November 18, 2025 • 47 mins
When S.G. Goodman released her debut album, Old Time Feeling, in 2020, critics hailed it as a stunning introduction to a bold new voice in Americana. Co-produced with Jim James of My Morning Jacket, the album showcased Goodman's ability to balance classic Southern sounds with progressive ideas, earning widespread acclaim and landing on numerous year-end best-of lists.
S.G. was raised in Hickman, Kentucky, in a family of row crop farmers and storytellers. That upbringing shaped her worldview and her songwriting—she sings about small-town living with both deep affection and clear-eyed critique.
Now, with her third album, Planting By The Signs, S.G. continues to mine rich themes like love, loss, and reconciliation. The record is inspired in part by the ancient tradition of farming according to the cycles of the moon—a practice passed down through generations in her family.
On today's episode, Bruce Headlam talks to S.G. Goodman about growing up in a family of storytellers and how that tradition makes its way into her songwriting. She also discusses co-producing her latest album and how she was able to make a bigger, more atmospheric-sounding record. And she performs the song "I'm In Love" live.
You can hear a playlist of some of our favorite songs from S.G. Goodman HERE.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin. When SG Goodman released her debut album, Old Time
Feeling in twenty twenty, critics hailed it as a stunning
introduction to a bold new voice in Americana. Co Produced
with Jim James of My Morning Jacket, the album showcased
Goodman's ability to balance classic Southern sounds with progressive ideas,
(00:35):
earning widespread acclaim and landing on numerous year end best
of lists. SG was raised in Hickman, Kentucky, and a
family of roe crop farmers and storytellers. That upbringing shaped
her worldview and her songwriting. She sings about small town
living with both deep affection and clear eyed critique. Now,
with her third album, Planting by the Signs, Goodman continues
(00:56):
to mind rich themes like love, loss, and reconciliation. The
record is inspired in part by the ancient tradition of
farming according to the cycles of the Moon, a practice
passed down through generations in her family. On today's episode,
Bruce Helen talks to SG Goodman about growing up in
a family of storytellers and how that tradition makes its
way into her songwriting. She also discusses co producing her
(01:18):
latest album and how she was able to make a bigger,
more atmospheric sounding record, and she performs a song I'm
in Love Live. This is broken record, real musicians, real conversations.
(01:39):
Here's Bruce Headlam with SG Goodman.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Tell me about planting by the signs.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Well, Planting by the Signs, which is the title of
my album, is an ancient belief system, and in fact,
a lot of people. I guess there's been a lot
of different cultures that have looked to the moon and
the stars for guidance and planting by the signs, and
I guess a simple way to put it is when
(02:08):
people noticed that the moon affected water and everything that
was made of water would probably be affected by the moon.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Was this an idea you grew up with your dad
was a farmer.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, I kind of learned about this concept just over
the kitchen table old people in my community. And it
wasn't necessarily something that they pointed out that we believed in.
But for instance, I was weaned for my mother by
the signs. My brother cuts his hair by the signs.
(02:47):
I remember, you know, my grandmother saying things like the
signs are in the head, you'll if you pull a
tooth threat in you're gonna bleed more these types of things,
but in current day, because you know, I guess my
lineage of knowing this belief system would have came through
like probably Celtic, Irish ancestors, German whatever passed through the
(03:12):
Appalachi Mountains settled in the South, and these are things
that they still believed. But this was just kind of
a common practice and still people use this to this
day to plant and to do certain things.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
What resonated for you when you were thinking of this
album and the song.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
Well, I have five little nieces and a nephew, pretty young,
and I guess there's probably this moment for everybody when
you realize that you are going to be the one
who's now the storyteller of the family. I remember my
aunts and uncles and older people in my community telling
(03:54):
stories and kind of giving me a context of things.
And yeah, that was just kind of a little bit
of burden that I felt to do to make sure
that my art reflected something and more substantial than me
just writing like a heartbreak song. You know, I mean,
(04:16):
if people were looking back at music in this current moment,
we could find a lot of heartbreak songs. But can
we find songs that help us, you know, hold onto
our history and kind of point to how our belief
systems have always changed over time. Maybe that would help
(04:38):
somewhere down the road.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Are there songwriters who do that for you?
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Well, I would say that there are archivists that have
done that for me, you know. I think of like
Alan Lomax, and I think of how I've really enjoyed
listening to old field recordings and people who've gone into
different parts of the world and set up a little
(05:06):
tape recorder and have captured something, especially when it comes
to old traditional folk tunes and melodies and things. You
can see we're connected across history, especially when it comes
to musical traditions for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
And that's also a sound, that field recording sound. That's
something that finds its way into your albums. It finds
its way into this album, I think, yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
You know, I guess a better way to put what
made me want to write this album is I was
really interested in how stories are passed down, and one
thing that was important to me while making the album
was to represent a lot of different ways stories are
passed down. So that's one reason I included some field
(05:57):
recordings and the actual album. That's the reason I included
tattoos as my artwork that showcased, you know, little images
that show up in the album. Tattoos are a way
that we actually put stories on our own bodies. You know.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Were there great storytellers in your family?
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Oh? Absolutely?
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Who are the great storytellers?
Speaker 3 (06:20):
My favorite storytellers would be my aunt Sally, And you know,
I think Southerners sometimes they have their little signature thing
that they say. I would say that if people who
are close to me, I tend to go, well, Comma
and then go into it. Well. My aunt Sally, her
(06:43):
husband my uncle is named Walter, and the way she
always starts a story is, well, I laughed and told
Walter and whatever it is, and so she always says that,
and that's, you know, it's something I'll never forget. But
it's the it's really kind of the cadence and the
flow of a story that I think is you know,
(07:04):
one of the most special things about a Southern story
because they're going to be long, they're going to be winding,
and it's an art form for sure. But yeah, I
was raised with best I'd say I was raised with
the best storytellers.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Are you very conscious of that. When you sit down
to write, are you thinking of telling stories in a
certain way.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
I feel like it's something that comes kind of natural
to me, and also I'm a little bit sometimes too
aware of it and self conscious of it. So, for instance,
in this album, my song's Snapping Turtle, it is a
real stream of consciousness, but it is a story and
they do connect. But it is a very Southern story
(07:46):
because I go from talking about kids in a Snapping
Turtle too all of a sudden, we're not hearing about
a snapping turtle anymore for quite a while, and that's
kind of a Southern story. And then at the very
end you wrap it together and it all makes sense,
and you might have sat on somebody's porch for an
hour and a half, but you know it's a whole
cohesive story, but it might take you a minute to
(08:08):
get there. So I did find myself really leaning into
Southern storytelling in this album on several songs.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
These are character driven stories often, and the character in
Snapping Turtle is whether there's the narrator and there's Leanne.
So when you were writing that, were you writing the
Leanne part and then the Snapping Turtle which is almost
an image that starts it. Yeah, how do you put
those things together in your mind?
Speaker 3 (08:40):
Well, actually, the line I guess that started the song
Snapping Turtle was something that I actually heard when I
was maybe twelve or thirteen, where a girl that I
grew up with actually came to school after we were
back from summer to tell us, you know, our friend group,
(09:04):
that she had spent the whole summer in Paris, which
was Paris, Tennessee, and it was just like a little
Paris that had an Eiffel Tower and everything. But I
remember being in college several years later, I was in
a little short story writing class and that image came
(09:25):
up to me, and I thought it was really an
interesting way to think about worldview, maybe economic status, opportunity, fate,
all these things, just in the fact that what's really
sad is that my friend back in grade school to
(09:48):
this day I know, really doesn't know the difference of Paris,
France and Paris, Tennessee. And it's not coming from a
judgmental place. It's just saying something really true about where
I come from and about how I have been trying
to process us how different people are growing up right
(10:14):
beside you and have been handed very different hands than others.
So that line started that many years ago and reappeared
here in this song. And the snapping turtle line that
was also a lived experience from childhood.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
When does that snapping turtle? When does that happen? What's
the realization that you can put those together?
Speaker 3 (10:40):
I think really the moment when I realized that the
snapping turtle was lee Anne was when I realized the
protagonist or you know, the narrators I guess purpose in
that song, which was that they were they were playing
(11:00):
God when I say, when I raised my hand, I
brought down the wrath of God himself. You know, I'm
I'm really really intrigued with, you know, religion, free will,
but mostly predestination. If I was honest with myself, I
(11:21):
wasn't a philosophy major because I was going to take
the LSATs and be a lawyer. I think I was
obsessed with the question of predestination, and I took every
course I could to understand more about this because it
was a really important question for me in the context
(11:42):
of how I was raised. I was raised Southern Baptist,
I wasn't raised a Calvinist necessarily, but I was intrigued
by it. I've always been really weird into doctrine and
things like that. So the idea that an all knowing
God would know someone's fate and is said to be
the creator that has to bother you when you see
(12:05):
things that don't seem fair.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
There is a line in that song small Towns where
my mind gets stuck. You grew up in a small town.
