By Zac Taylor
Managing Editor

Photos by Tom Moore

At 20 years old, Seth Glier has already made quite a name for himself as touring singer-songwriter. After leaving Berklee in 2008, Glier has been all over the country playing everywhere from coffee houses to theatres. After being recently picked up by MPRess Records, his label debut The Trouble with People has just been beautifully remixed by Grammy-winner Kevin Killen, and he is excited to release it to his Boston fans at Club Passim on November 25.

The traveling minstrel took some time in between stops on his tour to have a telephone interview with BerkleeGroove.com to talk about the ins and outs of his current lifestyle, alma mater, and big bro.

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By Travis Lund
Contributing Writer

If you’re at all familiar with the prolific output of the Boston folk scene over the past two decades, Kris Delmhorst’s name probably rings a bell or two. A perennial favorite at the Boston Music Awards, Delmhorst has released five solo albums, two EPs, two excellent collaboration records (Vinyl Avenue String Band; Redbird), and toured extensively all over the US and Europe. Her breathy vocal delivery and poignant, edgy songs have engendered a large following, and garnered praise from Performing Songwriter, The Irish Times, NPR Radio, and many other corners. The Groove got the recent opportunity to catch up with Kris just before she begins a brief tour through New England and Europe, including a show this Thursday at the Red Room at Café 939.

Groove: Thanks so much for taking the time to talk with us today. You’ve obviously drawn your songwriting style from a wide range of influences, including non-musical areas, so I’d like to begin by throwing out a few categories and get your responses, be they favorites or just things you’ve been into recently. Firstly: Authors.

Kris Delmhorst: Oh, that’s tough. I’m not someone who has a lot of favorites, I’ve read so many things. Also I just had a child, so I haven’t been reading a lot lately for obvious reasons, but most recently I’ve been rereading a lot of Faulkner, and some Cormac McCarthy and Marilynne Robinson.

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By Zac Taylor
Managing Editor

Jon, Ryan, Aaron, Jeff, & Carlo

Power-Pop-Punk Quintet Westland has been trailblazing all across the west coast and elsewhere, making a name for themselves on the national scene. How did they make the leap from jamming in high school and meeting at Berklee to getting some notable sponsorship deals and slots at major festivals? Hard-hitting drummer and Berklee alumnus Carlo Ribaux brings The Groove up to speed. Read the full story

Lissy Trullie. Photo by Jay Hanna.

By Zac Taylor

Managing Editor

Lissy Trullie is a name you may not have heard of if you aren’t a snooty Manhattan fashionista music snob. Not because her crooning indie tunes cater to this clientele— it’s just an unfortunate byproduct of being the next ‘it’ girl out of New York City. She and her band have been touring the east coast, browsing thrift stores in Europe, staving off swine flu, and working on some new material to follow up her recent EP Self-Taught Learner, the contents of which is as engaging as its cover art. The track “Boy Boy” will be stuck in your head before you can say ‘Williamsburg Bridge.’

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By Liz Turner
Contributing Writer

If you grew up in the 1990’s, you may remember hearing Duncan Sheik’s “Barely Breathing” as it soared to the top of the charts. But since that foray into mainstream success, Duncan Sheik has now taken his music and imagination to an entirely different genre: musical theater. Over a period of eight years, Duncan Sheik worked with acclaimed director Steven Sater on writing a rock musical based on the controversial German play Spring Awakening by Frank Wedekind.

Spring Awakening opened on Broadway in December of 2006, and soon achieved popular success, particularly among young musical theater fans. Sheik won two Tony awards for Best Orchestrations and Best Original score, and a third award also went to the cast of Spring Awakening for Best Musical. A year later, Sheik also won a Grammy award for Best Musical Show album. After playing 888 performances to sold-out audiences on Broadway, Spring Awakening closed on January 18th, 2009. I had the great opportunity to meet up with Sheik last week while he was in town and ask him what he has been up to since Spring Awakening closed.

