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Much Time, No Pressure
By Tom Lanham
he truth is out there, believes Rachael Yamagata. For any young artist curious enough to ask the right questions, rethink the major-music-label power structure, and ultimately willing to do the legwork involved in reimagining yourself as an independent DIY musician, the life-changing answers will become selfevident. For her inventive new fourth fulllengther, Tightrope Walker, she broke so many rules of conventional recording wisdom, she can barely remember them all. After playing the major-label game via her Private Music / Arista-issued 2004 debut Happenstance, she partnered with PledgeMusic to fund her third, 2011’ s Chesapeake, then teamed with the crowdsourcing company again two years ago for her latest. And she auctioned off virtually everything but the kitchen sink.
Why beg some big shot A & R executive for the money to underwrite your latest collection of songs? she reasoned. A Sword-of-Damocles advance that you’ ll eventually have to pay back, no matter how well said record should sell? Through sites like PledgeMusic and KickStarter, performers can tap directly into their fan base and offer one-on-one premiums in exchange for album-financing donations. What can you put up for sale?“ I think it’ s just up to how creative you want to be with your ideas,” says Yamagata, 39, who was a local star in Chicago band Bumpus.“ The world is your oyster.
“ And in terms of what fans want to be part of, the more you can put into that initial stage of setting things up, the better,” she adds.“ I see some people offering a dinner, and the artist will cook for you, and if I could cook, I would do that. But there are so many interesting ways to connect with people, and it’ s a great system to
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invite someone into your world, and also, they’ re there to become part of your ability to pull something off. And you learn as you go.” The premiums for Tightrope Walker were like platinum-card premiums for serious Yamagata fans, and certainly must-owns for any completist. Depending on your donation amount, you could get your greedy mitts on: A coveted collection of covers, including Janis Ian’ s“ At Seventeen,” and 10CC’ s“ I’ m Not In Love”; A 17-track anthology of demos, outtakes, B-sides, and alternate song versions; Or a quiescent re-recording of Happenstance, with all cuts done acoustically. And that was just for starters.
“ By the end of this Pledge process – if you count the new record itself – I delivered almost five albums’ worth of material,” the singer says.“ It’ s been intense, and it’ s been the most extensive campaign I’ ve ever done, for sure.” But there was one high-priced item that sold out within hours of being posted – ten‘ Songs for You,’ wherein she would compose a number specifically about the purchaser themselves, who were asked to submit a onepage biography for Yamagata’ s inspiration.“ I’ ve written them all, and I’ ve recorded seven out of ten,” she says, proudly.“ And sometimes, the songs include very specific items from their particular story, sometimes I went a bit more broad. But there were always these really interesting kernels of phrases or ideas for just beautiful moments.”
People would apologize to their idol for not being that imaginative, she sighs.“ But I never believed them – it’ s just a matter of finding the channel that you’ re best at, because the beautiful things that people would just say when they were telling their story were really inspiring. And I spent a ton of time – maybe four to five hours – on each writing, and then a full day in the studio, trying to figure out the best presentation of it.”
How would the tunesmith cope with, say, someone named Aloysius?“ Oh, my God!” she guffaws.“ Easy –‘ Aloysius / Liked the fishes!’ But there was a lot of passion behind people’ s stories, and they were very honest and vulnerable. And particularly with my fans, things aren’ t always easy in what they’ re trying to express.” That’ s why they are drawn to her music in the first place, she thinks – she’ s always been equally intrigued by both the dark and light sides of topics, issues.“ So my hope is that I took the best wishes that everybody would have in a difficult situation, and presented them truthfully without adding fuel to the fire. I think I found a way that that worked, for all of our best selves to come out in these ten songs. Because there were some situations that were heated or emotional. But for me, as a songwriter, it made it all the more interesting.”
Yamagata says that she hasn’ t sent these coveted prizes out just yet – she’ s working on the legal copywriting / publishing ramifications, should said folks proudly start uploading their ostensibly private material. And it’ s tricky, she confesses. She stands firmly behind these unusual works, and has thought several steps ahead, as in, would it be possible to one day assemble them all as a fullfledged, fan-blessed Rachael Yamagata album? And will her subjects insist that she play them their songs live, when her tour hits their town? All good food for thought, she muses.“ In general, the response to this idea has just been pure excitement, though,” she says.“ Just knowing that an artist they admire is paying them that kind of concentrated attention to do their story. It’ s one of the coolest things. So if there’ s a way to do more of this, I will. I mean, can you imagine I could call up Barbara Streisand and go,‘ Hey – can you write about me?’ I, for one, would be really, really excited.”
But wait. There’ s more! The shrewd songstress also auctioned off handwritten lyrics to her various anthems. And not dusty old scrapbook tatters of original, hastily scrawled snippets from the original sessions, she clarifies. But all-new, carefully-drawn exercises in calligraphy that took her nearly an hour to ink, per songs. One of her cuts was so wordy that she was crossing her cramped fingers that no one would request it( they didn’ t; bullet dodged).“ The handwritten lyrics, I think, have become a really nice keepsake for the fan to have, especially if the lyrics are really speaking to them – plus, they look nice,” she explains.“ But they really hurt your hand, so you’ ve got to stagger them a little bit. But I did each one individually, and there were hundreds.”
The multi-instrumentalist won’ t pinpoint exactly how lucrative this venture was for her. It was quite a healthy amount, is all she’ ll confess. But it came with some harsh realities that newcomers should be aware of.“ It was very fruitful, but it’ s also very expensive to handle the shipping and the manufacturing,” she elaborates.“ I’ d like to contribute something more in-depth that lays it out a little bit, because I’ m not sure everyone understands the realities of just how expensive it can be to market and promote and tour. I’ ve talked to a lot of artists( post crowd-funding) who are like,‘ God – I made all this money, but then where did it go?’ So I’ ve learned a lot over the past couple of years about budgets.”
Somehow, though, after spending time in Chicago, Yamagata managed to purchase a house on 12 woodsy acres in Woodstock, NY, which she and her sound engineer / boyfriend converted to a home studio. This allowed for even more creative freedom, leading to Tightrope, her most experimental effort to date. It opens on the bluesy, skeletal title track, which relates the story of an aerialist drawn to the inherent danger of his craft.“ Some people think he’ s crazy / Some people want him to fall,” she sings in her signature smoky, sultry murmur, in a metaphor for her own acrobatic career as a self-reliant singer-songwriter. The stomp-clanking“ Nobody” follows, with her voice descending into darker, more sinister love-as-addiction territory, leading into a jittery“ EZ Target,” a Leonard Cohen-forlorn“ Break Apart,” the symphonic dirge“ I’ m Going Back,” and a straightforward folk ballad written for her Japanese-American father, who just retired,“ Black Sheep.”“ Money Fame Thunder” closes the set out in classy processional style, and – as it reprises certain key lyrics from“ Tightrope Walker” itself-- plays like a case study of those three subjects on an average aspiring Joe, who may or may not be prepared for any of them. And it brings the record full circle, back to its cynical beginnings.
Yes, Yamagata agrees, it is her most inventive work, to date.“ And it comes from, well, not having a plan,” she snickers.“ We’ ve created this home studio where there are no time limits, and we have an amazing group of musicians up here in Woodstock, and we just called them in. So in a very organic setting, we could be very experimental.” Talents like Kevin Salem,
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