You very much identify still with that town. Tell me
about that line in the context of your growing up.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
You know, especially around how I moved from talking about
the snapping turtle to going into le end. The way
this song kind of folded for me really started when
I started therapy. A line that didn't make it in
(12:44):
this song was don't look at me when I'm crying.
I had this chorus and actual chorus that was in
this song, and I didn't I scrapped it. But when
I first started therapy, I wasn't raised in an emotional family.
You know, we didn't cry. I've gotten a little bit
better at crying publicly in the last maybe like four
(13:06):
years of my life. But I remember being in this
therapy session and she something came, but she had me
do this thing eft this tapping stuff, and I just
started crying, and I was so unbelievably embarrassed, and of
course because instead of allowing myself to be vulnerable, I
(13:27):
just got angry and I was yelling at this therapist
and saying like, don't look at me right now, like
why are you staring at me when I'm doing this?
And that led me kind of to write this entire
song because I look at this song as a looking
back and processing the past and context of my life
(13:51):
growing up.
Speaker 2 (13:52):
Was the church your first exposure to music?
Speaker 3 (13:55):
Definitely, yeah, I would say the church was was where
I went to three concerts a week. But there was
also even though not everyone in my family was musical,
I think it was a very commonplace that every house
had a piano and someone in the family could play.
(14:16):
And I do remember, you know, my aunt Sally could play,
my brothers could play different ones. And I remember very
as I was a really small child when my dad
and his brothers still farm together. They had a fish
fry at our at our family farm shop and had
a string band there and that was probably I was,
(14:37):
you know, three four years old at that time, so
I've been around it. But church is probably the biggest
musical influence.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Now, when you say there were concerts at church, were
these secular music concerts or were these old you?
Speaker 4 (14:49):
No?
Speaker 3 (14:49):
I just make a joke because I get asked a
lot of time, like what was your first concert? And
I said, well, I went to three a week. Yeah, okay,
oh no, there was never secular music. There wasn't even
you weren't allowed to have. I didn't grow up in
a church where you had like a drum set or
there was nothing like that. They believed that anything passed
may in organ You might have been carried away by
(15:13):
the energy, and we wanted to stay focused.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Okay, when when were you first carried away by the energy?
What music did you hear that made you think this
is something I want to do.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
My dad was a big music lover, he still is,
and being in such a rural area, we spent a
lot of time in the truck and tractor cabs and
all that. He loves Super Tramp. You know that song
take the Long Way Home? Sure, Okay, the harmonica. I
just remember my dad just cranking that up in his
(15:49):
old Chevy. So I guess what people are. What I've
thought of is like classic rock. My dad was really
into that, and I had a neighbor who was really
into old country. This one of our landowners wives that
we took care of as she aged. But she would
get on her piano and play old Hank Williams and
(16:12):
Lefty Frizell and different different songs like that for me.
And that's how I was introduced to old country.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
And did you like it?
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Oh? I loved it. And I remember finding Miss Betty
was this lady's name, and my job. Since I think
I was probably about ten years old, I started cleaning
her house and she lived right across the street from
my parents. Miss Betty couldn't sing, God bless her. But
when she'd sit down at that piano and start singing,
you know, I was walking after midnight, you know, it
(16:43):
was nice. I loved the song, but Miss Betty couldn't sing.
So when I found a little CD of some old
country classics at Walmart, I could not wait to take
my little CD player over there for Miss Betty. And
she enjoyed it, and I enjoyed our time a lot
better too.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
You know, we'll be.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
Back with more from SG Goodman after the break.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
There are some Kentucky writers that right. Character songs. I
thought of them when I was listening to her out
like Tom t Hall oh yeah, and Keith Whitley, Who's
and a little Loretta Lynn. I have to say, oh yeah,
she's got strong characters in her song. It's usually the narrator.
Were they influences on.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
You, I mean, of course I would imagine that. I
deeply appreciate what they do. Yeah, I think when it
comes to character development, I have to give tribute to
my writing mentor. His name's del Ray Phillips. He was
a short story writer Pulitzerprise nominee actually, and I was
(17:49):
lucky enough to study under him in college and then
we've remained very good friends. You know. He's the one
who taught me to really respect your characters. In fact,
I remember he was a big smoker up until recently. Actually,
our college ram was on the first floor of this building,
(18:10):
and he'd go outside and teach us through the window
while he Jane smoke, okay, And I remember him yelling
through the window one day that we were not good
enough writers to kill our characters, and that he better
not have any papers turned in where somebody killed off somebody.
(18:31):
He said, you got to earn that wow. And he
also said something to me that made me think about
characters differently. He said, when you die, like nobody's going
to remember your name, but they might remember your characters,
and that's how people actually live.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
On tell me about the song, Michael told me, it's.
Speaker 3 (18:51):
A special song for me. I lost a kind of
a father figure called himurried dad, Mike, and he was
super special to me. And this song actually kind of
revolves around his death. But who I'm speaking to in
this song is not my it's actually a close friend
(19:12):
of mine bandmate, actually co produced this record, someone who
I've collaborated with for you know, thirteen fourteen years now.
But at the time that Mike passed away, we were
about on our second year of not speaking with each other.
We weren't on speaking terms. We had a little falling out,
and that wasn't our first falling out. We've gone a
(19:34):
year without speaking prior to that. So maybe in another
like five years, will you know, something might happen. We'll
do that. But it's because he's a chosen brother. Sometimes
siblings fight and we were just in our moment in
that time. But when Mike passed away, we reached out
to each other. And I think sometimes death gives you
(19:57):
a good reason to put your bullshit aside and say
I love you and I'm glad we're here together. And
now look what's happened. You know, the song is on
the record. Matt was kind enough and wanted to collaborate
with me again, and I believe in his gifts so much.
(20:19):
I as going to be a co producer and it's
been a really great way to reconcile. And now we
have this to show for it too.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
That's wonderful.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Now, I think when you're young, everybody thinks, gee, why
the Beatles break up so soon? And then anytime you're
in a creative endeavor with other people, you're like, how
did they last so long?
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Yeah, well, I think there's something special. You know. A
friend told me once, She's like, sometimes the only thing
a person can imagine is having been wronged. Sometimes when
you don't have the experience of of reconciling with people,
you can't imagine what's on the other side. Like, it's
(21:00):
it's safer to remain in hard feelings than it is
to be vulnerable and imagine what it could be if
you reconciled. Because sometimes you can't imagine what that would
look like. That was a part of this album for sure.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
Now you write with him as well?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
Is that Yeah, we've written a few things. He ended
up out. We were fighting, not in a bad way,
but you know, we fight all the time. We're both
really passionate people. But I had a song on the
album Satellite. He was making suggestions for some the chord
progression in that song, and I'm pretty hard headed, but
(21:44):
Matt was right, so he helped me with the music
on that one.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Okay, what's your typical writing process? How do you write?
Speaker 3 (21:51):
I wish I knew, I really do. You know a
few of the songs we've already talked about, they've come
together over years, and what I've found works best for
me is to always be willing to just keep notes,
to not overthink. You know, I don't feel like you
have to have a song written every day to be
(22:12):
a songwriter. I don't write like that. Do I write
every day? I would say I do, But what I
consider writing every day might be just humming a little
melody into a recorder or my phone, or writing down
a word that I think is interesting. And I think
that allows me to always be in a creative state,
(22:35):
but as far as having a fully finished product, I
don't write like that.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Does there come a point where you've got a collection
of images things you want to put together and you
do have to sit down and work.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
It out well, like, for instance, with this album. I
knew when I knew that I wanted to write about
Planting by the Signs, and I knew that my goal
was I didn't want to write a college dissertation. I
wanted to write songs that have picked apart and looked
at individually, could stand alone by themself. But I knew
(23:13):
that I really wanted to try to write a cohesive
song that would lead back to Planting by the Signs.
So the way I dealt with that was I read
everything I could get my hands on. I watched everything
I could get my hands on, I could talk to
everywhere I was. I was even well Jason isbel in
Europe last fall. Late last fall, I was in Scotland
(23:37):
and I asked the the coffee guys, like you happen
to know anybody who's into moon planting or planting by
the Signs around here? And he did, isn't that cool?
Speaker 2 (23:49):
Wow?