Duncan Sheik was at the Berklee Performance Center on March 13 performing songs off of his new album Whisper House, Spring Awakening as well as his own solo material. Whisper House is a new musical that Sheik and playwright Kyle Jarrow have been working on about a young boy whose father dies in World War II, and then goes to live with his aunt in a haunted lighthouse in New England. Ghosts of the lighthouse (played by the musicians of the show) appear and are the embodiments of all of the young boy’s fears and desires.

Joining Duncan Sheik on his tour are original Spring Awakening cast member Lauren Pritchard and promising singer-songwriter Holly Brook. The band members consist of Duncan on vocals and guitar, Gerry Leonard on guitar, Louis Schwadron on French horn, Lauren Pritchard and Holly Brook singing and playing keys, and cello, clarinet, bass and drums. The instrumentation brings unique sounds to Sheik’s compositions, which span a range of genres including pop, rock, folk, and classical. I asked Sheik if there are any plans for Whisper House to become a staged musical and he said that they are working on a small, intimate production of Whisper House to debut in San Diego sometime in January of 2010.

Throughout his career, Sheik has tried to stay true to himself. “I wasn’t going to go off and try to be Steven Sondheim,” he said. “It wouldn’t be authentic, and I wanted to write music for young people in the contemporary world, to do theater where the music was relevant to a wider culture.”

With the current economic hardships and many shows unable to afford to stay open on Broadway I asked Sheik what he currently thought of Broadway. “Broadway is going to be just fine” he replied. “ It doesn’t matter what the economy is doing. In fact when the economy goes bad is when people start going to the movies and theater a lot more, they want to be taken away from their troubles for a few hours.”

Duncan Sheik grew up listening to a wide variety of artists ranging from Mark Hollis of Talk Talk, Bjork, Radiohead, Peter Gabriel, Genesis, The Cure, Yes, Nick Drake, and John Martin. He also reminisced about seeing David Sylvian of the indie band, Japan at the Berklee Performance Center, when he was at the boarding school, Phillips Andover, just 25 miles north of Boston.

Duncan Sheik ended our interview with some advice to aspiring musicians. “It’s not usually a great thing to try and second guess what other people are going to like and want to listen to. Just because something is a commercial success, it doesn’t mean you should follow, imitate, or re-create that exact path. Music is always made best when someone has a unique and different point of view.” “I’ve also found in my own process whenever I’ve tried to do things for more commercial reasons, they have been very disappointing, and then when I’ve done things for purely artistic reasons, the irony is that those are the things other people seem to like much more.”

He also confirmed for us that the rumors are true: Spring Awakening will be made into a motion picture sometime in the near future. Spring Awakening has just opened up in Vienna and also in the West End of London. It will also be making its way to Boston as part of its North American National Tour. Spring Awakening will be playing at Boston’s Colonial Theater April 28 to May 24 2009. For student rush tickets visit the box office one hour before the show with your student ID, to receive a ticket for $25 or visit broadwayacrossamerica.com for more details.

Helena Costas, aka Joker's Daughter. Photo by Stephen Dowling.

By Zac Taylor
Editor-in-Chief

Joker’s Daughter, the moniker of the ethereal synth pop band fronted by UK-based Helena Costas, has just released a highly anticipated debut full-length album entitled The Last Laugh. A collaboration with acclaimed producer Danger Mouse of Gnarls Barkley, the record has a sonic and emotional depth that pulls you in and out of her dark, mystical world. As the featured new artist of New York Indie Label Team Love (Bright Eyes, Jenny Lewis), Joker’s Daughter has some serious momentum.

I started with Logic Audio creations and he would build on them. When he was over in London doing the Gorillaz album, we would work together on his laptop on songs that I recorded at home. He also used a MIDI keyboard which he would play around with and record his ideas. One of the songs, which is also the oldest, was recorded in LA when I was over there for a week at his studio back in 2003.

ZT: Did you use mainly samples for the orchestral sounds or real strings?

HC: Danger Mouse used the Sonus Quartet to record live strings on the album which I absolutely loved and it created such texture in the songs that I could not record. There are also parts where I play the violin experimentally, and some samples were used too.

ZT: How important is this production to the emotional impact and weight of the songs?

HC: Enormously! The different layers fill in the gaps of the initial skeleton parts of the songs. It brings them all alive.

