check this out.” So, it was beneficial in that respect. KT: They were surprised that you wanted to come along because what, they identified you as a different sort of vocalist? LH: I was one of the southern girls? KT: So, what were you supposed to say? LH: Demure, I don’t know, stuff. Well, you know, I mean there were a lot of mix of backgrounds, geographically speaking, and just in general in almost every respect. I mean it wasn’t like a situation with College of Charleston, or USC or Clemson, where there are a lot of people you know going to the school, so you’ve already got built-in relationships. I mean we’re all coming from different places. And there are a lot of preconceived notions. Oh, she’s from some hick town in the south, she’s not going to dig a punk show. KT: Would they have thought of you as a country person? LH: No, in fact, I hated country music at that point. And I associated country music with Nashville pop. I had not discovered the difference. I was kind of more into jazz. KT: Okay, jazz vocalist. LH: If you were to ask me at that point what my singing style is, that would have been that. KT: Which still comes through, I think. LH: Yeah, yeah, it does. But the thing that I didn't like about Berklee is they kept trying to push me towards R&B. And I was really resistant to that, to the point where I’m �15 not coming back. I’m not going to pay this much money and you keep pigeonholing me in something I don’t want to do. KT: They do that with their students, huh, they really try to what, like market you? LH: Groom you, and you know. KT: It’s very professionally oriented in that sense? LH: Kind of. It’s funny, I had an instance at the College of Charleston, where I ended up graduating, where I had to sit down in front of some administrative people, general, and within the music department, and I said, “Look, I’ve had an opportunity to go to one of the most prestigious colleges of music in the country, and I finished my time out here, and I value my time here one hundred percent more than I ever would have if I’d finished out at Berklee.” Berklee, you meet a lot of people, you make a lot of contacts. You have a lot of great life experiences, I mean with the College of Charleston, I knew my professors were kind of invested in what I was doing. And they were giving me opportunities to come out in a real live situation and sing some songs, and do some stuff. I don’t know if I would have ever gotten that if I had stayed all the way through Berklee, you know. It was just kind of like a process dynamic, like here you are, you’re in the machine. You paid a lot of money to get here. Go through the steps and good luck on the way out. KT: Do you think that’s kind of what’s driving that because tuition is so high, they almost feel like obligated to make sure that you graduate with some marketable skills, or what? LH: I don’t know what their situation is. Now back when I was there, there was a �16 very alarming statistic, where seventy percent of their freshmen didn't come back. I don’t know if it’s the same way now because it’s almost twenty years, but that was a viable statistic, from what I understood. I mean from all the people that I know that I was there with that first year, I only know two or three that did finish the program and graduate. KT: How long did you stay? LH: A year. KT: Just a year, okay. LH: Yeah, I was one of those. KT: So, you came back to Charleston then in ‘95, and enrolled in C of C right away? LH: No, I hit a speed bump. I was pretty sure I didn't want to go back to Berklee. I’d come back to Charleston this summer after my first year, and was really trying to think about what I wanted to do and what my options were, and really wanting to concentrate on that jazz thing. So then I decided well, if I want to sing jazz, let me move to New Orleans, and I’m gonna enroll in the University of New Orleans. Why not? You know, that seemed like the best plan. And I had a cousin who lived in New Orleans at that time, so was enrolled. Flew down like a week early, and hung out and stayed with my cousin. And then I was going to go enroll in school, you know, get going. All my stuff was with me. So, we’re driving and his car catches on fire, completely, like in this huge eight lane situation. It was just horribly traumatic. I mean it was in flames, and we’re trying to move the car over, and just like, well, all right, most of my stuff’s burned. It was just like wow, this is--. KT: What? �17 LH: Yeah, it was awful. He was driving a Volkswagen square back, and the engine was in the back, and the engine caught on fire. KT: Oh, my God. LH: So, we regrouped, and I went back to his place that night, and was like, “All right, I’ll go back tomorrow and try to get settled in.” So, I went in and got moved in the dorm. It was a little weird. KT: Yeah, moving in a pile of like burnt metal. LH: Charred stuff. And I went to go register for classes, and they said, “Well, we didn't have as many students enroll in the vocal program as we wanted to, so we’re not doing that this year. You can either do jazz in another instrument, or you can do classical voice.” I was like, “Well, I didn't come to New Orleans to do classical voice, no way.” And I wasn’t proficient enough in another instrument to play jazz. I mean piano, I could do a ballad maybe. So I said, you know, I’m out of here. New Orleans is telling me something, you know. So, I came back to Charleston, and I didn't go back to school. I took four or five years off, got my first apartment, shared apartment here in Charleston, actually on St. Margaret Street. And this was back in ’95, ’96. KT: Uh-huh. LH: I was supporting myself. I was kind of on my own. My parents weren’t supporting me, and it was just kind of like doing that. And then um, in 1998, I had a friend from Berklee, a really good friend of mine, who was living in upstate New York, this town called New Paltz, and he said, “My roommate just moved out. Why don’t you come up here. You’re not doing anything in Charleston. Are you playing?” And I hadn’t been playing at all. I hadn’t sang that entire time probably. �18 KT: What about as a guitarist, are you developing at all? LH: Yeah, as a guitarist, I’m trying to get past the--get some calluses developed, you know, and just kind of get to the point where I could play for thirty minutes without giving up. Um, so I’m kind of doing that, but I’m definitely not performing. KT: You’re not playing with other people. LH: No. KT: Just noodling. LH: Yeah, just you know, hanging out by myself. So this friend of mine in New York, he was an active musician, like he was finishing up college, but he was definitely a song writer. He exposed me to a lot of song writing in Berklee. And he was trying to give me a little tough love. He’s like, you know, “You’re not doing anything down there. You need to whip it in shape, so why don’t you come up here.” So I moved up there in February of ’98, and kind of stayed in New Paltz. It was kind of tough. His name was Jeff, and Jeff was traveling and doing a lot of gigs and stuff, so he wasn’t around much, and it was a small town. I didn't really know anybody. KT: There’s a college there, right? LH: There is a college there, yeah. KT: One of the SUNYs maybe? LH: Yeah, one of the SUNYs. And my parents were kind of pressuring me to go back to school. They’re like, “You need to finish.” KT: Yeah, yeah. LH: So, in August, Jeff decided he was moving to Austin for music to take off, and I had to make a decision on whether I wanted to stay up there, and maybe enroll in �19 SUNY after another six months, once I’d established residency, or do I want to come back to Charleston. So I decided to come back here, and then that’s when I enrolled at the College of Charleston. KT: Okay. Now, but in terms of your jobs here in Charleston before you went back to school, these are just basically to pay rent kinds of things and that thing. LH: Yeah, super random. KT: But you’re not developing any other kind of career beyond your--? LH: Skills, no. I totally should have. This is my dilemma that I find now. Well, yeah, in between moving to Charleston and briefly moving to New York, I was working for a guy who had started a small business--it was a really weird business but very successful. He dealt with copying documents. He would call up law offices and say, “Are there briefs that you don’t want to copy? Well, we’ll copy them for you.” And that was his business. KT: Like scanning and archiving kind of stuff? LH: No, just copies, you know, like just running a copying machine. I mean just random, that’s what his business was. He did all the copying jobs that nobody wanted to do, and he would come and pick them up, do it, and then deliver it back, and so all of these office assistants and personnel that didn't want to do this, they’d call him up and he had an office set up with several industrial sized copiers and staff to run them. And he would take a bag of cookies back with each job, and that was his brilliant move because all of these office assistants would call and say, “Okay, I’ve got a new job.” And then they’d always get a bag of warm cookies with their finished copy job. KT: Yeah, Kinko’s does not give you a bag of cookies. �20 LH: No, they don’t. I was doing that. I had a weird job working for the farmers’ market. I had a job in a retail spot. I had a job working at Bleeker Street Bagelry. I was working all the time. I was nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, so I could do that then. I could get up for a six a.m. shift. KT: Was it in the back of your head though that you’re going to sing at some point. LH: I was just kind of trying to figure out what I wanted to do, and I wanted it to be singing. I didn't know though. I didn't know how to get it started, that was a big problem, so like what do I do? And when I came back to Charleston after New York, and I enrolled in the College of Charleston, I was actually going to start in arts management. That was the program that I started in. And I thought here’s a good possible career--or at least helpful career, you know, like a supplemental situation, in case singing doesn't work out. Although, I’m still trying to figure out how to make that work anyway. I must have done a semester in that program. And I’d heard that the music department at the College of Charleston had these jazz combos, and someone said you should talk to them about singing for one of them. And I thought okay. So I went and met the head of the jazz department, and his name was Jim Bastian. And I met him in his office. I said, “Hi, my name’s Lindsay. I’m currently in Arts Management, but I’d like to do some singing. And he was just kind of like, “All right, why don’t we sing something? Why don’t you sing something for