Speaker 3 (23:49):
So I went to this, yeah, this little nursery and
asked around. I knew, even if I couldn't recall, you know,
every single sign of the zodiac or whatever, if I've
read enough and just entrenched myself in it, that it
would come out in my writing. And it did, you know,
(24:10):
it did, and it wasn't in a natural way. When
it came time to actually write it, the details were there.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
You do have a song called fire Sign, which I did,
seems to be the most explicit reference to that kind
of thinking. How, for example, does it appear in Solitaire,
which I is probably my favorite song on the album.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Oh well, thank you?
Speaker 5 (24:33):
Well?
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Have you ever noticed how a deck of cards has
four suits? Right, there's four seasons. How many weeks are
in a year. It's how many cards are in a deck.
It's set up actually to mimic a calendar and your
(24:54):
experience passing through a year. In order to live by
the belief of planting by the signs, you have to
be aware and be able to tell what could possibly
happen in the future by looking at the past. And
so so for me, that song is about seasons that
have passed you. Now, that's the way I would make sense.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Of it, and there's a beautiful line it's about betting
against yourself and I don't remember the precise line. What
is it?
Speaker 3 (25:21):
Yeah, it's Lords, You're gonna lose if you bet against yourself.
Because the song starts out Solitaire is the only game
where you don't need nobody's help. The Lord You're gonna
lose if you bet against yourself? Right because the chorus,
you know, back to actually Miss Betty and Hank, Hank
(25:42):
Senior teaching me about, you know, some of the greats.
He has this song lost on the River, and being
that I was raised on learned how to you know,
ski on the Mississippi River. I thought when Hank was
talking about being lost on the river that he was
talking about a physical river. Well, no, years later, when
(26:03):
I learned how to play poker, which I'm terrible at,
you know, I did. I was a second one stand
in my first game, but apparently that's beginner's luck. But
we were playing Texas Hold Them, and Hank SR. Was
talking about the river in Texas Hold Them. So I
went from talking about Solitaire to where, yes, you were
(26:26):
a you're playing by yourself? Where the river I'm speaking of?
And my song Solitaire is also It's Hank's River, It's
It's the River in Texas. Hold Them where you Can
Lose it all.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
So much of that song seems informed by church. M Yeah,
it's it's I think as close as you get to
a hymn on the album.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Yeah, I could see that for sure.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Were you conscious of that when you were writing?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
I think this is another example of how, you know
how I just said that the images and details of
planting by the signs would come if I just immersed
myself in the material enough to where I didn't have
to think about it. I think writing a melody like
is that I did on Solitaire, it's just an example
(27:19):
of how I've been immersed in that world, you know,
from such a young age, where those old types of melodies,
I'm never going to be able to separate myself from them.
They've gone too deep. You know.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
There are I mentioned there are biblical illusions throughout the
more so than in your other records. I think. You know,
I saw the dabble and this incredible last song talk
about that song.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Heaven Song, Heaven Song. Well, you know, I think at
the beginning of this we were talking about storytelling and that
is a song where I really just gave myself full
liberty to talk as long as I wanted. It's almost
nine minutes long. And along with losing Mary Dad Mike.
(28:11):
In fact, it was only two weeks before I lost Mike.
I lost my dog of thirteen years, Howard, And then
I was on tour and Mike was supposed to join
us on tour in Austin. He's from Texas and wanted
to go to that show, but his lodging fell through.
He didn't make it. We were out in southern California. Oddly,
(28:36):
I ran into ice on the Laguna Mountains. Scared the
shit out of me. I've never lived in a place
where you had to chain your tires, and there I
was in a you know, twelve passenger van with gear
and my band, and we had nothing but mountains in
(28:57):
front of us. You know. I had to go all
the way up into Seattle and down Utah and Colorado
by the end of the tour. So I called Mike
and asked him if he had any experience with chains
on the tires, and we talked a bit on the phone.
This was after I played Austin and played La and
on the way to San Francisco from La Is when
(29:17):
I got the call that Mike had had passed. That
was my first tour of the year.
Speaker 2 (29:21):
And this was unexpected.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
This was unexpected. He died in a tree accident. And
let me tell you, Mike was crazy and he would
have wanted to die that. There was only one other
way I can think he would have wanted to die,
which was just get eat by a shark. He liked
to surf. This was nuts. He got crushed in a tree. Okay,
and Mike wouldn't mind me telling you this. In fact,
(29:43):
it's pretty badass. He got crushed in a tree. And
this is the most Mike thing ever. But his partner, Terrez,
was trying to make her way out to where he
was to help load this wood he was cutting, and
as Mike was dying, he answered his phone to tell
(30:03):
his partner of twenty years that he was dying.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
Yeah, I mean, it's amazing. If you knew him, you
would be like, well, isn't that Mike Harmon? You know,
of course he would, And you know, you can giggle
at it now because it's just so him. That was
the beginning of twenty and twenty three. I had an
insane touring year. That year, I never got to stop.
(30:32):
When I started writing Heaven Song, I was heading out
on tour with Margo Price right after that. That was,
I believe late August. At that point, that was the
first time I got to catch a breath. Really, that
whole year, I hadn't been able to process Mike's death
or my dog. And I finally had a moment by
(30:53):
myself at home. So I took some little mushrooms that
Mike had given me and had like a very mellow
moment on my back porch, and I remember just right
down the words and singing the melody to maybe if
I see it, then I want it, because of course,
(31:16):
when people close to you die, when a little creature
who's been in your house for thirteen years is no
longer there, you're thinking about mortality. You're thinking about, you know,
life after death, all these things. And I really was,
and I wanted to. I was hoping to do some
processing around that when I was home, and I ended
(31:38):
up writing this big old road trip where I mean,
I know I'm the protagonist, and the song where I
end up being in a car with all these man
made concepts. The only thing really that was real was
the dog, you know, and we're on a road trip
to heaven. I knew I wanted to end the song.
(31:59):
It took a long time. It took about another full
year from that moment before I got the line, but
I knew at the end of the song, you know,
the chorus is maybe if I see it, then I
want it. And I'm talking about heaven even though I'm
trying to get there, but I'm still not sure if
I'll even want to give it a go. But then
(32:23):
at the end of the song, Sin, who has also
been in the car with me this whole time, you know,
wouldn't let me go into heaven before I answered what
I had learned from Sin specifically, and my reply was
that maybe if I see it, then I want it,
which is kind of what you know, if you were
(32:45):
raised in kind of the Christian tradition, That's what sin does, right.
It makes you lust after things?
Speaker 4 (32:55):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (32:56):
Are you patient with yourself when there's something not working
on a song? Will you try and force something in
or you'll just you'll let it sit.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
No, And that's another thing I learned from my writing mentor.
He would always say, like a story, you'll go about
its business, and I look at songs the same way.
You know, there's songs that have taken years to write
and the way I believe it. I do write everything down,
but I'm not scared to put a song away because
(33:25):
I have this idea that if it comes back, then
it's meant to and if it doesn't, then it wasn't.
I really am not precious about that. I don't think
I've thrown away my best ideas or something like that.
I think if they're meant to stick around, they will.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
And you believe in predestination for songs.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
Oh yeah, let's bring it back full circle here.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Yeah, well that's break and we'll be back with SG Goodman.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Are you writing for other people as well?
Speaker 3 (33:59):
I would love to. You can tell you something. This
is funny. I have a really bad tendency. What I'll do,
I'll get it. I'll get a wild hair one night
and write somebody and say let's get together, let's write.
You know. I'm more of a phone call kind of person,
or it doesn't stick in my brain. So what I've
tried to do now is keep a list and then
(34:19):
share it with my management to say, hey, I want
you to know I wrote so and so, and they
said they were willing to write with me, but I
haven't followed up. And I have a feeling, if you know,
I go on a walk after I hang up this phone,
that it'll be another two weeks before I remember that
I did that again. You know, I love my manager
(34:42):
and thank God that you know they are willing to
help me do that. But yeah, I love to co
write with people. I don't have a lot of time
for it, but I wish I did.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
You know, Because I was listening to this record, I thought, well,
who wouldn't want some of these songs on their record too?
They just seem to work that so well.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
Let's name some people that we would want to cover
these songs. What are you thinking? Like Dolly Parton, let's
willing into existence?
Speaker 2 (35:07):
But would I would? I want you to make as
much money as possible.
Speaker 3 (35:12):
I would have wanted you have to follow me on substack.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
Yeah, I'm eight dollars a month.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
You know I would have said, honestly, I would have
said Mary unfaithful because I thought she covered songs so beautifully.
Speaker 3 (35:27):
You know, covering songs is one of it's truly an
art form. I can't do it. I'm not very good
at it.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Really.