ZT: How has your songwriting style evolved leading up to this record?

HC: My style has shifted significantly. When I compare my first songs to what I write now, I have grown to realize what my strengths are in writing and tried to evolve them—I will always learn something new and be constantly changing. The songs on this album were picked from material over five years so the diversity in styles are prominent. Sometimes I like to crossover styles, I don’t like to set boundaries as I think songwriting for me is about playing with inspiration and allowing for any possibilities.

ZT: Do you keep a notebook, or record quick ideas into a laptop, etc?

HC: I’ve got a notebook for lyrics, and I also record my guitar strumming and singing onto my blackberry Dictaphone, it’s easily reachable for quick ideas.

ZT: With regards to your early classical training, how much of it do you actively use in your current compositions? Does it ever get in the way?

HC: Because the training was at such an early age, I don’t think it affected the spontaneity that goes with not being classically literate as it were. I improvise more than I calculate when it comes to the actual music-making process. I can have the best of both worlds where I can use the classical training that I had to be able to hear string arrangements and want to use them but in a way that can be experimented with. So no it never gets in the way—on the contrary, it enhances the creative process.

ZT: How do you prepare to make the songs and overall stage show shine and keep the audience engaged in your world?

HC: I did have quite a theatrical image in my head of how I could perform these songs on stage, with multiple visions flying around. I want to convey the sounds you hear on the album as much as possible, and I’d like to have more visuals to create the illusions in some of the songs that are fantasy-ridden. I will be experimenting to see what works and what doesn’t. Initially, I think it will be a simple affair…for now that is.

ZT: How has working with Team Love been with regards to the UK, US, and elsewhere?

HC: Team Love have been great. They have been able to see the vision for this album from the start and have trusted both Danger Mouse and I in the whole album making process and just let us get on with it, which I was very thankful for.

ZT: Your debut record comes out tomorrow—congratulations.

HC: Thank you very much!

ZT: What aces do you have up your sleeve from here on out? Are you looking forward to touring?

HC: An Ace of Wands for a creative adventure, and an Ace of Cups for flying high but staying grounded. Touring will be great fun.

ZT: What will the live act consist of?

HC: The live act will probably consist of a few other musicians on stage and myself. I want to recreate as much of the sound you hear on the album as possible so there may be laptops involved too.

Annie Clark lounging backstage at The Red Room. Photo by Molly BrolinGroove Exclusive: St. Vincent

By Zac Taylor & Ann Driscoll

On April 13, Annie Clark, a.k.a. St. Vincent, played a private, intimate show at Café 939 to a seated audience. Business Professor Jeff Dorenfeld was responsible for the invited guest list, among which was Newbury Comics CCO Duncan Browne. The nimble Clark strolled onto the stage and said, “Thanks for coming to the open mic,” with a sly grin before tearing into her first number. Banging away on a Fender Jaguar with an army of loopers, stompboxes, and an auxiliary vocal mic for distorted phrases, the chanteuse created sparkling, verb-drenched tapestries that elevated her songs to sonic compositions.

A former sidekick for The Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Stevens, as a well as a Berklee alumna, the multi-instrumentalist songstress has got the magical ‘it.’ She occasionally set the guitar down and played some ballads on piano, like the title track off of her 2007 LP Marry Me, riffing with the crowd with an unabashed, unflinching stage presence between, and even during songs. She closed the set with a tune off of her new record Actor called “Marrow,” which had everyone humming afterwards.

The full band version of St. Vincent will be performing at the Somerville Theater May 19. After doing some meet and greets with some important music business clientele in the audience, Annie Clark was kind enough to chat with The Groove.

Zac Taylor: You made a few Berklee cracks during your set—that was cute.

Annie Clark: I did. You got to represent.

ZT: How long were you here?

AC: Three years.

ZT: Did you feel well-prepared?

AC: I think it’s good to learn as much as you can, then get out and unlearn as much as you can.

ZT: What would you have done differently on your first EP Ratsliveonnoevilstar? Were you still at Berklee when you made it?

AC: It was horrible. I did that my sophomore year or something. I haven’t listened to that in a really long time. I would say I should have put a little more Bill Callahan and a little less Herbie Hancock in it.