me?” And I think he just kind of thought I was a flake, you know, so he pulled his guitar out and we sang--I sang a song, and he was--wow. So, he gave me this really amazing speech about you know, obviously singing is your passion and why not go full �21 force with your passion, and why are you in Arts Management, and sold me right then. Walked out the next day, changed my major to jazz. They didn't even have a vocal niche. I was with poor Tommy Gill. I got stuck with Tommy Gill, the piano professor, that’s kind of where they put us. KT: Right. Do you remember what you sang? LH: “The Nearness of You,” yeah. KT: And he was obviously impressed. LH: He was; I did a good job. I mean sometimes you know when you nail it, you know, and I felt real good about it, and I could tell by his reaction that--I can’t imagine what he thought when I walked in, it’s like wow. But yeah, he was impressed, and they kind of made some space for that. And I--to this day, I think that should be more developed within that program, that vocal track. When I was there, there was another singer, Aaron Armstrong, and then Leah Suarez. And I think we kind of all started maybe a semester or two around the same time as each other. KT: She was a student. LH: Mm-hmm. So, we were all kind of dealing with the juggling that happened with us, and at one point, they had hired a vocal teacher from Atlanta, who would come down once a week, but that only lasted about a semester or two. But it was still a great experience, just the combo aspect of it. That was a class. That was my first experience in interacting with a band and learning the dynamics of that, which is beyond helpful. I’ll maintain that the College of Charleston’s music experience was just stellar, as far as what I got to do, and the opportunities I got, and the support. Yeah, it was amazing. KT: So, what was your first band? �22 LH: Well, when I’d gotten up to New York, I was starting to write songs. I was feeling like I had some things to say I guess. So, that was starting to really build, and then when I got back into town, I somehow got on a singer songwriter night at the Mezzane. And I was on with this guy name--there were several of us there, and I met this guy named Danny Cassidy. And he’s an amazing character, an amazing musician. He’s since moved to New York, and he’s still playing music actually. I think he is. But he and I connected over Gram Parsons. And I remember after that show, he was working at the Terrace, and so we went to the Terrace. He had a set of keys. We went in after it was closed, and just sat around all night playing Gram Parsons songs. And that was kind of my first experience really coming out and saying this is what I can do. And then I met some people through Danny. I mean that wasn’t a formal thing or anything. That was just kind of my real first jam session. And then through the College of Charleston, I met a couple of guys that were interested in trying stuff other than jazz because the songs I was writing were not jazz songs. I’ve never felt that I had the vocabulary musically to write that. I respect the complexity of jazz, and it’s like my medium is different for writing. But within the jazz department, I found a couple of people that were open to trying that. So, that’s where like relationships started being built, as far as you know, little band things here and there, but nothing official. I mean my first official band as--I guess a band leader would have been the dirty kids, which was years later, 2006. KT: Okay, very recently then. LH: Yeah, yeah. KT: So, like mid-to-late nineties, are you starting to like identify with--I mean �23 Parsons is an influence, Nick Drake, but like are you aware of and identifying with like the alt country, no depression crowd, is that what you want to listen to, and that’s kind of where you’re gravitating. LH: That was where my head was, and my heart. I finally discovered the differences between pop country and old country, and alt country. Very much big into Wilco--huge Wilco fan. Ryan Adams was really appealing to me, and yeah, all those people, Lucinda Williams. I try to go to a lot of shows, and that was a thing I was doing more was trying to seek out these shows and these experiences. KT: What was the Charleston scene like at that point, I’d imagine there’s like a younger punk crowd, but was there a sort of roots--Americana cluster? LH: There was. KT: You start seeing the same people at the Lucinda Williams show, or how does that work? LH: Yeah, I mean I was really, for the late ‘90s, and up until about 2001, I was very insulated, and that was probably self-imposed. I didn't go out a lot, and I didn't work--like I didn't go out meeting people and networking and doing anything like that. I was keeping to myself, and so I really have a hard time describing the scene. It’s like I don’t feel like I was a part of it. KT: I see. LH: Especially the local scene. I mean I was starting to run into people in 2000 and 2001 that I started to recognize. Cary Ann, Bill Carson, these were people that I was seeing in Charleston around Danny Cassidy, who I had initially connected with Gram Parsons, he was playing with Cary Ann. And that scene really started to come up. They �24 had a weekly gig thing at a place called Fluids, and I think if anybody could attribute the growth of the alt country scene in Charleston, to my recent recollection, it would have been that period and that group of people that kind of started that weekly thing. So then, I mean I really started to get my feet like into the Charleston scene, and the local scene probably 2005. I’d had some friends that I’d actually met--the Black Crows have just been unbelievable in how they keep popping up in my life. There’s a guitar player in the Black Crows called Mark Ford. I love him, he’s an amazing guitar player. He’s no longer with the band. And back in 2001, he had a show at Music Farm. And I was going to go, and my brother Jeremy, my older brother, you know, said, “Are you going to go?” I said, “Sure, of course.” He said, “Well, there’s this band called the Dirty South opening. Are you going to go check them?” I was like, “Well, that’s kind of a lame name; I don’t think I am. Really, the Dirty South?” So I end up catching the last song of their set, the Dirty South, and I thought oh, my God, I recognize some people. And it turns out they were huge Black Crows fans. And one guy, his name was Brad Russell, and he was a guitar player, just rhythm guitar. And I really started to connect with him and this group of guys, and that was kind of the genesis, was our love of that band and that music, but then Gram Parsons started to bleed in. And that was a timeframe for me, a lot of jam sessions. 2001 to 2003, that group of people--Brad lived with his two best friends, and they all kind of played, and his brother played, and they were all around, and I would hang out with them. And we would get together three or four nights a week and just play. No one ever did anything out of the house. It was all just in the living room, but it �25 didn't matter. I mean it was still as fulfilling to me as whatever. So, my first show ever, as like a show show, was probably 2003 or something like that, at Theater 99, where it used to be on Cumberland Street. And I got Brad to play a couple songs with me, and then I did some solo stuff. And it was pretty good. It was a pretty good show. KT: I mean it sounds like a step above a kind of open mic thing basically? LH: Yeah, yeah, I mean there were tickets. I mean it would be like throwing a show at Theater 99 now, just it was a different space. And it was kind of great because it wasn’t a bar scene. I mean people were listening. And that might have been my first experience playing in a completely quiet room, where there was no clinking of glasses, no chatter. I mean it was a theater, you were on the stage, there were seats there. KT: Were you nervous for that? LH: Not really--a little bit, but not really. When I’m singing and someone’s listening to me, that’s kind of like the dialogue, you know, and that part of it helps me do my part. I have a much harder time playing to like just noise, like when you’re in the background in the corner or whatever, and no one’s listening. That’s what I struggle with right now. When I’m in a position where I know someone’s actually listening to what I’m saying, it makes me better. KT: Yeah, yeah, interesting. LH: It doesn't make me nervous, no. KT: What would your set list have included at that point? You’re doing a couple originals? LH: A lot of covers. KT: And mostly some Gram covers and a couple other things? �26 LH: Yeah, a couple of weird covers. I probably had at that point, three or four originals. I don’t put it out there unless I’m feeling about 90 percent good about it. Some people are--they’ll try anything. They’ll pull out some little thing they’re noodling on and debut it. KT: So, your unfinished work is not performed generally. LH: No, no, no, no. KT: Your works in progress. LH: Yeah, that’s mine until I’m ready--I feel like it’s ready. And I stand behind all of my songs, you know, because I haven’t let them out until I feel like, okay, they’re ready. KT: So, the reception to the show? LH: It was great, yeah. And it was nice because that--Brandy and Greg--oh, man I forget his name--the guys who run Theater 99 and the Have Nots, they were there that night, and they had a lot of positive feedback. I’d seen them around town and stuff, so that was really helpful for my confidence, like oh, well, these guys kind of dug it, and obviously they know what they’re talking about. The show went really well, and they said, you know, Theater 99 said, “Anytime you want to do it again, please let us know.” And so I thought, okay, great. And the unfortunate thing was those guys moved. My little core group of music cohorts, they moved to Colorado. So, I was kind of like, oh. So, I kind of, just kind of piddled around a little bit for a couple of years. I tried to get a little band together to do some original songs, and like maybe record them. I’d never done that before, and I got a group of jazz guys together, and again, my songs were not jazz. And it never seemed to quite gel. I don’t know, we weren’t all on the same page. �27 And I think some of them will definitely agree with me to this day, you know, we all wanted to play together, and it’s just about, you know, directions that you wanted to head. KT: Did that band have a name? LH: I don’t think it did, no. KT: It didn't quite get that far. LH: Didn’t get that far, although we actually had a great situation where we recorded some music with Kevin Taylor, he is more known for his visual art, but he had a little studio set up in his basement, and he was more of a