Speaker 3 (35:34):
Yes, I was in the studio with a friend of mine,
Kelsey Walden, who's a great, great artist man. She really
has an act for reworking someone else's songs. I just
have absolutely I go blank. I've been really fortunate in
the covering song department. Tyler Childers covered sure one of
(35:54):
my songs, and it really is a rare thing where
you're like, you know what, You're a really good person,
and I'd be happy for you to cover my song.
You know, I don't have to worry about Tyler doing
something and me being scared to be associated with him.
(36:14):
But you know, you never know about some of these others.
I'm not trying to make assumptions, but I do read.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
So you do. Do you feel at all a part
of that world? You know, you root yourself in western Kentucky,
which is not Nashville. Uh huh? Do you feel a
part of that kind of Nashville world?
Speaker 3 (36:40):
I would say I'm about two hours out, you know,
because that's how far I am from Nashville. It's good.
Nashville has been good to me, and I don't have
things to say about it. Negatively in that regards. But
it's not a bad thing to be from Kentucky and
be a musician. I think Kentucky music stands on it's
(37:00):
own it and it has for a really long time
and will continue to. So yeah, I'm about two hours
out of Nashville.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
Everly Brothers, Ricky Skaggs, Bill Monroe.
Speaker 3 (37:10):
Kentucky isn't even just like a country music hub. I
mean when I opened my mouth, I'm country, you know,
but I love punk music, I love rap, I love
all kinds of different music. And Kentucky has a really
big history of you know, we have Bonnie Prince, Billy,
we have we have Slint, an old post punk band,
(37:33):
My Morning Jacket, you know, State Champion was a big
influence on me. The span at A Louisville. It's great
indie band Wombo. There's lots of different types of really
amazing music that has come out of Kentucky.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
And well, Jim James from My Morning Jacket produced your
first rect Did he discover.
Speaker 3 (37:52):
You in a sense or I think I was forced
on him? Not really.
Speaker 2 (37:58):
I had a bit of worked out.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
It did well, I asked a mutual friend of mine,
I got the nerves I went and worked on some demos,
and then six months later I finally got the nerve
to send them to a mutual friend of ours, this
artist named Daniel Martin Moore. I was up in the
mountains with him and Joan Shelley and a bunch of
(38:21):
different writers for this compilation called the Pine Mountain Sessions,
and I saw that Jim James was on it, and
I was like, oh my goodness, because I was a
really big fan of my morn Jacket and I was like, wow,
I guess I'm not crazy far removed from this person.
And I knew Daniel's friends, and after I got those
demos together, I sent Daniel an email in October of
(38:45):
that year, and by December, my friend and now publicist
actually told me we haven't heard back from Jim. It's
a good record. You should if you don't hear back
by Monday, like you should move on and like just
cut the record go on. Well, I was working and
(39:06):
I was actually living in Nashville. I lived in Nashville
for about six months and was working at a little
taco shop there. It was right before my serving shift.
I'd been there prepping since seven. I was having a
coke outside and I got an email looping me in
that Monday with Jim James.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
Did you do your shift?
Speaker 3 (39:27):
I did it a lot happier that day than all
the other ones.
Speaker 2 (39:30):
You know, everybody got a little EPI.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
Yeah, but I was like, I'm not gonna be here
much longer. I'm going back to Kentucky. I had my
house in Kentucky and live there to help pay off
my property taxes that year.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
Now that sound had it does have that low fi sound,
a lot of reverb on the guitar. You still some
of that, but this, this album feels the sound feels different.
Did you go in with different ideas for how you
wanted the production to go.
Speaker 3 (39:59):
I did. I wanted not only did I want the production,
as far as the sound to feel different. I wanted
to make it no that I was going to be
a third whill as the producer. I've always co produced
all my records, and you know I have a very
(40:19):
particular vision, and you could verify that with anyone who's
ever done anything with me. I had worked with Drew
Vandenberg and I've worked with Matt Rowan before on other projects,
but never where it was as blatant as all right,
we're going to be all co captains on this, and
(40:40):
I am going to be more open to your ideas
and things like that. So that was different and vulnerable feeling.
But as far as yes, making a bigger sounding record
than I had in the past, that I went into
the studio know when I wanted to do that, and
I hired musicians specifically to help accomplish that.
Speaker 2 (41:04):
For me, do you know enough about production? I think
there's things I can do here to make this feel bigger.
Speaker 3 (41:11):
Oh definitely. This is the first record where I ever
let keys and kind of anything that wasn't easily packed
into my van and could go across this country on
a record. I always had a problem with that. I
always have been really particular about wanting for my live
(41:31):
performance to sound just like the record. A lot of
people aren't like that, you know, and a lot of
listeners don't want that. But for me, being starting out
in music and trying to cut my teeth and pretty
much anyone I would come in front of had never
heard me before, I wanted my live show to sound
(41:51):
exactly like the record. So I was representing what I
had done. And having a keyboard player early on in
my tour life. That just couldn't have happened. I couldn't
have fit everybody in the van, and I couldn't afford
to pay an extra person. Even this record, I knew
that I wanted to add another sonic element that was
(42:15):
not present on albums in the past, and I chose,
you know, kind of auxiliary key stuff and I love it.
I have had Ben Tanner plays with Alabama Shakes and
was down in muscle shows. Lives down there so right
by the studio and what a what a champ? Really
good and I mean, I'm not gonna lie. It took.
(42:38):
I was really uncomfortable with some of the ambient things
that were coming out at first, but we honed it
in in a way that I was comfortable and I
never they Matt and Drew, my co producers, would always say,
you are steering the ship of what and that's important.
I have to have the music sound like something that
(42:59):
I don't get up in front of people and feel
like it's not me, you know. So that was that
was fun. But Matt Penn was my drummer, and it
was just like washing a person like just an alien.
His drumming is just it was hard to play live
with him because I just wanted to watch. It was
(43:21):
really amazing, And yeah, I was really fortunate to get
to work with a lot of really really great musicians
on this record that made things. We just locked in
with each other in the live room and we're out
of there in ten days.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
Amazing. Well, it's a great record. Thank you so much
for doing this. It's been just wonderful.
Speaker 3 (43:46):
Thank you. Yeah, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (43:48):
Do you want to play a song?
Speaker 3 (43:49):
Let's do it, all right, play something.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
You can play anything you want, all right.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
I'm going to play my song, I'm in Love, a
sweet little song.
Speaker 4 (44:09):
All the early birds now singing like a late night
talking for I've been trespassing on my neighbors, swimming naked
through their pool. Well, I've forgotten all my friends, but
(44:37):
I don't.
Speaker 5 (44:37):
Know they can tell the Army love. I'm in love.
I'm in love. I'm in love.
Speaker 4 (44:55):
I've been crying at commercials on the Hotel hotelevision set,
and I've been lieing on my tex Is, crowding off
the things that I ain't ballsed RSV. Petere and thetation
(45:20):
snowing in my heart that I never show.
Speaker 6 (45:28):
That.
Speaker 5 (45:29):
Army Love. I'm in love.
Speaker 6 (45:32):
I'm in love. I'm in love. The moon is right
now for cutting off hair.
Speaker 4 (45:45):
I'm checking out Walmart collections of underwear.
Speaker 6 (45:51):
I'm in love. I'm in love. I'm in love. I'm
in love.
Speaker 4 (46:03):
Oh, have our conversation, said the checkout line at the
grocery store, telling my whole life now to strangers in
a way I've never done before. Yeah, I've been dancing
(46:27):
in my kitchen, singing into school.
Speaker 6 (46:36):
There, arm in love, Armon Love, Armen Love, I'm in love, Yes,
Armon Love, common Love, Armon Love, arm in.
Speaker 2 (47:02):
Beautiful, thank you.
Speaker 1 (47:06):
In an episode description, you'll find a link to our
favorite Goodman tracks, as well as her latest album, Planting
by the Signs. Be sure to check out YouTube dot
com slash Broken Record podcast to see all of our
video interviews, and be sure to follow us on Instagram
at the Broken Record Pod. You can follow us on
Twitter at Broken Record. Broken Record is produced and edited
by Leah Rose, with marketing and help from Eric Sandler
(47:28):
and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Holliday. Broken Record
is production of Pushkin Industries. If you love this show
and others from Pushkin consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Pushkin
Plus is a podcast subscription that offers bonus content and
ad free listening for four ninety nine a month. Look
for Pushkin Plus on Apple podcast subscriptions, and if you
like this show, please remember to share, rate, and review
(47:49):
us on your podcast app Our theme musics by Kenny Beats.
I'm justin Richmond.