ZT: Did you really come to Berklee with 2s [for your ratings] and leave with 2s?

AC: Totally. I wasn’t a very good student. What’s the magic secret? Oh— Practicing.

ZT: I think tighter jeans and cigarettes works better than practicing around here. And blogging a lot.

AC: Really? Everybody blogs?

Ann Driscoll: And Twitters. Are you into twittering?

AC: I have to be honest—I started twittering, and I feel very uncomfortable about it. No one cares if I’m like, “Woke up. Ate a bagel.” My life is very boring. I would never want people to know how boring it is.

ZT: Did you go straight to Brooklyn from Berklee?

AC: I did. Then I ran out of money and moved back to Texas. It’s really expensive.

ZT: A lot of kids here are planning to make the move to New York to pursue music. What are some tricks of the trade on how to survive?

AC: I’m the worst person to ask, because I didn’t survive. I ran out of money. Sold a guitar to pay rent, which was way dumb. And then moved back to Texas. I only moved back to Brooklyn a year and a half ago, when I could afford to live there and not have to sell guitars. I’m not like a high roller or something. So I have no idea, because I tried and failed. So I wouldn’t ask me.

ZT: So you moved back to Texas, saved some money, and recorded some stuff?

AC: Yeah. I joined this band the Polyphonic Spree and finished the Marry Me record, and toured a bunch, then wrote with Sufjan, and then blah blah blah. And then started touring with my own St. Vincent thing a whole lot starting in 2007.

AD: So it’s really not that important to move to New York or LA, you can do it from Texas or a variety of locations.

AC: Yeah. I certainly know a lot of musicians in New York now, but I feel like I kind of know them because we’re on the same label, not because I necessarily know them as organically as I would have if I was like, “Oh yeah—I saw you at the open mic.” I know that people can do that and totally make it work, but I have no idea how to do that.

ZT: How’d you hook up with Sufjan Stevens?

AC: I had done about half of the Marry Me record, and he had heard it and liked it, and I had just agreed to work with Billions Corporation, which is his agency, and so many other bands. I kind of sought out the Billions Corporation, because I looked at their roster—Antony [and the Johnsons], Joanna Newsom, and Sufjan. It was like all my favorite artists ever.

ZT: Working with Producer John Congleton on Actor—

AC: Johnny C. We’re getting married. Could you start spreading that rumor?

ZT: We’ll tweet it for you. But you seem to be quite a savvy sound technician yourself. What was it like working with him? Did you reach a happy medium? Was he the boss or were you the boss?

AC: I think any good producer-artist/co-producer relationship has nothing to do with someone assholishly asserting their ego. It’s all about a common goal. We can sometimes disagree about what it would take to get there, but there’s no throwing your weight around. That’s a weird thing to put into a communicative situation. You both want the ship to sail. You just resolve to both commit to that, and not have an ego about it.

ZT: How much of the production and the arrangement is preplanned and how much do you experiment?

AC: All of the clarinet stuff, and all of the orchestral parts I arranged before recording. They were all put together, I knew what I was doing with those.

AD: What do you use to demo your ideas?

AC: I use Garageband and Logic. I wrote a lot of the music for the record in Logic. Technology. Awesome.

AD: How many pedals do you have?

AC: Too many. The pedals that I’m using right now are a fraction of what I own. Which is disgusting. It’s totally unnecessary. But it’s like Tourette’s or something. I can’t stop.

ZT: What year Jaguar do you have?

AC: That’s a weird Frankenstein Jaguar that I found at this place in Tuscon. I managed to find that guitar for like $200, and I think it’s Japanese, which is probably a rip-off. It’s kind of a monster of a guitar. Somebody did this really wonky job putting in new pickups. So some of the wiring and knobs don’t even work. It’s a guitar I don’t mind abusing, or being really brutal with. Not because I didn’t pay a lot for it, that’s the nature of that guitar. It just wants to be beat up.

ZT: Kurt Cobain would have been proud.

AC: It wants to be abused, and it has a whammy bar. Which is necessary.