rock punk guy kind of thing. I felt like oh, this is a great experience; good to meet somebody like this and just try to do some recording stuff. Although, it didn't really work out and it didn't go anywhere, the experience was valuable, I would think. But I don’t know where any of that stuff is, to this day. I have no idea where those tracks are. I mean some of those songs are still in play, but I have no idea what happened with all that, yeah. KT: So your first band that sort of had legs that--you know, that played out, that recorded, who would that have been? LH: That would have been the Dirty Kids. KT: And they were formed in what year? LH: Well, in fall of 2005, at this point, my friend Brad Russell had moved to Cincinnati. He had started a family and was living up there, and we would still email back and forth quite a bit, just talking about music or whatever, and he said, “I want to write some songs together.” And he’d never brought that up before. I thought well, okay, I’ve never done that, like co-written stuff. Sure, I was like, “Well, you’re in Cincinnati.” �28 So, for my birthday, my brother Jeremy had bought me my first four-track, hot pink fourtrack. And I was kind of figuring it out. I didn't have my own computer at that point. I was hesitant about technology. And Brad definitely didn't have a computer, so we FedExed this four-track back and forth for three months, writing songs, packed it in a box. KT: In 2005, 2006? LH: Yes, yes. KT: That’s late in the game to be doing that. LH: It is real late in the game, but it’s so appropriate for both of us. If you knew both of us, you would say, “Yeah, that’s not surprising.” But it worked out. One of my best songs I’ve ever had a hand in came out of that. KT: Yeah. LH: So, we got a couple songs together and we decided we wanted to record them. And I knew this guy Jason Dodson, who was a musician in town. He had a little step above a home recording studio, and he recorded onto tape, which Brad and I liked. We’re like, “Oh, let’s record on the tape,” because we’re dealing with a four-track, of course. So, Brad comes down for Christmas for the holidays because his family is here. So, I said, “Well, we’ll do it then.” And then he decided he wanted to have drums. So, Jason Dodson recommended Nick Jenkins. He’s like, “I play this guy every now and then. He’s a real nice guy. You should meet him, and he might dig what you’re doing.” And so, I met Nick and I kind of played some stuff, and played him the four-track tapes, like this is what we’re thinking. And Nick said, “Sure.” So, right around Christmas, like I guess it might have been a �29 couple days after, we recorded these two or three songs, and then Brad went back to Cincinnati, and Nick and I said, “Well, that was a lot of fun, you want to play again? You want to play together?” And he’s like, “Sure.” So, he said, “Well, let’s fill out the band, you know, drums and guitar.” So, he knew a guy named Michael Hanf, who played vibraphone. And at this point, I was really into a big Tom Waits phase. And Michael also played a lot of percussion. He was actually a background and drummer, and he played a lot of found instrument percussion, which I loved. I thought oh, here we go. And it’s funny because when we first started rehearsing, I kept trying to nudge Michael towards the percussion and not the vibraphone. I wasn’t sold on that yet. KT: But you had a drummer, right? LH: Yeah, but I liked just the whole rhythm. KT: A drummer and another percussionist. LH: And percussion, I just like a wall of rhythm. But Nick kept us on track. He kept redirecting Mike back to the vibraphone, you know, like, “Look, you’ve got this beautiful instrument here and this guy who can actually play it, get behind the ball, Holler.” So, we found a guitar player. Again, these guys were younger than me, they were a lot younger than me, like ten years younger than me. So this was almost a different generation. And they had some mutual friends, a bass player, his name was Ben Wells, and then a guitar player, his name was David Linaburg. So, we all got together and we all had very different backgrounds, but it worked. This was the first time I’d ever felt like I was in a situation where the personalities all gelled really well, and the creativity was off the charts. And yeah, I’ll attribute that to the �30 first tour I ever went on was with these guys. So, I mean there were a lot of firsts with that band. KT: Well, I want to hear about several things. So, you know, I’ve not been in bands, but just in being around musicians, my sense is that in terms of musicians’ ability to kind of plan, organize, handle logistic stuff, that among musicians, those skills are kind of few and far between. LH: Oh, yeah. KT: And so that when you have somebody with--like an organizing head, you know, that person’s an absolute, so I’m wondering like where do you fit in your bands-there’s usually like a sensible person. LH: That’s me. I’m the organizer. KT: Okay, okay, I kind of thought so. LH: Yeah, I’ve taken it to an extreme actually recently. I’m geared that way anyway. I like to organize, and I’m getting much better at scheduling, and so yeah, I was happy to take that part on. That was definitely me. In every band I’ve ever been in actually. KT: I mean I love musicians, but they’re generally just nuts, they’re flakes, I mean they’re really difficult. LH: Yeah, they’re very difficult. And the thing that was great about the Dirty Kids is there wasn’t a whole lot of that to begin with. These guys were all actually out of the jazz program at the College of Charleston, and they were all going to school there in that track. KT: So, serious about practice. �31 LH: Right, they were very cool with rehearsals. We loved to rehearse. We had a weekly rehearsal, which I think is kind of almost key for a band, you know, you’ve got to get together continuously, and just play together. They were all for that. The Dirty Kids was a lot--it was a first thing for a lot of them as well, so we were all on board, and it made it a lot easier. And they were all really good about being where we need to be on time, and getting back to me. And I was older, so I think that helped a little bit. They were kind of like--you know, I think in that respect, that helped a little bit with getting responses back and that kind of thing, so didn't really have an issue too much with that. KT: Yeah, and the personalities gelled, too? LH: They did, and we have wildly different personalities. And I even talked about this within the last couple of years. I’m in contact with all of these guys, and Michael Hanf and David Linaburg, always had very different approaches, and usually very different opinions. And that would come out in a rehearsal, to the point where they’re challenging each other. And we’ve always agreed that that really helped us quite a bit, you know, having that tension and they respected each other enough where there was always that respect there for each other’s abilities, but their perspectives were different. And yeah, that totally helped us. KT: But how do you figure in terms of--because these are your songs primarily. LH: Because I gave up a lot of control. KT: You do give up a lot of control. LH: Yeah, I don’t want to play guitar. I’d rather have somebody playing guitar who knows how to play guitar, you know, I don’t want to play drums. I don’t want to do everything. I would prefer to be around people who know how to play their instrument, �32 and let’s let everybody do their job, like my job’s to sing. I’ll take care of that part. Now with the songwriting, I mean I would bring songs in and they were real basic--I mean basic folks songs, pretty much. My chord knowledge is not extensive on the guitar, so I was limited with what I could do. Although I would do unorthodox things sometimes because I dealt in shapes and not really theory on a guitar, so it would drive them nuts sometimes, like what are you doing? But I would bring a song in. We’d sit down, and all these guys like Michael and Ben are in composition classes. So we just kind of tear it apart, you know, and try to find a path that we all can live with, and that’s my preferred way of doing it. I don’t need control over the music process. KT: But the tension is--at least I would--I could see it, but your vocals are the draw. And to what degree should the musician be sort of working to foreground you, to spotlight you? Does that make--I’m not saying that very clearly, but--. LH: I mean are you. KT: Lucinda Williams is a parallel. She’s had great people play with her over the years, but it’s always Lucinda. I mean it’s built around Lucinda. She’s the real draw, and it’s the power of her songs, so that nobody can ever be sort of so into their own thing that they detract from that. I don’t know, does that even come up? LH: Does it come up? KT: That kind of tension, does that play out? LH: It hasn’t seemed to. KT: Yeah, okay. LH: Maybe it’s just my approach. I don’t know, I mean I don’t ever try to be �33 overbearing about my presence within a situation or a song. I’m never taking that position. I mean I feel like my voice is big enough where if it just shows up, it’s going to --. KT: No one’s getting around it. LH: It’s going to stand where it’s going to stand. It’s kind of like a little bit of the bully in the room, and just by what it is, not even that I try that. So I’ve never felt like I’ve had to fight for a position or say, “Hey, you need to support me on this.” Yeah, it’s never really come up, and it’s never been something that I’ve cared about. It’s just been like you know, I’m going to do my thing, and I’m cool with wherever it lands. And usually, it lands in the front. As far as least dynamics, you know, I mean I have a big voice, and it’s usually right there. It’s kind of hard to get around it. KT: Being around like all these young guys, does this get tiring? LH: I feel like it’s energizing. Yeah, I mean I think it kept me a little younger. And I was able to relate more to different people. I was around these guys a lot. Yeah, those three years, I mean we did a lot of playing, and probably did three or four tours together. KT: How far did you tour? LH: They were always East Coast tours, and they were usually up to New York and back. Some were longer than others. And the first couple of them, we toured with another local band, called a Decent Animal, amazing band. It was a three-piece. Jonathan Nicholson was the singer. Richard Well was the bass player, and then the drummer’s name was George Baerreis. And they were a little bit more rock, like there wasn’t much of an acoustic element to them. I don’t really know how to describe them, and they were �34 all veterans. They were a little bit older than me. They were veterans