Pushkin. When SG Goodman released her debut album, Old Time
Feeling in twenty twenty, critics hailed it as a stunning
introduction to a bold new voice in Americana. Co Produced
with Jim James of My Morning Jacket, the album showcased
Goodman's ability to balance classic Southern sounds with progressive ideas,
(00:35):
earning widespread acclaim and landing on numerous year end best
of lists. SG was raised in Hickman, Kentucky, and a
family of roe crop farmers and storytellers. That upbringing shaped
her worldview and her songwriting. She sings about small town
living with both deep affection and clear eyed critique. Now,
with her third album, Planting by the Signs, Goodman continues
(00:56):
to mind rich themes like love, loss, and reconciliation. The
record is inspired in part by the ancient tradition of
farming according to the cycles of the Moon, a practice
passed down through generations in her family. On today's episode,
Bruce Helen talks to SG Goodman about growing up in
a family of storytellers and how that tradition makes its
way into her songwriting. She also discusses co producing her
(01:18):
latest album and how she was able to make a bigger,
more atmospheric sounding record, and she performs a song I'm
in Love Live. This is broken record, real musicians, real conversations.
(01:39):
Here's Bruce Headlam with SG Goodman.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Tell me about planting by the signs.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Well, Planting by the Signs, which is the title of
my album, is an ancient belief system, and in fact,
a lot of people. I guess there's been a lot
of different cultures that have looked to the moon and
the stars for guidance and planting by the signs, and
I guess a simple way to put it is when
(02:08):
people noticed that the moon affected water and everything that
was made of water would probably be affected by the moon.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Was this an idea you grew up with your dad
was a farmer.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, I kind of learned about this concept just over
the kitchen table old people in my community. And it
wasn't necessarily something that they pointed out that we believed in.
But for instance, I was weaned for my mother by
the signs. My brother cuts his hair by the signs.
(02:47):
I remember, you know, my grandmother saying things like the
signs are in the head, you'll if you pull a
tooth threat in you're gonna bleed more these types of things,
but in current day, because you know, I guess my
lineage of knowing this belief system would have came through
like probably Celtic, Irish ancestors, German whatever passed through the
(03:12):
Appalachi Mountains settled in the South, and these are things
that they still believed. But this was just kind of
a common practice and still people use this to this
day to plant and to do certain things.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
What resonated for you when you were thinking of this
album and the song.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
Well, I have five little nieces and a nephew, pretty young,
and I guess there's probably this moment for everybody when
you realize that you are going to be the one
who's now the storyteller of the family. I remember my
aunts and uncles and older people in my community telling
(03:54):
stories and kind of giving me a context of things.
And yeah, that was just kind of a little bit
of burden that I felt to do to make sure
that my art reflected something and more substantial than me
just writing like a heartbreak song. You know, I mean,
(04:16):
if people were looking back at music in this current moment,
we could find a lot of heartbreak songs. But can
we find songs that help us, you know, hold onto
our history and kind of point to how our belief
systems have always changed over time. Maybe that would help
(04:38):
somewhere down the road.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Are there songwriters who do that for you?
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Well, I would say that there are archivists that have
done that for me, you know. I think of like
Alan Lomax, and I think of how I've really enjoyed
listening to old field recordings and people who've gone into
different parts of the world and set up a little
(05:06):
tape recorder and have captured something, especially when it comes
to old traditional folk tunes and melodies and things. You
can see we're connected across history, especially when it comes
to musical traditions for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
And that's also a sound, that field recording sound. That's
something that finds its way into your albums. It finds
its way into this album, I think, yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
You know, I guess a better way to put what
made me want to write this album is I was
really interested in how stories are passed down, and one
thing that was important to me while making the album
was to represent a lot of different ways stories are
passed down. So that's one reason I included some field
(05:57):
recordings and the actual album. That's the reason I included
tattoos as my artwork that showcased, you know, little images
that show up in the album. Tattoos are a way
that we actually put stories on our own bodies. You know.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Were there great storytellers in your family?
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Oh? Absolutely?
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Who are the great storytellers?
Speaker 3 (06:20):
My favorite storytellers would be my aunt Sally, And you know,
I think Southerners sometimes they have their little signature thing
that they say. I would say that if people who
are close to me, I tend to go, well, Comma
and then go into it. Well. My aunt Sally, her
(06:43):
husband my uncle is named Walter, and the way she
always starts a story is, well, I laughed and told
Walter and whatever it is, and so she always says that,
and that's, you know, it's something I'll never forget. But
it's the it's really kind of the cadence and the
flow of a story that I think is you know,
(07:04):
one of the most special things about a Southern story
because they're going to be long, they're going to be winding,
and it's an art form for sure. But yeah, I
was raised with best I'd say I was raised with
the best storytellers.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Are you very conscious of that. When you sit down
to write, are you thinking of telling stories in a
certain way.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
I feel like it's something that comes kind of natural
to me, and also I'm a little bit sometimes too
aware of it and self conscious of it. So, for instance,
in this album, my song's Snapping Turtle, it is a
real stream of consciousness, but it is a story and
they do connect. But it is a very Southern story
(07:46):
because I go from talking about kids in a Snapping
Turtle too all of a sudden, we're not hearing about
a snapping turtle anymore for quite a while, and that's
kind of a Southern story. And then at the very
end you wrap it together and it all makes sense,
and you might have sat on somebody's porch for an
hour and a half, but you know it's a whole
cohesive story, but it might take you a minute to
(08:08):
get there. So I did find myself really leaning into
Southern storytelling in this album on several songs.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
These are character driven stories often, and the character in
Snapping Turtle is whether there's the narrator and there's Leanne.
So when you were writing that, were you writing the
Leanne part and then the Snapping Turtle which is almost
an image that starts it. Yeah, how do you put
those things together in your mind?
Speaker 3 (08:40):
Well, actually, the line I guess that started the song
Snapping Turtle was something that I actually heard when I
was maybe twelve or thirteen, where a girl that I
grew up with actually came to school after we were
back from summer to tell us, you know, our friend group,
(09:04):
that she had spent the whole summer in Paris, which
was Paris, Tennessee, and it was just like a little
Paris that had an Eiffel Tower and everything. But I
remember being in college several years later, I was in
a little short story writing class and that image came
(09:25):
up to me, and I thought it was really an
interesting way to think about worldview, maybe economic status, opportunity, fate,
all these things, just in the fact that what's really
sad is that my friend back in grade school to
(09:48):
this day I know, really doesn't know the difference of Paris,
France and Paris, Tennessee. And it's not coming from a
judgmental place. It's just saying something really true about where
I come from and about how I have been trying
to process us how different people are growing up right
(10:14):
beside you and have been handed very different hands than others.
So that line started that many years ago and reappeared
here in this song. And the snapping turtle line that
was also a lived experience from childhood.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
When does that snapping turtle? When does that happen? What's
the realization that you can put those together?
Speaker 3 (10:40):
I think really the moment when I realized that the
snapping turtle was lee Anne was when I realized the
protagonist or you know, the narrators I guess purpose in
that song, which was that they were they were playing
(11:00):
God when I say, when I raised my hand, I
brought down the wrath of God himself. You know, I'm
I'm really really intrigued with, you know, religion, free will,
but mostly predestination. If I was honest with myself, I
(11:21):
wasn't a philosophy major because I was going to take
the LSATs and be a lawyer. I think I was
obsessed with the question of predestination, and I took every
course I could to understand more about this because it
was a really important question for me in the context
(11:42):
of how I was raised. I was raised Southern Baptist,
I wasn't raised a Calvinist necessarily, but I was intrigued
by it. I've always been really weird into doctrine and
things like that. So the idea that an all knowing
God would know someone's fate and is said to be
the creator that has to bother you when you see
(12:05):
things that don't seem fair.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
There is a line in that song small Towns where
my mind gets stuck. You grew up in a small town.
You very much identify still with that town. Tell me
about that line in the context of your growing up.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
You know, especially around how I moved from talking about
the snapping turtle to going into le end. The way
this song kind of folded for me really started when
I started therapy. A line that didn't make it in
(12:44):
this song was don't look at me when I'm crying.
I had this chorus and actual chorus that was in
this song, and I didn't I scrapped it. But when
I first started therapy, I wasn't raised in an emotional family.
You know, we didn't cry. I've gotten a little bit
better at crying publicly in the last maybe like four
(13:06):
years of my life. But I remember being in this
therapy session and she something came, but she had me
do this thing eft this tapping stuff, and I just
started crying, and I was so unbelievably embarrassed, and of
course because instead of allowing myself to be vulnerable, I
(13:27):
just got angry and I was yelling at this therapist
and saying like, don't look at me right now, like
why are you staring at me when I'm doing this?
And that led me kind of to write this entire
song because I look at this song as a looking
back and processing the past and context of my life
(13:51):
growing up.
Speaker 2 (13:52):
Was the church your first exposure to music?