ZT: Coming out of the gate of Berklee, what’s some general advice you have as far as the craft of songwriting? Did you scribble in a notebook for hours? Were you out gigging? What was your priority?

AC: Well, I knew I wanted to make an album, and release an album. I didn’t have any idea if anyone would hear it or any sense of that. But part of life is being moderately prepared at the right time at the right place. But I would say there’s not like a theorem or a formula or anything, except to just do what you really love to do, and follow that. Whatever makes you feel really awesome about yourself, about life—do that. And keep doing that. And keep doing that. And the other stuff, the ephemeral, and the things that are out of your control, will remain out of your control. Always. So focus on the things you can control. Make music that you love and believe in it. I know it sounds cheesy, but there’s not a shortcut in that regard. And in the process of doing that, you typically attract like-minded people.

AD: What’s your take on the music industry? How’s it treating you? Do you think it will recover? Is it possible to really be successful?

AC: Totally. There are so many tools at your disposal. Maybe the idea of the big father record company whose going to roll up, pork barrel, and there going to be tons of money flowing like wine—that’s not happening, because that’s not a very successful business model. But there are still labels that are thriving, and still booking agencies that are thriving. Because a $12 ticket—people can prioritize that if they want some escape. I think it’s changing but there will always be a supply and a demand.

AD: Well that’s encouraging.

AC: Totally. It’s not like the 80s. The idea of the ‘rock star’ I don’t think really exists anymore. Maybe Nickelback. Maybe that’s something.

ZT: The music video you made for “Actor out of Work” is really cool.  But music videos aren’t really commercials for records anymore. So you have a beautiful video and website, and an excellent internet presence. What excites you the most about the way this industry’s changing? How are you capitalizing on that the best?

AC: I’m with a label called 4AD, who I really like, and everyone there is good at their job, and smart, and totally capable—and I kind of let them think about that. I used to do a blog, which was kind of okay, and I twitter, so I try to keep current, but I’m in my late-mid twenties, so things are changing and I feel like I’m older. I guess it means more access for people. There are a lot ways to get your thing out there. And I twitter. Usually about the bagel.

By Ann Driscoll
Associate Editor

Cris Williamson, a pioneering folk singer-songwriter and activist, will visit Berklee next week for a three-day residency. Williamson was at the forefront of the women’s music movement, which began in the early 1970s. Her landmark album The Changer and the Changed sold over 500,000 copies and broke new ground by openly exploring lesbian themes. Along with several other activists, she founded Olivia Records, the first independent label run by women with the goal of releasing records by female artists.

Speaking by phone from her home in Seattle, Williamson shared her thoughts on songwriting and social justice with the Groove.

Ann Driscoll: What has been your association with Berklee? Are you excited to visit?

Cris Williamson: I’ve played at the BPC in the past. It’s been many years now. I certainly know it as a fine institution. I wish I myself had gone to a school like that. It’s interesting to come back to it now. I’m thrilled to even come there. It’s gonna be awesome.

AD: What kind of advice do you plan on giving to students, especially to young lesbian musicians who look up to you? What do you want them to take away from your residency at Berklee?

CW: Being a lesbian came so much later in my career because I started when I was 16. I didn’t fall in with the feminist world until my mid-twenties. Before that I was in rock ‘n’ roll, folk music, and standards. I took voice lessons. Nobody taught me to write a song. Politics taught me about politics. Living in a world where all our leaders were assassinated one by one. It entrenched me in the left. When I became a feminist, I further honed a humanist consciousness, which is now a feminist leaning. The overriding element that led me into music is the human condition, that we are all alike. That’s why different styles of music appeal- it’s either good music or not. I listen to everything. I’m widely read in music as well as literature. And, so my approach to music is to speak as though we were all creatures who come to a water hole, in a clearing, in the wilderness. And everybody deserves the water, and the water to me is music. And that’s what brings us all human beings together. And I think music should bring people together and not drag them apart.

AD: What would be an example of music that drags people apart?