in the music scene, like they’ve been around for the long time. Jonathan had been in a lot of bands around the area for a while, from probably like early ‘90s. It was an interesting dynamic because you had these guys here who were a little bit older than me, and definitely more in tune with the music scene. There was me, who was kind of a weird hybrid, and then I had the younger guys in the band. I mean there was only a fifteen, sixteen year difference between my youngest band member and the oldest band member of a Decent Animal. And we would play a lot together, to the point where there was a year where I think every show we played was together, whether it was in town or we’d even go out of town to play together. KT: Oh, wow. LH: Which was amazing because they were so experienced in a lot of things, in band things and that was helpful to have. And they found my band to be hysterical. Like they just thought they were just like funny kids. KT: Kids--well, tell me--I mean do you like touring? LH: I did. It was everything I’d ever want it to be, you know, I mean it wasn’t some big flashy thing by any means. KT: Not very glamorous? LH: No, but it was so much fun. I mean just one of those things where it was just the weird shenanigans all the time. I think the first one was ten days, and Richard in a Decent Animal and I booked it together, and we just kind of put it together. And they had a van, and I rented a van, and we did a caravan type situation. KT: So, two vans and a car maybe? �35 LH: No, no. KT: Just two vans. LH: Two vans. KT: With how many people? LH: Well, they had three in theirs, and we had five in mine, and we put all of our gear in there. KT: Oh, my God. LH: Oh, we would get one hotel room with eight people, to save money. KT: No. LH: Oh, yeah, we would do three people in each twin bed, and then two people would have to sleep on the floor. And usually, nobody wanted to be--like Jonathan and Richard and George did not want to be a part of all that. They’re like, “We’re not going to squeeze into some bed.” But we wanted to save money, and so yeah, there would be no problem with that. And the shows were fun, the shows were real weird. Some were successful, some were just weird, but it was still like what you would want to happen on your first tour, you know. You just--wow, you know. KT: So, broken down vans, any end up in jail, anyone? LH: Nobody ended up in jail on a tour. A Decent Animal’s van would break down quite a bit. They tried to go play by themselves to Savannah one time, and they broke down on Seventeen, and they ended up calling me to come get them. And yeah, they had problems with their van. I got into a wreck one time. Well, no, it was a stupid thing. We were all going up to play a show in Asheville, and I just kept renting things because I didn't have my own van. So, I had rented a Yukon, and it was gigantic. And we were �36 probably almost at the border of North Carolina and South Carolina at a gas station. And we were going to leave, and somebody needed to throw something away, so I was going to pull up beside the trash can, misjudged, ran the whole side down one of those metal things. And it was awful. I mean the damage was extensive. Everybody got out and hugged me. Oh, my God. So, this is a rental, and I mean it could run. It still ran. And I called the company. KT: Did you buy the supplementary insurance? LH: I didn't. KT: No, who would, nobody does. LH: Well, this was my thing. I said, you know, “I’ve got insurance through my credit card.” So, I called the company and I explained what happened. They asked me if it could run, and I said it could. They said, “Well, just bring it back tomorrow when you’re planning on doing that.” So, we went up and played the show. Needless to say, I was pretty bummed out, like this is going to be a disaster. And so, the next day, I took it back to the airport, and I remember giving the keys to the guy, and he was walking out with me to look at it, and I thought--this guy, he just shook his head when he looked at it. It looked like somebody had taken a bulldozer around the side of it, and it was brand new, too. But it turned out all the fine print worked out in my favor because my credit card company said, “Well, we’re a secondary coverer. We’re not your primary coverer of insurance for car-related stuff. Your car insurance would be your primary coverer.” So, I got in touch with my car insurance, and I only had liability. I thought oh, my God, we’re going to have to have like a fundraiser. But because I only had liability--. �37 KT: It goes to secondary. LH: It goes to secondary, so they covered it all. KT: Wonderful. LH: And it was--oh, man, the day I got that letter in the mail was just--because it was about $4000 in damage. I mean it’s just unbelievable. KT: What was your worst show? LH: Probably that night. No. Worst show with that band? KT: Ever. LH: Ever, oh, God, that’s tough. I don’t know. I mean I guess to me, what would constitute the worst show, would be when no one shows up. That’s the hardest thing for me. Yeah, I don’t know, that’s tough. I mean when we were at that show after that car thing, we were playing in a really small place in Asheville, to the point where it didn't really have a stage. It had kind of a side pocket, and then the door, and then the bar. And so, we played our little set, and Michael and I got off and were walking to the bar, and the door guy kind of looks at us. And he goes, “Hey, you guys look like a couple. I’ll only charge you five bucks.” And I looked at him, and I said, “What are you talking about?” He’s like, “The cover to get in.” And I looked at Mike, and I looked at the guys, like, we just played. It’s like we were literally five feet away from you fortyfive seconds ago, just playing. I looked at Mike, and we looked at this guy, and it was just the most bizarre thing in the world. I thought this day’s getting worse. Yeah, it was weird, not necessarily a bad thing. I mean it was funny. We still laugh about that to this day. One time out on a tour, we played a show in North Carolina, and the venue was under construction. They should never have had the show. I mean under construction to �38 the point where it didn't have running water. And there were five bands there to play, all out of town. There was us, there was a Decent Animal, and then there was a really cool like punk duo from New York, another band from Virginia, like all these out of town bands, and they didn't want to cancel it, so they had it happen anyway. So that was weird because there was really nobody there, just the other bands. And so, we’re sitting there doing our set, and some guy walks up, and he walks right by me on the microphone. He starts trying to sing the song he’s never heard before, and I don’t know what to do. I’m trying to keep kind of going and not laugh. And all the guys from A Decent Animal are standing in the back laughing because they’ve seen our set and they know this is not supposed to happen. So I hate to stop songs. I hate--I would never try to stop a song in the middle, so Dave kind of says, “Well, come use my mike,” to the guy, like, “let’s just get your own mike here, whatever.” It was just ridiculous. KT: So, you did an impromptu duet with that Memphis dude. LH: Yeah, and we tried to wrap up a song real quickly. It’s like, “I don’t know. I don’t know who this guy is. He doesn't know the song either.” It was just random, it was weird. There are a lot of weird shows, but that’s okay. I mean they’re funny stories usually. KT: A best show? LH: On one of these tours, the Dirty Kids backtracked and kind of separated from A Decent Animal to play, which is never what you want to do on a tour. You never want to backtrack like 200 miles. But there was a venue in Winston Salem called The Garage, some people had recommended, and I had gotten in touch with them. And the guy was like, “You really want to play with this band, I need an opener.” And I was like it doesn't �39 really work much with our track, but if you--he’s like, “You really need to do it.” I said, “All right, we’ll do it.” So, we’ll separate and come back. And it was opening for the Felice Brothers, which are a really great band. And this was probably 2006, 2007, so they were still kind of getting started. And we got there, and they were real rock and roll, just in every respect. And we were like a junkyard gang walking in, you know, with the youngsters, and with the vibraphone, which is so not rock and roll. And we saw their sound check, and we all looked around at each other and thought oh, we’re going to get shown off the stage here because they were amazing, great, you know; real tough, too, like seasoned guys, and we’re like, “Oh, man.” So, we went up and played the show of our lives. I mean we played the shit out of our songs. And I remember we came off the stage and they were like, “Wow, all right, where are you guys from?” I liked the fact that everyone in the Dirty Kids, they kind of felt that pressure and were like we need to step up our game a little bit. And it was obvious, you know, and we all felt it. We thought man, you know, that was a great show. And it was a great night, like their set later was just you know, amazing, and it was just like one of those kind of shows where--wow, do you remember all that? Yeah. KT: But the band broke up after what, three years? LH: Three years. Michael moved to New York, and David Linaburg moved to New York, both of those guys did. And I don’t know, it had been such a close knit unit for so long, I was like I don’t want to keep going with the Dirty Kids. I’d prefer to get a new name, and maybe probably some similar songs, but you know, let’s kind of start new. So Ben Wells, the bass player, was still in town, and Nick Jenkins was still in town, �40 so we found a piano player, Sam Sfirri. He played Rhodes, primarily, so he was interested. He joined us, and then as far as guitar goes, I reached out to Bill Carson. I thought you know, he and I had a conversation because he said, “You know, I’m not a guitar player.” And I was like, “Well, you know, I’m not expecting you to do what Dave Linnaburg did. Dave Linnaburg was a guitar player, you know, he’s a jazz guy, and tootle ooh. I was like, “That’s not what I’m looking for from you.” I said, “When you play guitar with your hollow body, you have such amazing tones.” Kind of like Marc Ribot with Tom Waits, that was kind of what--. KT: So, you’re looking for a little rhythm, and like some phrasings. LH: Yeah, yeah, and just that texture. KT: Because you’ve got the piano. LH: Right, if we need crazy solos--although I’m not really into solos that much. That was a little bit of a thing with Dave and I was he would kind of bring a little too much jazz into it. I’m like, “Look, take