Speaker 3 (13:55):
Definitely, yeah, I would say the church was was where
I went to three concerts a week. But there was
also even though not everyone in my family was musical,
I think it was a very commonplace that every house
had a piano and someone in the family could play.
(14:16):
And I do remember, you know, my aunt Sally could play,
my brothers could play different ones. And I remember very
as I was a really small child when my dad
and his brothers still farm together. They had a fish
fry at our at our family farm shop and had
a string band there and that was probably I was,
(14:37):
you know, three four years old at that time, so
I've been around it. But church is probably the biggest
musical influence.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Now, when you say there were concerts at church, were
these secular music concerts or were these old you?
Speaker 4 (14:49):
No?
Speaker 3 (14:49):
I just make a joke because I get asked a
lot of time, like what was your first concert? And
I said, well, I went to three a week. Yeah, okay,
oh no, there was never secular music. There wasn't even
you weren't allowed to have. I didn't grow up in
a church where you had like a drum set or
there was nothing like that. They believed that anything passed
may in organ You might have been carried away by
(15:13):
the energy, and we wanted to stay focused.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Okay, when when were you first carried away by the energy?
What music did you hear that made you think this
is something I want to do.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
My dad was a big music lover, he still is,
and being in such a rural area, we spent a
lot of time in the truck and tractor cabs and
all that. He loves Super Tramp. You know that song
take the Long Way Home? Sure, Okay, the harmonica. I
just remember my dad just cranking that up in his
(15:49):
old Chevy. So I guess what people are. What I've
thought of is like classic rock. My dad was really
into that, and I had a neighbor who was really
into old country. This one of our landowners wives that
we took care of as she aged. But she would
get on her piano and play old Hank Williams and
(16:12):
Lefty Frizell and different different songs like that for me.
And that's how I was introduced to old country.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
And did you like it?
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Oh? I loved it. And I remember finding Miss Betty
was this lady's name, and my job. Since I think
I was probably about ten years old, I started cleaning
her house and she lived right across the street from
my parents. Miss Betty couldn't sing, God bless her. But
when she'd sit down at that piano and start singing,
you know, I was walking after midnight, you know, it
(16:43):
was nice. I loved the song, but Miss Betty couldn't sing.
So when I found a little CD of some old
country classics at Walmart, I could not wait to take
my little CD player over there for Miss Betty. And
she enjoyed it, and I enjoyed our time a lot
better too.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
You know, we'll be.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
Back with more from SG Goodman after the break.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
There are some Kentucky writers that right. Character songs. I
thought of them when I was listening to her out
like Tom t Hall oh yeah, and Keith Whitley, Who's
and a little Loretta Lynn. I have to say, oh yeah,
she's got strong characters in her song. It's usually the narrator.
Were they influences on.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
You, I mean, of course I would imagine that. I
deeply appreciate what they do. Yeah, I think when it
comes to character development, I have to give tribute to
my writing mentor. His name's del Ray Phillips. He was
a short story writer Pulitzerprise nominee actually, and I was
(17:49):
lucky enough to study under him in college and then
we've remained very good friends. You know. He's the one
who taught me to really respect your characters. In fact,
I remember he was a big smoker up until recently. Actually,
our college ram was on the first floor of this building,
(18:10):
and he'd go outside and teach us through the window
while he Jane smoke, okay, And I remember him yelling
through the window one day that we were not good
enough writers to kill our characters, and that he better
not have any papers turned in where somebody killed off somebody.
(18:31):
He said, you got to earn that wow. And he
also said something to me that made me think about
characters differently. He said, when you die, like nobody's going
to remember your name, but they might remember your characters,
and that's how people actually live.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
On tell me about the song, Michael told me, it's.
Speaker 3 (18:51):
A special song for me. I lost a kind of
a father figure called himurried dad, Mike, and he was
super special to me. And this song actually kind of
revolves around his death. But who I'm speaking to in
this song is not my it's actually a close friend
(19:12):
of mine bandmate, actually co produced this record, someone who
I've collaborated with for you know, thirteen fourteen years now.
But at the time that Mike passed away, we were
about on our second year of not speaking with each other.
We weren't on speaking terms. We had a little falling out,
and that wasn't our first falling out. We've gone a
(19:34):
year without speaking prior to that. So maybe in another
like five years, will you know, something might happen. We'll
do that. But it's because he's a chosen brother. Sometimes
siblings fight and we were just in our moment in
that time. But when Mike passed away, we reached out
to each other. And I think sometimes death gives you
(19:57):
a good reason to put your bullshit aside and say
I love you and I'm glad we're here together. And
now look what's happened. You know, the song is on
the record. Matt was kind enough and wanted to collaborate
with me again, and I believe in his gifts so much.
(20:19):
I as going to be a co producer and it's
been a really great way to reconcile. And now we
have this to show for it too.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
That's wonderful.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Now, I think when you're young, everybody thinks, gee, why
the Beatles break up so soon? And then anytime you're
in a creative endeavor with other people, you're like, how
did they last so long?
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Yeah, well, I think there's something special. You know. A
friend told me once, She's like, sometimes the only thing
a person can imagine is having been wronged. Sometimes when
you don't have the experience of of reconciling with people,
you can't imagine what's on the other side. Like, it's
(21:00):
it's safer to remain in hard feelings than it is
to be vulnerable and imagine what it could be if
you reconciled. Because sometimes you can't imagine what that would
look like. That was a part of this album for sure.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
Now you write with him as well?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
Is that Yeah, we've written a few things. He ended
up out. We were fighting, not in a bad way,
but you know, we fight all the time. We're both
really passionate people. But I had a song on the
album Satellite. He was making suggestions for some the chord
progression in that song, and I'm pretty hard headed, but
(21:44):
Matt was right, so he helped me with the music
on that one.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Okay, what's your typical writing process? How do you write?
Speaker 3 (21:51):
I wish I knew, I really do. You know a
few of the songs we've already talked about, they've come
together over years, and what I've found works best for
me is to always be willing to just keep notes,
to not overthink. You know, I don't feel like you
have to have a song written every day to be
(22:12):
a songwriter. I don't write like that. Do I write
every day? I would say I do, But what I
consider writing every day might be just humming a little
melody into a recorder or my phone, or writing down
a word that I think is interesting. And I think
that allows me to always be in a creative state,
(22:35):
but as far as having a fully finished product, I
don't write like that.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Does there come a point where you've got a collection
of images things you want to put together and you
do have to sit down and work.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
It out well, like, for instance, with this album. I
knew when I knew that I wanted to write about
Planting by the Signs, and I knew that my goal
was I didn't want to write a college dissertation. I
wanted to write songs that have picked apart and looked
at individually, could stand alone by themself. But I knew
(23:13):
that I really wanted to try to write a cohesive
song that would lead back to Planting by the Signs.
So the way I dealt with that was I read
everything I could get my hands on. I watched everything
I could get my hands on, I could talk to
everywhere I was. I was even well Jason isbel in
Europe last fall. Late last fall, I was in Scotland
(23:37):
and I asked the the coffee guys, like you happen
to know anybody who's into moon planting or planting by
the Signs around here? And he did, isn't that cool?
Speaker 2 (23:49):
Wow?
Speaker 3 (23:49):
So I went to this, yeah, this little nursery and
asked around. I knew, even if I couldn't recall, you know,
every single sign of the zodiac or whatever, if I've
read enough and just entrenched myself in it, that it
would come out in my writing. And it did, you know,
(24:10):
it did, and it wasn't in a natural way. When
it came time to actually write it, the details were there.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
You do have a song called fire Sign, which I did,
seems to be the most explicit reference to that kind
of thinking. How, for example, does it appear in Solitaire,
which I is probably my favorite song on the album.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Oh well, thank you?
Speaker 5 (24:33):
Well?
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Have you ever noticed how a deck of cards has
four suits? Right, there's four seasons. How many weeks are
in a year. It's how many cards are in a deck.
It's set up actually to mimic a calendar and your
(24:54):
experience passing through a year. In order to live by
the belief of planting by the signs, you have to
be aware and be able to tell what could possibly
happen in the future by looking at the past. And
so so for me, that song is about seasons that
have passed you. Now, that's the way I would make sense.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Of it, and there's a beautiful line it's about betting
against yourself and I don't remember the precise line. What
is it?
Speaker 3 (25:21):
Yeah, it's Lords, You're gonna lose if you bet against yourself.
Because the song starts out Solitaire is the only game
where you don't need nobody's help. The Lord You're gonna
lose if you bet against yourself? Right because the chorus,
you know, back to actually Miss Betty and Hank, Hank
(25:42):
Senior teaching me about, you know, some of the greats.