CW: An example of that is where it’s so deliberately laden with obscure lyrics and style, so that you feel you didn’t belong there. Jazz and opera used to be that way. They were associated with class, but now they’re not. Everyone can listen. If it moves you, it moves you. If it doesn’t, let’s move onto something else that does. As a writer, it’s really important to come from the personal and aim for the universal. We all need to speak one language. We all need to agree. It furthers people to escalate differences. It’s harder to sell peace very well.
AD: We’ve just come out of two terms of George W. Bush. Is making political music different now that Obama has been elected? What is the tone of the music you want to create in the age of Obama?

CW: There’s the danger of preaching to the choir. The thing about either side, whether it’s the left or the right, is that the left will sing to the left, and the right will sing to the right. What about the middle way? Somewhere in the middle lies the truth of either side.

As you say, it’s easy for us to be politically aligned because we had a common enemy in Bush. Now the common enemy is poverty. From that is going to come more compassion from countries who labor constantly in the realms of poverty, who don’t have water, who are racked with disease, who know no medicine.
The obvious problem is that we had somebody in the White House who never thought about anything. He was placed there for just that reason so that the shadow government behind him could operate efficiently as a business: government as the corporation. And then they all walk off as millionaires and leave us with two wars that nobody wanted that has to get cleaned up somehow and our tax money, which people are struggling to have to pay anyway, is going to have to pay the bonuses and salaries of the corporations. The powers that be set it up so that we could never regulate those agencies, like AIG, which is an insurance company that operates like a bank.

It was not Obama’s fault. He was left with it. I don’t know. He at least is a man of decent intelligence and his reach is based in people. People put him there. The next generation put him there. The young people: you live in that world of computer-generated reality- of grassroots internet mobilization.

We dropped out of the middle class, and tried to live tribally, because our innocence died, due to our leaders, who crushed our hope. It was hard to not feel cynical. For me, to come back and teach, and be a musician, and I want to say to people, making music is compassionate. The raison d’etre of music is not to make money. Music eases things. It’s a miraculous thing.

AD: What is your take on music that is not uplifting? Some of the greatest music that has been created is sad. What is your take?

CW: Music is a prism of the heart. If you pass the pain through that prism, it’s refracted through fractals of emotion. One of those can be anger. One of those can be incredible pain, all embodied in music. It doesn’t have to stay pent up. Once it’s out, it’s out.

Some people are more inclined towards down. I’m more inclined towards up. So, when I listen to reggae, that’s revolutionary, spiritual, and danceable. It’s anchored in the offbeat- the bass on two and four. All music is just patterns: musical patterns, word patterns. It’s how you arrange the patterns that leads to your style. My friend Bonnie Raitt is a great blues player, but I always feel exalted when I hear her play- she passes it through that prism, and it’s positive.

Music can help heal the sadness of the world- it’s clinically proven. People write me, and say “you’ve saved my life.” Never forget for one minute, somebody may listen to your music, so be careful. What’s the effect you want here? Do you want to unite people, or split them? I like people to think and I like people to come to their own conclusions. It’s very philosophical. I don’t start out with savior behavior. Save yourself, before you save the world, as if you saved the world. It’s existential. The Buddhists say “you can’t clean up the world but don’t stop trying. Don’t suffer over your own suffering.”

The harder song to write is the happy song. It’s easy to write the sad song. When you’re happy you don’t need to write one. You’re just being in the world. It’s when we feel alienated that we have to write. So we can belong somewhere. We’re caught between the devils and angels. It’s cellular; it’s visceral. Give people a place to perch. Do I want them to understand it? Yes. It doesn’t mean I don’t have personal, eclectic mythology, but I try to put the jewels in the right setting, so people can grasp your meaning. They don’t have to understand your whole thing. The songs that last forever are simply made, they’re simple stories- people sneer at that. But that’s the music that lasts. That’s Dvorak who used the folk melodies. Obama is like a folk song. He’s the best of us right now.

AD: Who is at the forefront of music these days? Who are some upcoming artists you enjoy listening to?