all the notes you just played and cut them in half.” The song’s not going for that. So, I convinced Bill that you don’t need to play a lot of notes, that’s not what we’re going for. So we came up with another name, the Western Polaroids. And we played together for about--well, I mean I guess technically it’s still around. I mean that group played together for about a year or two. We went on one tour as the Western Polaroids, back up to New York and back. Then Nick moved to New York. And the Stuart White is a local drummer that kind of joined in. Bill got kind of busy with stuff, and was like, “Look, I’m not going to be able to play as many shows.” And you �41 know, things just kind of drifted a little bit, you know, as far as focus. Yeah, and then I picked up a project back in 2010 with Michael Hanf, a duo, vibraphone guitar project called, “Oh, Ginger.” And that kind of took over a little bit more precedence with my time and energy and focus. So, I mean the Western Polaroids could come back. I mean they show up every now and then. It’s funny because I always refer to it more as a catalogue of music now than a band. They’ve got songs that are the Western Polaroids. KT: Okay, and since the Western Polaroids, have you had another--kind of a fuller band other than the--. LH: Yeah, I’ve got something now that I’ve been playing with for about a year, called Matadero. And it’s such an incestuous situation because all these same people are coming back in. George Baerreis who played drums for A Decent Animal, is playing bass in Matadero. And Sam Sfirri who played Rhodes in Western Polaroids is playing Rhodes in Matadero. And then there’s a drummer named Ron Wiltrout, who is playing drums. And there’s no guitar. KT: You’re doing a little rhythm? No, nothing. LH: No guitar, there’s not a guitar in the band. KT: So, wait, what was that lineup? LH: Bass, drums, Rhodes, voice. The bass takes on a very unique presence. George’s style is very in your face and full, and he uses some fuzz pedal things. KT: Oh, interesting. LH: And it boosh. KT: Okay, would Grove Street, would that be a Matadero track? �42 LH: That’s a Matadero’s, yeah. KT: Oh, yeah, that’s really interesting. LH: Yeah, yeah, no guitar, that’s all bass, and he’ll solo on the bass. It’s a very interesting dynamic because Sam’s a lot like me. He doesn't feel the need to jump in and do a bunch of stuff. He’s perfectly fine hanging back and kind of doing his thing. And that works really well tone wise, with the tone of the Rhodes, and the bas sound. They occupy different spots rhythmically and tonally, and yeah, it’s been a wonderful dynamic. KT: That’s kind of is dark and grungy. LH: Very, very, very. KT: Yeah, it’s interesting. LH: The bummer now is Sam’s moving. KT: This is a recurring theme in your life here. LH: Yeah, it is, lots of moving. He’s moving to Canada, and very far away, to go to school in a couple months, so the rest of us are trying to figure out how we want to go forward. I mean we want to because this project is not like any other project any of us are involved in, so it’s definitely unique in holding onto that spot. KT: Well, what are your goals? LH: I don’t know. I just keep moving forward, you know, like going forward. That’s what I’m kind of trying to figure out right now, what are my goals? That’s been a huge topic lately, the last six months. I mean I’ve gotten into producing shows recently, has been a big thing with me, and that kind of goes back into my organizing mind. KT: I wanted to talk to you about this, yeah. LH: That’s been a thing I’ve gravitated towards in the last year. I’ve had a really �43 good relationship with the Tin Roof, kind of taken the reins on a couple of theme shows. And that’s been a really big interest. But I don’t think it’s anything I’d want to do exclusively, you know, sometimes I need to remember I play music, too, and to not forget about that. But then you’ve also got a day job, you know, so it’s like there are a lot of hats. KT: I mean that’s where I heard you was the Gram Parsons Show, and--. LH: The Gram Parsons thing, yeah. KT: And not as well attended as I would have liked, but I thought it was just a night of phenomenal music. LH: It was. KT: I thought it was terrific. LH: Yeah, and that show--the Holy City Cold Heart Revival is something that-it’s a kind of an annual music night that I conceived with some friends of mine back in 2005, 2006. We were in Cumberland’s, and we were all talking about how we needed to play a show. It’s like we’ve all got kind of bands, like let’s put a show together. And we wanted to do kind of an alt country theme. So the guys at Cumberland’s were nice enough to give us a night, and we kind of reached out to some local people and some outof-town bands, and put together about a five or eight-band bill, all geared towards alt country, not necessarily towards a specific person. And did that at Cumberland’s for two years, Cumberland’s closed, and then that’s when we moved it to the Poor House. Alex was really great about kind of letting me again, grab a night in November and go for it. The two friends who had started it with me, both moved away--back to that theme. And so I kind of kept going with it. And I was kind of done with it after 2011. It �44 had been six years or something, and it was okay. I mean it still felt like it never was super well attended, and it was a lot of work, and so I was really not feeling like doing it again. And then Brian Hannon, who is in a band called Company, he is a huge Gram Parsons fan as well, and he approached me and said, “Well, why don’t--are you doing this again this year?” And I kind of was, “Maybe not.” And he said, “Well, why don’t you make it a Gram Parsons night?” And I thought well, that’s kind of interesting because that’s easy. He had a relationship with the Gram Parsons Foundation. And so we could tie it into a benefit. And I thought, well, great. So, having his energy on board really helped a lot. It made me kind of want to get back in and try it again. And we decided to put together a little Gram Parsons band, and that was a lot of fun. The night ended up being great, you know, the different bands involved were awesome. And it was nice because I remember when we were rehearsing for that show, with that Gram Parsons band, those were people I’d never played with. I hadn’t played with any of those guys before, so that was a nice experience to kind of--oh, cool, I’m feeling out new people here. KT: I remember it being really tight, too. LH: Yeah, yeah, it was real good. Well, those guys are--I mean they--talk about hustling, I mean they play all the time. Like I remember Mackie Bowles probably had three gigs a day or something. I mean he’s just like gig to gig. KT: Well, what’s your sense then of the Charleston music scene over the last few years? I mean do you feel pretty positively about it? LH: Oh, yeah. KT: Or is it just--you know. �45 LH: It’s exploding. I seem to have been catching waves of generations, I guess. You know, I mean like whether it’s knowing Jonathan and Richard and those guys, who really started kind of an early ‘90s alt rock kind of thing, to meeting you know, like Cary Ann and Bill Carson and those guys that really started an alt country kind of thing. And then, you know, with my first band, the Dirty Kids, that’s a certain timeframe and age group. That kind of group was more into experimental stuff, and like the New Music Collective was kind of born around that time. And then you’ve got these guys now, the Royal Tinfoil, and Sarah Bandy, and Rachel Cade. And then this whole group of people that I don’t even know, like these younger bands. And I mean I can’t keep up with it. I’m older now, so I can’t go to as many shows as I’d like to go to, but it just seems to be exploding, whether it’s productivity, there are a lot of bands out here. They’re recording, they’re making music, they’re playing a lot of shows, but then there seems to be a lot more recognition for that work as well, coming outside of Charleston, as well as inside, but I mean it seems like people are noticing the music scene here a little bit more. KT: Do you have to move away to make it? LH: No. That’s an interesting question. I don’t think you do, no. I think things are changing so quickly with how that’s even defined. I mean what is making it at this point? That’s tough. And the lines are being blurred so much. I mean there’s so much more you can do now than ten years ago, as far as publicity, as far as getting your music exposed. I mean it’s just a different game. So I don't feel like you’ve got to move. It’s just hard to keep up with how to even �46 define that, you know, I mean selling your music, how do you make money doing that? What’s the best way to do that? I mean is a label really something you need now? I don’t know. It’s funny, a lot of people joke about this invisible train to New York that Charleston seems to have. I know a lot of musicians who have moved up there, and they’ve been very successful, and they’ve put a lot of work into it, and they’ve suffered through a lot and it’s great to look at what they’ve gone through and the progression they’ve come to now, where they’ve got some success under their belt. But I don’t think you have to do that. I mean and it kind of depends on what you’re doing. I mean if you’re an instrumentalist or if you’re a front person, or that’s a different part of it as well. I mean that’s an ongoing dialogue. And I don’t know if I’ve got the answer to that anyway. KT: Did you play shows at all with like Megan Jean? LH: Yeah. KT: Because I think, didn't they just leave the city, or they’re leaving soon? LH: I mean I don’t think they’ve lived in Charleston, technically like lived here for a while. I mean they live on the road, I’m pretty sure. I mean I think that they had possibly a mailing address here, and this was kind of a hub for stuff. But from what I understand, they were just traveling and playing, and kind of living on the road. And I think for them, as far as routing goes, it made more sense to have a hub that was more in their track. I mean Charleston’s off the track, definitely, unfortunately, which has been an issue. They’re moving their base of operations to Atlanta or something like that, which makes it a little bit easier. And I mean if it saves them money, that’s something they’ve �47 got to consider with their situation. I saw an amazing thing. Megan kind of wrote about, as far as a DIY band and the economics behind it. And she did this crazy comparison with another band. And I don’t know if they were a label band or what it was, but it was a--she broke it down financially, yeah, about each little bracket. And I mean she--it was amazing. KT: They’re about as economical as you