He has this song lost on the River, and being
that I was raised on learned how to you know,
ski on the Mississippi River. I thought when Hank was
talking about being lost on the river that he was
talking about a physical river. Well, no, years later, when
(26:03):
I learned how to play poker, which I'm terrible at,
you know, I did. I was a second one stand
in my first game, but apparently that's beginner's luck. But
we were playing Texas Hold Them, and Hank SR. Was
talking about the river in Texas Hold Them. So I
went from talking about Solitaire to where, yes, you were
(26:26):
a you're playing by yourself? Where the river I'm speaking of?
And my song Solitaire is also It's Hank's River, It's
It's the River in Texas. Hold Them where you Can
Lose it all.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
So much of that song seems informed by church. M Yeah,
it's it's I think as close as you get to
a hymn on the album.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Yeah, I could see that for sure.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Were you conscious of that when you were writing?
Speaker 3 (26:54):
I think this is another example of how, you know
how I just said that the images and details of
planting by the signs would come if I just immersed
myself in the material enough to where I didn't have
to think about it. I think writing a melody like
is that I did on Solitaire, it's just an example
(27:19):
of how I've been immersed in that world, you know,
from such a young age, where those old types of melodies,
I'm never going to be able to separate myself from them.
They've gone too deep. You know.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
There are I mentioned there are biblical illusions throughout the
more so than in your other records. I think. You know,
I saw the dabble and this incredible last song talk
about that song.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Heaven Song, Heaven Song. Well, you know, I think at
the beginning of this we were talking about storytelling and that
is a song where I really just gave myself full
liberty to talk as long as I wanted. It's almost
nine minutes long. And along with losing Mary Dad Mike.
(28:11):
In fact, it was only two weeks before I lost Mike.
I lost my dog of thirteen years, Howard, And then
I was on tour and Mike was supposed to join
us on tour in Austin. He's from Texas and wanted
to go to that show, but his lodging fell through.
He didn't make it. We were out in southern California. Oddly,
(28:36):
I ran into ice on the Laguna Mountains. Scared the
shit out of me. I've never lived in a place
where you had to chain your tires, and there I
was in a you know, twelve passenger van with gear
and my band, and we had nothing but mountains in
(28:57):
front of us. You know. I had to go all
the way up into Seattle and down Utah and Colorado
by the end of the tour. So I called Mike
and asked him if he had any experience with chains
on the tires, and we talked a bit on the phone.
This was after I played Austin and played La and
on the way to San Francisco from La Is when
(29:17):
I got the call that Mike had had passed. That
was my first tour of the year.
Speaker 2 (29:21):
And this was unexpected.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
This was unexpected. He died in a tree accident. And
let me tell you, Mike was crazy and he would
have wanted to die that. There was only one other
way I can think he would have wanted to die,
which was just get eat by a shark. He liked
to surf. This was nuts. He got crushed in a tree. Okay,
and Mike wouldn't mind me telling you this. In fact,
(29:43):
it's pretty badass. He got crushed in a tree. And
this is the most Mike thing ever. But his partner, Terrez,
was trying to make her way out to where he
was to help load this wood he was cutting, and
as Mike was dying, he answered his phone to tell
(30:03):
his partner of twenty years that he was dying.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
Yeah, I mean, it's amazing. If you knew him, you
would be like, well, isn't that Mike Harmon? You know,
of course he would, And you know, you can giggle
at it now because it's just so him. That was
the beginning of twenty and twenty three. I had an
insane touring year. That year, I never got to stop.
(30:32):
When I started writing Heaven Song, I was heading out
on tour with Margo Price right after that. That was,
I believe late August. At that point, that was the
first time I got to catch a breath. Really, that
whole year, I hadn't been able to process Mike's death
or my dog. And I finally had a moment by
(30:53):
myself at home. So I took some little mushrooms that
Mike had given me and had like a very mellow
moment on my back porch, and I remember just right
down the words and singing the melody to maybe if
I see it, then I want it, because of course,
(31:16):
when people close to you die, when a little creature
who's been in your house for thirteen years is no
longer there, you're thinking about mortality. You're thinking about, you know,
life after death, all these things. And I really was,
and I wanted to. I was hoping to do some
processing around that when I was home, and I ended
(31:38):
up writing this big old road trip where I mean,
I know I'm the protagonist, and the song where I
end up being in a car with all these man
made concepts. The only thing really that was real was
the dog, you know, and we're on a road trip
to heaven. I knew I wanted to end the song.
(31:59):
It took a long time. It took about another full
year from that moment before I got the line, but
I knew at the end of the song, you know,
the chorus is maybe if I see it, then I
want it. And I'm talking about heaven even though I'm
trying to get there, but I'm still not sure if
I'll even want to give it a go. But then
(32:23):
at the end of the song, Sin, who has also
been in the car with me this whole time, you know,
wouldn't let me go into heaven before I answered what
I had learned from Sin specifically, and my reply was
that maybe if I see it, then I want it,
which is kind of what you know, if you were
(32:45):
raised in kind of the Christian tradition, That's what sin does, right.
It makes you lust after things?
Speaker 4 (32:55):
Are you?
Speaker 2 (32:56):
Are you patient with yourself when there's something not working
on a song? Will you try and force something in
or you'll just you'll let it sit.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
No, And that's another thing I learned from my writing mentor.
He would always say, like a story, you'll go about
its business, and I look at songs the same way.
You know, there's songs that have taken years to write
and the way I believe it. I do write everything down,
but I'm not scared to put a song away because
(33:25):
I have this idea that if it comes back, then
it's meant to and if it doesn't, then it wasn't.
I really am not precious about that. I don't think
I've thrown away my best ideas or something like that.
I think if they're meant to stick around, they will.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
And you believe in predestination for songs.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
Oh yeah, let's bring it back full circle here.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Yeah, well that's break and we'll be back with SG Goodman.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Are you writing for other people as well?
Speaker 3 (33:59):
I would love to. You can tell you something. This
is funny. I have a really bad tendency. What I'll do,
I'll get it. I'll get a wild hair one night
and write somebody and say let's get together, let's write.
You know. I'm more of a phone call kind of person,
or it doesn't stick in my brain. So what I've
tried to do now is keep a list and then
(34:19):
share it with my management to say, hey, I want
you to know I wrote so and so, and they
said they were willing to write with me, but I
haven't followed up. And I have a feeling, if you know,
I go on a walk after I hang up this phone,
that it'll be another two weeks before I remember that
I did that again. You know, I love my manager
(34:42):
and thank God that you know they are willing to
help me do that. But yeah, I love to co
write with people. I don't have a lot of time
for it, but I wish I did.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
You know, Because I was listening to this record, I thought, well,
who wouldn't want some of these songs on their record too?
They just seem to work that so well.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
Let's name some people that we would want to cover
these songs. What are you thinking? Like Dolly Parton, let's
willing into existence?
Speaker 2 (35:07):
But would I would? I want you to make as
much money as possible.
Speaker 3 (35:12):
I would have wanted you have to follow me on substack.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
Yeah, I'm eight dollars a month.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
You know I would have said, honestly, I would have
said Mary unfaithful because I thought she covered songs so beautifully.
Speaker 3 (35:27):
You know, covering songs is one of it's truly an
art form. I can't do it. I'm not very good
at it.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Really.
Speaker 3 (35:34):
Yes, I was in the studio with a friend of mine,
Kelsey Walden, who's a great, great artist man. She really
has an act for reworking someone else's songs. I just
have absolutely I go blank. I've been really fortunate in
the covering song department. Tyler Childers covered sure one of
(35:54):
my songs, and it really is a rare thing where
you're like, you know what, You're a really good person,
and I'd be happy for you to cover my song.
You know, I don't have to worry about Tyler doing
something and me being scared to be associated with him.
(36:14):
But you know, you never know about some of these others.
I'm not trying to make assumptions, but I do read.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
So you do. Do you feel at all a part
of that world? You know, you root yourself in western Kentucky,
which is not Nashville. Uh huh? Do you feel a
part of that kind of Nashville world?
Speaker 3 (36:40):
I would say I'm about two hours out, you know,
because that's how far I am from Nashville. It's good.
Nashville has been good to me, and I don't have
things to say about it. Negatively in that regards. But
it's not a bad thing to be from Kentucky and
be a musician. I think Kentucky music stands on it's
(37:00):
own it and it has for a really long time
and will continue to. So yeah, I'm about two hours
out of Nashville.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
Everly Brothers, Ricky Skaggs, Bill Monroe.