CW: I haven’t been listening to anybody. I’ve been listening to birds, I’ve been walking in silence. I’ve been listening to classical music. If I have music on, it’s classical. In my car, I have been listening over and over to a James Taylor album. I love Joni Mitchell. I love so many artists that I think are truly great. Recently, because I’ve been writing so much, I try to write out of silence and space. If I’m stuck for a groove, I’ll slip around on various radio stations. I’ll borrow liberally from everywhere. I need to remember the notes the chickadee is singing. It whistles notes. I hear music coming out of rivers, out of the wind. I hear a lot of nature.

AD: Earlier you talked about how the raison d’etre of music shouldn’t be to make money, but what has been your experience in the music industry in terms of earning a living?

CW: It’s hard. Right now I don’t have much money. Coming to Berklee is a great gig for me. It’s business, but it’s my absolute pleasure. I think of myself more as a trader. Women don’t have money. When we first started, women would give whatever they could for our music; sometimes that was a dollar. Gradually, the prices would go up and up, just to match the standard of living.

I’m not a wealthy woman. I could have been. I had a major album. My album traveled to DC where a group of lesbians heard it. Meg Christian, one of these women, knew my album by heart. These women knew all my music- the music had traveled where I had not been. I had no idea what women’s music was. Feminism was still sort of theoretical at that point. There weren’t very many books about women. And Meg had this idea, and they did an interview with me, and it was on one of the very first women’s radio shows. They started asking me about sexism in the music industry that I had experienced. I hadn’t had hideous experiences in terms of sexism. I’ve been lucky- fortunate in fact. It was men who had lifted me up and put me in the industry in the first place- had invested in me. I said why don’t you start a women’s record company? And they did the next day.

Women didn’t have much experience. There weren’t women in bands or orchestras; all the engineers were men. We crashed through a whole membrane of things. We did Meg’s album. We did the Changer and the Changed. We pressed 500 of them; they sold so fast. They sold out in a matter of days. I produced it. I never produced anything in my life.

A Christian-far-right studio gave us, a bunch of lesbians, a locked studio. So we could make our own mistakes and nobody could make us feel bad about it. And we did it and we learned how to do it! And we gave each other permission to do it. So we just made something up and it turned out to be a really viable alternative. After that, I cruised. I worked all the time. I was on the road all the time. We all helped create a whole batch of women artists who said “Why can’t we do it?” Now everyone can have their own label. It’s all back in the heads of the people. It’s a better thing. It’s a greater thing.

AD: Were you in touch with the other people at the forefront of folk music and feminism? People like Dylan and Steinem?

CW: They were all working. We didn’t have hang-out time. Dylan was in another league all together. Gloria and I have met and we know each other. We’ve never hung out. I’ve hung with the circle that was around Janis Joplin. I was a hippie in Northern California at the same time that all of these movements were happening- while all these things were all getting borne. Of course, I listened to Dylan and Steinem! How brilliant she still is. What a fine human being Gloria Steinem is and she’s changed the world. And I, in my way, also changed the world. I would never put myself in their league. I was so independent, because I became known as a lesbian singer. But my music isn’t so heavy on gender or queer politics because it’s about the human condition.

AD: What was it like being gay back then? Were there places you could go and hang out?

CW: There were gay bars, and there were lesbian bars. The only ones I ever went in were in San Francisco and they were famous. Maude’s, for instance. I was never really comfortable in them because I didn’t drink. It was like hunting. People were hunting and I felt like prey. That aspect is always there. We started doing concerts at Unitarian churches and they let us into their churches and we started doing concerts there. The power of women in a room is huge. Not hunting but there to be together. The Michigan Womyn’s Festival, for example, is amazing. It’s so professional.

AD: Do you think it’s easier to get attention if you’re an out artist? Does it help or hurt you?

CW: Well, it’s lesbian chic. It became chic. But there were only two of them. Melissa Etheridge and k.d. lang. But it’s still the boys’ money behind them. The difference between that and the Michigan Womyn’s Festival is that it’s women’s money. It’s all women running it, and the only thing the men do is clean the toilets.

Next Wednesday, April 8, Williamson will speak at a panel discussion, which will include the screening of excerpts from Radical Harmonies, a documentary chronicling the women’s music movement. The panel will be held at The Loft at 939 Boylston from 2:30-4:30. Williamson will also perform a free show for students on April 9, at 8:00 p.m at Café 939.