can get, right. LH: Yeah, but I mean when it comes to those tight budgets, every little dollar has got to be accounted for, so if you’re going to save a dollar or a bunch of dollars, move in your hub, and you got to do that. KT: But you’ve never been seriously tempted to move? LH: To relocate? Yeah, I have been a lot. I just never knew where. I didn't actually--ironically, I didn't want to go up to New York. Part of my fear is I hustle so much here, I was like I can’t imagine what would be required of me up there. Although maybe if I’m doing my same hustling up there, maybe it goes farther, I don’t know. But kind of where would be my big question. My brother Jeremy has always wanted me to move to Austin. He lived there for a number of years. KT: I mean there’s a logic to that, right, I mean there would be great musicians. LH: Great musicians. I’ve been there enough where I feel pretty comfortable with the city, I know it pretty well. Yeah, I guess I’m kind of romantic in the fact that I want to go somewhere, where I’m automatically, yeah, I got to go, you know, where there’s zero question, just automatic pull. And maybe that’s a terrible way to approach it. Maybe I need to be more thoughtful about it. Yeah, the idea is there, definitely. I’ve been here for a long time. I need to maybe embrace some change, mix it up a little bit. But yeah, �48 figuring out where--I mean and then when you get older, you know, your family starts coming into play. You don’t want to be too far. KT: Your parents are both still alive? LH: Mm-hmm. My mom lives in Columbia. And my dad lives outside of Asheville, so they’re all pretty close. KT: Is he still lawyering? LH: No, no, he’s retired. No, they’re both retired, yeah. Yeah, he’s living in the mountains. Actually, completely away from technology. His wife will answer my emails, but he doesn't even do email, so it’s--yeah, I can’t email any mp3s to check out. KT: Tell me just a little bit about your other gig. LH: Oh, my job, my day job? KT: Yeah, I assume that’s what pays the bills mostly? LH: Oh, yeah, I’ve never made money off of music. Music has always been just putting it back in. That’s why I’ve always had a day job is usually any excess is funded right back into recording or--my current day job is--I came upon it very--I needed a job. Back in 2009, I answered a Craigslist ad for an administrative position, and I thought okay, I can do this, I’ve worked in an office before. I went to my interview, and it was a little bit different than what I’d read about. This was a recruiting firm. And so they recruited restaurant managers for different restaurants all across the country. And I thought weird, okay, try it out. And that’s kind of been my attitude with a lot of things. I’ve tried a lot of different things, and usually I’m like sure, why not? So, you know, by the second day there, they had me doing interviews with people, the restaurant managers. I’ve never conducted an interview--didn't really know much about �49 what goes into a restaurant manager’s position, but I jumped in and I’ve kind of been doing it ever since. I really like my boss. He’s like just somebody that I can kind of--he understands me. I’m kind of a direct person, and that doesn't freak him out that much, so it’s been good. And he’s been really supportive about the music thing, if I need to go out of town for a show, or last year I went on a tour in the late summer, and he was so supportive about that, so it’s just been great. KT: You work in an office, like basically nine to five? LH: Yeah, yeah, I work in an office downtown, and I live downtown, so I’m in a situation where I can walk to work, which is really nice. KT: Oh, terrific. LH: Yeah, it’s been so great. Which I realize that at some point, that might come to an end, so I need to appreciate every day that I can. But yeah, it’s an interesting office setting. His wife is a painter, and so he’s got a little gallery set up in the front for her stuff, and then in the back is his office. And there are two other people with me, and then he’s there. And then we also have an office in Greenville as well. KT: And you place people in restaurants all around the country, not just Charleston. LH: Right, oh, yeah. We really don’t do that much work in Charleston. Every now and then we will, but it’s primarily across the country. We’ve even done a little bit of overseas stuff, but it’s a sales job basically, and it’s something I’ve never tried before, and it’s been good for trying to get me to be more outspoken because I’m not into intruding on a lot of things. I’m kind of like uh. And at this point, when you’re talking to people about why they left positions and why they did things, you’ve got to ask these �50 questions, and you’ve got to be forward, and you’ve got to be more proactive about it, and that’s--. KT: Goes against you kind of. LH: Yeah, this has been good for me to kind of exercise that part of me, and now I’ve developed that a little bit more. I mean I can close the deal now, which I don’t know if I would have been able to do a couple of years ago. KT: I could ask this two ways. I’ll give you the option, favorite or most influential album? LH: “Rain Dogs,” Tom Waits. KT: Both favorite and most influential you think? LH: Yeah, yeah. I remember right where I was when I heard it for the first time, exactly where I was, what I was doing, who I was with, which my memory’s usually pretty terrible, so that kind of right away tells me that it made an impact. KT: Where were you? LH: I was in upstate New York, I was with my friend Jeff, and I was actually visiting. It was before I’d moved there. Jeff and I had met at Berklee, and I was up there for a visit, and we were playing Scrabble, and we were eating pizza with eggplant on it, which I thought was really weird. It’s like what is that, eggplant? And he put it on, and I said, “Who is this?” And he explained it to me, and I was hooked. And I can’t think of as far as what I want out of a musician or a band, or whatever, that’s everything, right there. His authenticity, originality, and everything, daring. I mean Tom Waits is just a bad ass, so much so, yeah. And I’ve been lucky enough to see him a couple of times, which has been great. It’s been amazing. �51 KT: Do you think Charleston marks you as an artist in any way that’s particular? I mean do you consider yourself either a regional, a southern, or a Charleston artist that-anything about the south that marks you as unique? LH: Probably things that I’m not aware of. For a long time, I didn't embrace that I was a southerner, and it was usually something I had to defend, especially when I was up in Boston. I go a lot of grief about my accent, which I don’t think I’ve got one now, but I think I did back then. And living in different places, you come across people painting you with that stereotypical brush, and so I always felt like, don’t hate me because I’m from the South. And it felt like it wasn’t embracing it at all. And I’m trying to change that around a lot more. I mean as far as making a mark on me, I don’t know. That’s a good question, like musically? KT: Yeah, do you feel particularly southern as a musician somehow? LH: I mean I think that certain visual themes will come up in some of my songs that--. KT: That might reflect the region. LH: The region, yeah. I don’t know if my delivery is necessarily southern. I mean I guess it’s a little soulful. I don’t know if you’d equate that just to the south though. I mean people could say Detroit is soulful. KT: Sure, indeed they could. LH: Yeah. I mean I guess if you had--you know, some of the country or elements that I’ll incorporate, you know, a little twangy kind of element there. KT: But that could as easily be Midwest or you know, no one has a monopoly on country in this country. �52 LH: Right, yeah, maybe I don’t have anything that’s--that I know of that’s easily-I don’t know. That’s tough, I don’t know. KT: Who are the singers that you’re most often compared to? LH: Janis Joplin, got that last night, or the night before last. KT: Do you like that comparison, or is that? LH: It’s okay, it’s great that you get compared to someone so talented, sure. I don’t hear that a lot. I mean yeah, there’s a raspy quality that I would imagine, but that’s just not something that I wouldn’t--. KT: I was thinking too, of the jazz and blues influences. LH: Oh, really. KT: Yeah, that I hear in Janis, you know, I think those come through in your approach, yeah. LH: I’ve gotten Lucinda Williams a couple of times, especially in songwriting. She can be a little direct with her songwriting, and I tend to go that route. I kind of figured at one point when I really wanted to start writing songs that you couldn’t hold back, you know, everything’s fair game. I wanted to take that approach. Who else do I get compared to a lot? Definitely those two would be the tops. KT: Does Melissa Etheridge come up? LH: That has come up every now and then. I would never think that either. Although it’s funny because I think about all of my vocal influences over the years, and how at some point in time, I’ve tried to sound like somebody, and they’ve all been men. KT: Yeah, yeah. LH: You know. �53 KT: So, it’s Tom Waits and Gram Parsons, and Nick Drake are the people that you--. LH: Yeah, I went through a huge Pearl Jam phase in high school, and I wanted to sound like Eddie Vetter so much, and he’s got a very distinct presentation with his voice, and I could kind of mimic it a little bit. Even that, or you know, I’ll say I was always a fan of the way Harry Connick, Jr. sang, like his ballads. I mean I know people always wrote him off as a Frank Sinatra guy, but I loved the way he sang, and I can remember like doing some jazz stuff trying to check myself a little bit and like don’t completely copy what he’s doing. You know, you can borrow a little bit. Yeah. KT: Yeah, I hear all those, definitely, you know, the Tom Waits comes through. LH: Yeah, he does. But then you want to make sure that you are coming through, too, you know, where it’s not just a Tom Waits--. KT: I don’t think you ever even--. LH: Need to worry about that? KT: No, no, no. You’re--no. LH: Well, I keep--. KT: I would never--these comparisons are useful to some extent, but I never hear where you’re being derivative. LH: Oh, that’s good. Whew. KT: No, it’s definitely--it’s a unique voice. LH: Thank you. I feel like I can’t take credit for it, you know, it’s just kind of always been there. I’ve kind of beat it up actually. KT: Were you ever a smoker? �54 LH: Yeah. KT: Are you still? LH: No. KT: Okay. How did that change your voice at all? LH: I was a mezzo soprano when I went to Berklee. KT: So, you don’t regret being a smoker? LH: Well, I kind of made a decision when I was at Berklee, when