Speaker 3 (37:10):
Kentucky isn't even just like a country music hub. I
mean when I opened my mouth, I'm country, you know,
but I love punk music, I love rap, I love
all kinds of different music. And Kentucky has a really
big history of you know, we have Bonnie Prince, Billy,
we have we have Slint, an old post punk band,
(37:33):
My Morning Jacket, you know, State Champion was a big
influence on me. The span at A Louisville. It's great
indie band Wombo. There's lots of different types of really
amazing music that has come out of Kentucky.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
And well, Jim James from My Morning Jacket produced your
first rect Did he discover.
Speaker 3 (37:52):
You in a sense or I think I was forced
on him? Not really.
Speaker 2 (37:58):
I had a bit of worked out.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
It did well, I asked a mutual friend of mine,
I got the nerves I went and worked on some demos,
and then six months later I finally got the nerve
to send them to a mutual friend of ours, this
artist named Daniel Martin Moore. I was up in the
mountains with him and Joan Shelley and a bunch of
(38:21):
different writers for this compilation called the Pine Mountain Sessions,
and I saw that Jim James was on it, and
I was like, oh my goodness, because I was a
really big fan of my morn Jacket and I was like, wow,
I guess I'm not crazy far removed from this person.
And I knew Daniel's friends, and after I got those
demos together, I sent Daniel an email in October of
(38:45):
that year, and by December, my friend and now publicist
actually told me we haven't heard back from Jim. It's
a good record. You should if you don't hear back
by Monday, like you should move on and like just
cut the record go on. Well, I was working and
(39:06):
I was actually living in Nashville. I lived in Nashville
for about six months and was working at a little
taco shop there. It was right before my serving shift.
I'd been there prepping since seven. I was having a
coke outside and I got an email looping me in
that Monday with Jim James.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
Did you do your shift?
Speaker 3 (39:27):
I did it a lot happier that day than all
the other ones.
Speaker 2 (39:30):
You know, everybody got a little EPI.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
Yeah, but I was like, I'm not gonna be here
much longer. I'm going back to Kentucky. I had my
house in Kentucky and live there to help pay off
my property taxes that year.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
Now that sound had it does have that low fi sound,
a lot of reverb on the guitar. You still some
of that, but this, this album feels the sound feels different.
Did you go in with different ideas for how you
wanted the production to go.
Speaker 3 (39:59):
I did. I wanted not only did I want the production,
as far as the sound to feel different. I wanted
to make it no that I was going to be
a third whill as the producer. I've always co produced
all my records, and you know I have a very
(40:19):
particular vision, and you could verify that with anyone who's
ever done anything with me. I had worked with Drew
Vandenberg and I've worked with Matt Rowan before on other projects,
but never where it was as blatant as all right,
we're going to be all co captains on this, and
(40:40):
I am going to be more open to your ideas
and things like that. So that was different and vulnerable feeling.
But as far as yes, making a bigger sounding record
than I had in the past, that I went into
the studio know when I wanted to do that, and
I hired musicians specifically to help accomplish that.
Speaker 2 (41:04):
For me, do you know enough about production? I think
there's things I can do here to make this feel bigger.
Speaker 3 (41:11):
Oh definitely. This is the first record where I ever
let keys and kind of anything that wasn't easily packed
into my van and could go across this country on
a record. I always had a problem with that. I
always have been really particular about wanting for my live
(41:31):
performance to sound just like the record. A lot of
people aren't like that, you know, and a lot of
listeners don't want that. But for me, being starting out
in music and trying to cut my teeth and pretty
much anyone I would come in front of had never
heard me before, I wanted my live show to sound
(41:51):
exactly like the record. So I was representing what I
had done. And having a keyboard player early on in
my tour life. That just couldn't have happened. I couldn't
have fit everybody in the van, and I couldn't afford
to pay an extra person. Even this record, I knew
that I wanted to add another sonic element that was
(42:15):
not present on albums in the past, and I chose,
you know, kind of auxiliary key stuff and I love it.
I have had Ben Tanner plays with Alabama Shakes and
was down in muscle shows. Lives down there so right
by the studio and what a what a champ? Really
good and I mean, I'm not gonna lie. It took.
(42:38):
I was really uncomfortable with some of the ambient things
that were coming out at first, but we honed it
in in a way that I was comfortable and I
never they Matt and Drew, my co producers, would always say,
you are steering the ship of what and that's important.
I have to have the music sound like something that
(42:59):
I don't get up in front of people and feel
like it's not me, you know. So that was that
was fun. But Matt Penn was my drummer, and it
was just like washing a person like just an alien.
His drumming is just it was hard to play live
with him because I just wanted to watch. It was
(43:21):
really amazing, And yeah, I was really fortunate to get
to work with a lot of really really great musicians
on this record that made things. We just locked in
with each other in the live room and we're out
of there in ten days.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
Amazing. Well, it's a great record. Thank you so much
for doing this. It's been just wonderful.
Speaker 3 (43:46):
Thank you. Yeah, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (43:48):
Do you want to play a song?
Speaker 3 (43:49):
Let's do it, all right, play something.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
You can play anything you want, all right.
Speaker 3 (43:53):
I'm going to play my song, I'm in Love, a
sweet little song.
Speaker 4 (44:09):
All the early birds now singing like a late night
talking for I've been trespassing on my neighbors, swimming naked
through their pool. Well, I've forgotten all my friends, but
(44:37):
I don't.
Speaker 5 (44:37):
Know they can tell the Army love. I'm in love.
I'm in love. I'm in love.
Speaker 4 (44:55):
I've been crying at commercials on the Hotel hotelevision set,
and I've been lieing on my tex Is, crowding off
the things that I ain't ballsed RSV. Petere and thetation
(45:20):
snowing in my heart that I never show.
Speaker 6 (45:28):
That.
Speaker 5 (45:29):
Army Love. I'm in love.
Speaker 6 (45:32):
I'm in love. I'm in love. The moon is right
now for cutting off hair.
Speaker 4 (45:45):
I'm checking out Walmart collections of underwear.
Speaker 6 (45:51):
I'm in love. I'm in love. I'm in love. I'm
in love.
Speaker 4 (46:03):
Oh, have our conversation, said the checkout line at the
grocery store, telling my whole life now to strangers in
a way I've never done before. Yeah, I've been dancing
(46:27):
in my kitchen, singing into school.
Speaker 6 (46:36):
There, arm in love, Armon Love, Armen Love, I'm in love, Yes,
Armon Love, common Love, Armon Love, arm in.
Speaker 2 (47:02):
Beautiful, thank you.
Speaker 1 (47:06):
In an episode description, you'll find a link to our
favorite Goodman tracks, as well as her latest album, Planting
by the Signs. Be sure to check out YouTube dot
com slash Broken Record podcast to see all of our
video interviews, and be sure to follow us on Instagram
at the Broken Record Pod. You can follow us on
Twitter at Broken Record. Broken Record is produced and edited
by Leah Rose, with marketing and help from Eric Sandler
(47:28):
and Jordan McMillan. Our engineer is Ben Holliday. Broken Record
is production of Pushkin Industries. If you love this show
and others from Pushkin consider subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Pushkin
Plus is a podcast subscription that offers bonus content and
ad free listening for four ninety nine a month. Look
for Pushkin Plus on Apple podcast subscriptions, and if you
like this show, please remember to share, rate, and review
(47:49):
us on your podcast app Our theme musics by Kenny Beats.
I'm justin Richmond.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Ruthie's Table 4
For more than 30 years The River Cafe in London, has been the home-from-home of artists, architects, designers, actors, collectors, writers, activists, and politicians. Michael Caine, Glenn Close, JJ Abrams, Steve McQueen, Victoria and David Beckham, and Lily Allen, are just some of the people who love to call The River Cafe home. On River Cafe Table 4, Rogers sits down with her customers—who have become friends—to talk about food memories. Table 4 explores how food impacts every aspect of our lives. “Foods is politics, food is cultural, food is how you express love, food is about your heritage, it defines who you and who you want to be,” says Rogers. Each week, Rogers invites her guest to reminisce about family suppers and first dates, what they cook, how they eat when performing, the restaurants they choose, and what food they seek when they need comfort. And to punctuate each episode of Table 4, guests such as Ralph Fiennes, Emily Blunt, and Alfonso Cuarón, read their favourite recipe from one of the best-selling River Cafe cookbooks. Table 4 itself, is situated near The River Cafe’s open kitchen, close to the bright pink wood-fired oven and next to the glossy yellow pass, where Ruthie oversees the restaurant. You are invited to take a seat at this intimate table and join the conversation. For more information, recipes, and ingredients, go to https://shoptherivercafe.co.uk/ Web: https://rivercafe.co.uk/ Instagram: www.instagram.com/therivercafelondon/ Facebook: https://en-gb.facebook.com/therivercafelondon/ For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iheartradio app, apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com