I was getting pushed into that R&B thing, and I thought no, I want to do jazz stuff. And then I started listening to more jazz, and there weren’t sopranos singing jazz, and if you came across someone who tried to take that stand, I wasn’t as into as much. So, I thought well, let’s change the voice a little bit to adapt to the medium you want to do. I mean there are all kinds of ways you can damage your voice. A perfect example is the way you talk. I had a vocal coach at Berklee try to advise me to talk higher. She wanted me to raise the octave of my speaking voice, and I said no. I’m not going to do that. I mean I’ve heard of that before, a little bit of that. KT: To stretch your range, is that the idea? LH: No, no, no, it’s like if you just wallow down in the depths of your voice, it’ll just kind of stay there, you know, you’re using it too much, and you’re using certain parts of your vocal chords that don’t need to be used all the time. And in order to preserve everything, you should talk in a little bit of a higher voice. I’m talking too low, I basically what it is. And it’s more probably for a preservation of the vocal chords. It’s probably great advice; I just chose to ignore it basically. I mean all kinds of things are bad for your voice. �55 Caffeine’s bad for it, alcohol is bad for it, yelling’s bad for it. I mean and I used to go to concerts and yell, like just going as an audience member and yelling, and then coming back with a hoarse voice or no voice. That’s terrible for your voice. And even talking, I mean really talking too much is not great. I’m not going to say it’s a purposeful thing that I just said I’m going to just mess it all up, but I think in the back of my mind I was realizing that I wanted a different sound and a different texture and a different tone, with my voice. KT: Do you have recordings from your earlier voice? LH: There might be some tapes somewhere. KT: Yeah, that would be interesting to hear yourself, yeah. LH: Yeah, although it was always big. I mean in fact, with my vocal coach June Bonner, her background was opera, and for a second there, she was kind of saying, “Hey, have you ever thought about this?” Because I had a very big voice, even when I would get in to an upper register. But that just kind of thing never really appealed to me, so I didn't follow it. But it was always big, it was just my range. And I mean even now, I have kind of high-ish range for how low my voice sounds. I mean I can still--it’s funny, I’ve come across this situation where I’ve been playing--singing with a group of people on some Pink Floyd stuff. I’ve come across this where people are wanting to redo “Dark Side of the Moon.” And there’s a song on there called “Great Gig in the Sky,” and it’s a woman wailing. KT: Aha, that’s right. They want you to do that? LH: I’ve done it now. I’ve done it four times, and it’s funny because the first time �56 we tried it, I was kind of sick and I realized it was kind of high, and I thought I can’t get to it because I’m kind of sick, but I did it anyway and we got through it. And then the next time, I sat down and I looked at a transcription of the part, and it goes way up to like some high B--like high G above C--like some crazy place that I would never get to. And I was thinking this is not because I have a cold, this is because this muscle has not been used in fifteen years. But I was still able to kind of get closer than I would have thought. I was kind of-go, there’s some spark in those upper notes. But I’m happy with the way it’s gone. And it’s funny, my friend Jeff, who I met at Berklee, he’s playing music, very successful, and he heard something recently of mine, and he said, “Wow, your voice has held up really well.” And you know, and it has. I’ve been really grateful that I can tell some aging in it, certainly, and I have to be more aware about being kinder to it. That’s definitely more my thought process than ever before. But it has held up really well. I mean I’ve gotten the gruffness that I kind of want, but it’s definitely not falling apart yet. So, it’s weird, but it’s something--again, it’s like something I think I never could take credit for. It’s always been there. It’s always been something I could do, and it’s always been real easy to do, don’t know why. KT: Is there anything that either that we talked about earlier that you want to elaborate upon, or is there maybe something like that we didn't touch on that you think is really important for understanding you, but you as an artist, anything. LH: I mean I think it’s interesting that you’re so surprised that I don’t like to be in the spotlight. And I think a lot of people don’t realize that that’s an option with a singer. I mean like these days, everybody is me, me, me, show me, let me show you, you know, �57 it’s such a prevalent posture nowadays, where it’s in your face, and who’s going to be the loudest, and who is going to be the most out there, and that’s never been my thing. But I worry do you have to be like that in order to be successful? Because yeah, I mean I’m not going to change myself to make that happen, but I wonder about that now, it seems like there’s a trend where that might be an actual concern, you know, if I’m not in your face all the time, that’s going to be to my detriment, which is a little alarming. KT: Who is your ideal band in that sense? LH: In your face? KT: No, no, no, in terms of what you would like out of a band, you know, is there a band out there who you can think of who work together musically? LH: Wilco. KT: Yeah. LH: You mean as far as the dynamic--yeah. KT: You think Wilco’s your model? LH: Kind of, yeah. KT: Really? LH: Especially I’ve probably seen that band perform more than any other band. I first caught their show in ’94 in Myrtle Beach, to a room with nobody in it. So, I’ve seen that band change. I’ve seen the personnel change; I’ve seen the songwriting change, the style. Jeff Tweedy is not in your face. In fact, I don’t think he likes for you to be in his face. I think he’s probably not like the nicest guy in the world, you know, but he’s doing what he’s doing, and it’s there for your consumption. And I like that. He’s not trying to run for office, you know, it’s not a popularity contest. And I feel like that’s too much of �58 what it is, and I like the fact that he doesn't give a shit about that, you know, this is what I do. And he’s not going to pander and do all that kind of thing. And the way that that band has come about, especially now. I was watching a clip of theirs off of Letterman recently. Oh, he’s got Nels Cline on the guitar, which is kind of a wild card move to pull that element in there. KT: Somebody who is so present in the mix. Yeah. LH: Yeah, but I mean his background is varied, and then, you know, you’ve got that dynamic, and then you’ve got--who’s the guy’s name on bass, who’s been there forever. KT: John Stirratt. LH: Yeah, he’s been there forever. He’s the only guy that’s lasted the whole time, you know, and I like that there’s that different element. KT: I was wondering about that, like would you want to play piano for Jeff Tweedy, or would you want to play bass for Jeff Tweedy? I mean somehow Stirratt’s figured it out, but he strikes me as a pain in the ass that would be a nightmare for background musicians. LH: I think Tweedy is prickly. I think he’s prickly about the way he does things. KT: Everything. LH: And you know, maybe I am a little bit. Probably going to have to backtrack a bunch, do a little back peddling. I mean he seems to get along--the dynamic that’s currently there with Wilco--I mean I don’t have any inside information on anything, but I mean it seems to be the best dynamic he’s ever had, as far as there’s no visible tension between anybody. Everybody looks like they’re enjoying themselves as much as they �59 normally do. I mean he looks happier than he’s ever been on stage, you know, and I think it’s just finding the right fit of people. I mean like whatever these current personalities are, they work. And you’ve just got to find the right fit. KT: I mean one guy did kill himself. LH: Do you think he killed himself? KT: Didn’t he? LH: I thought he kind of died. KT: Of an accidental overdose? LH: Yeah. KT: Oh, okay, I shouldn’t say that. LH: No, no, no, what was his name, Jay--. KT: Jay Bennett. LH: Jay Bennett, yeah, yeah. I thought it was kind of an accidental thing, or like--. KT: I could be totally off on that, but I would think that the experience would be really--. LH: Stressful? KT: Very stressful, and I’m a huge fan, and you know, I saw Uncle Tupelo and absolutely loved him, and saw Tweedy shows before he formed Wilco, solo shows. LH: Oh, you saw some solo ones, oh, wow. KT: Yeah, in Chicago, and so--. LH: You think he’d be a nightmare to work with? KT: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. LH: Huh. �60 KT: I think he’s kind of a prick on the stage. LH: He is a prick. KT: Yeah. LH: I saw a solo show with him before, where he kind of just berated the audience. KT: Yeah. LH: I mean I don’t respect him for that, you know, there’s no reason where that should go down. Almost nothing happening should result in that kind of behavior, but there are aspects of him that I like, and that I recognize. I don’t feel like he’s in your face all the time, and he has that drive. KT: Right, in his defense, what he’s gotten out of his supporting cast has been absolutely brilliant. LH: Oh, yeah. KT: And he remakes himself continually. LH: He does evolve, and I like that. I like that his sound’s going to change from record to record usually. I don’t think it’s easy. I don’t think living in that lifestyle for as long as he has, that’s--I can’t imagine. But I don’t know, I’m okay with that. I don’t think being a prick to the audience is the right call, right direction to take, although I found it to be kind of funny when I saw it. Well, this guy in the audience kept saying, “It’s my birthday.” And Tweedy kind of looked over and said, “Do I care?” And it’s kind of the thing sometimes you wish you’d say that he kind of does. KT: Right, right. LH: But I mean on the other hand, you can’t really do that, you know, you got to-- �61 . KT: I’m sure you must be tempted though, you know, I mean a guy comes and takes the mike, after you’ve been driving twelve hours to play for eight people. LH: As much of a hot head I can get, and I’m learning more and more that I am a hot head--I try to not have public scenes, you know, like nobody needs to see that. Now if you need to go walk around the block and have a fit like around the corner, sure, take your time. But I mean like again, with that guy who came up, I don’t know, we’ll just keep going. I mean sure, there are certain things that I would probably not--you know, would shut down, but I don’t know, I feel like you’ve got to be--especially with people coming to your concerts and paying money to go see you, you’ve got to be cordial to some extent. And you’ve got to be present a little bit. Like I saw a couple of shows last year or the year before at the Performing Arts Center. Both bands, different shows, didn't know where they were, like thanking Charlotte, and thanking Charlottesville. And you’re like, you know what, I get it, you’re on the road, but you know what, I just paid fifty bucks, and you’re going to say, “Thank you Charlottesville. Oh, you ladies look good tonight.” Or something, I don’t know. KT: We’re so happy to be in Charlotte. LH: Yeah, and everybody in the audience is like oh. KT: That’s bad. LH: You know, I mean if that’s the worst that happens, that’s okay. Wow, now I’m going to have to think about Tweedy. I’m going to go home and think about him some. �62 KT: I mean I think I get your point, in terms of like band relation to the--you know, the central figure. LH: But he seems to take that position where he likes to have people that can do their job, you know, I need a guitar player. Well, let me go get Nels Cline if he’s interested. KT: And it creates a kind of healthy tension because his style is so distinct. LH: Yeah, and finding a balance between that distinct style and what’s already presented with Wilco, you know, and where does that fit in. I think he’s navigated that pretty well. I mean yeah, yeah, I’m okay with Jeff Tweedy, [01:56:40] if he wants to. KT: Any kind of final thoughts about anything? LH: Final thoughts, you know, I guess you know, when talking about directions, yeah, that’s the next thing is being more forethoughtful than just reactionary is kind of what’s on tap, and figuring out a plan, yeah. Talking about people moving all the time, it seems like I should be pretty good with change by now, like trying to just rebuild stuff. I was talking to somebody about spring the other day. I was like, “Spring is here; time for change. Time to redo stuff.” KT: Time to form a band. LH: I feel like I’ve been forming a band every year, for the last couple years. Maybe just sit and develop one for a little while is probably a good plan, instead of just trying something new, yeah. KT: Well, thank you for taking out the time. I mean this is wonderful to get to know more about you. LH: Well, thank you for listening. �63 KT: No, and I think there will be a lot of people who are interested in this. And you know, the other thing I didn't mention this, but we should probably--you know, once we get this digitized, we’ll figure out a way to link it to the website. LH: Okay. KT: Your website. LH: Oh, cool. KT: If you can think of any kind of use for this for--you know, professional stuff, you know, we’ll have to draw web traffic to it. LH: Oh, wow, that would be--who wants to listen to me talk for a couple of hours. It’s going to be funny. KT: Well, I certainly enjoyed it. LH: Well, thank you. Yeah, again, I’m not much of a talker, so this has probably been like the most I’ve talked in forever. Yeah, this will be good. KT: Great. Thank you. End of recording. Verified by Paul Garton Paul M. Garton, Inc. DBA The Transcript Co-op Date: April 4, 2013 LBP 8/29/13 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral Histories Description An account of the resource The oral histories in this collection were produced by The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel. Founded in 2008, The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel seeks to deepen understanding of the Lowcountry’s rich history and culture through the gathering and presentation of recorded memories from area residents.<br /><h3>Search Tips</h3> Interviews may be browsed by scrolling to the bottom of this page and selecting "View all items".<br /><br />When using the search bar, we recommend putting quotations around your search term, and selecting the Boolean search option, as illustrated here:<br /><p><img src="https://gdurl.com/aYPj" alt="aYPj" /><br /><br />To view interviews of a specific theme, please see the search tips in each series below.</p> <h3><strong>The Citadel in War and in Peace<br /></strong></h3> With generous support from the <a href="http://www.schumanities.org/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Humanities Council of South Carolina</a>, The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel collected thirty interviews with Citadel alumni regarding their experiences during WWII. Journalist and historian Jack Bass conducted the interviews during the Fall of 2008.They serve as a powerful testament to the veterans' experiences and their critical contributions to the war effort.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:</em><br /><ul><li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- World War II"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- Korean War"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- Vietnam War"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- The Second Gulf War"</li> <li>"The Citadel in War and in Peace -- The War in Afghanistan"</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Working Charleston</strong></h3> Working Charleston documents the on and off job experiences of the longshoremen and lawyers, the bartenders and carriage drivers, hospital aides and high tech workers who make Charleston among the nation's prime tourist destinations and vital centers of global trade.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:</em><br /><ul><li>"Working Charleston"</li> <li>"Charleston City Workers"</li> <li>"Lowcountry Foodways"</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Charleston and the Long Civil Rights Movement</strong></h3> <span><span>These interviews explore how community activism continues to shape modern life in the South.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:</em><br /></span></span> <ul><li>"Charleston and the Long Civil Rights Movement</li> <li>"Civil rights movement--South Carolina"</li> <li>"African Americans--Civil Rights--South Carolina--Charleston"</li> </ul><a target="_blank" href="https://citadeldigitalarchives.omeka.net/items/show/193" rel="noreferrer noopener"></a> <h3><strong>Las Voces del Lowcountry</strong></h3> <span><span>This project is designed to raise the profile of the Hispanic/Latinos who call the Lowcountry home and to promote a rational and humane conversation regarding immigration, education, and employment policies.<br /><br /><em>*To search interviews in this series, use the following terms utilizing the Boolean search option:<br /></em></span></span> <ul><li>"Las Voces del Lowcountry"</li> <li>"Latin Americans--Southern States"</li> <li>"Hispanic Americans--Southern States"</li> </ul> <h3><strong>Women in World War II</strong></h3> <em>*To search this series, type "Women in World War II" into the search bar, using the Boolean search option.<br /></em> <ul><li>"Women in World War II"</li> <li>"Women--Employment History"</li> <li>"World War, 1939-1945--Participation, female"</li> </ul> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Kieran Walsh Taylor Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Lindsay Holler Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 1 hour, 58 minutes Location The location of the interview Charleston, South Carolina Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Oral History of Lindsay Holler, interviewed by Kieran Walsh Taylor, 30 March, 2013 Subject The topic of the resource Women musicians--United States Musicians--Training of Music--Social aspects Description An account of the resource Born in Charleston, SC on September 11, 1976 and raised in nearby Pinopolis, Lindsay Holler is a singer, composer, and guitar player who has additionally been a strong advocate for local musicians and a fixture of the music scene. In this interview she recalls her musical influences, including her parents’ mainstream pop records and her brother’s enthusiasm for the Black Crows. In addition to playing flute in the middle school band and taking piano lessons, Holler also studied voice with opera singer June Bonner. That association led to a visit to Broadway at age 13, where she saw Gregory Hines and Phylicia Rashad in Jelly’s Last Jam. “I kind of fell in love with New York a little bit, and I was like, oh, man, that’s where I want to go,” Holler recalls. Following her high school graduation, Holler studied jazz at the Berklee College of Music before returning to Charleston to complete her musical education at the College of Charleston. She has recorded and performed with several locally-based groups, including the Dirty Kids, the Western Polaroids, and Matadero. Though often in the spotlight as the lead singer, Holler is ambivalent about the attention that it brings her and worries that that ambivalence may undermine her success: “Everybody is me, me, me, show me, let me show you, you know, it’s such a prevalent posture nowadays, where it’s in your face, and who’s going to be the loudest, and who is going to be the most out there, and that’s never been my thing. But I worry do you have to be like that in order to be successful?” <br />This interview is a part of the COHP’s “Working Charleston” series. Working Charleston documents the on and off job experiences of the longshoremen and lawyers, the bartenders and carriage drivers, hospital aides and high tech workers who make Charleston among the nation’s prime tourist destinations and vital centers of global trade. The digital recordings and transcripts are part of The Citadel Oral History Program Collection at The Citadel Archives &amp; Museum.<br /><br /><h3><strong><a target="_blank" href="http://lcdl.library.cofc.edu/lcdl/catalog/lcdl:63997" rel="noreferrer noopener">Listen to the audio on the Lowcountry Digital Library.</a></strong></h3> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource The Charleston Oral History Program at the Citadel Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Working Charleston Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available The Citadel Archives & Museum Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2013-03-30 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Materials in The Citadel Archives & Museum Digital Collections are intended for educational and research use. The user assumes all responsibility for identifying and satisfying any claimants of copyright. For more information contact The Citadel Archives & Museum, The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina, 29409. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context https://citadeldigitalarchives.omeka.net/items/show/182 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Charleston (S.C.)