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Annie Gallup (gal on the go)


A Conversation with Annie Gallup (continued)

PM: Along with that breathtaking version of "Enough" on the record, which for me is a real high point, my favorite new song is "Avalon." That is a remarkable song.

AG: Ah.

PM: So maybe, if there is anything to say about the writing of that, you'd share a little on that subject. How and when did that song come up?

AG: That song is new within the last year. It was a funny song to write because through the whole process of writing it I absolutely hated it. I thought speaking in a child's voice was a stupid idea. I always hate songs sung by adults from a child's perspective. It's impossible to do that gracefully. But once I was into the song, the only way out of it was to finish it. So it was a really uncomfortable song to write.

PM: Wow.

AG: It was a story I really wanted to tell, the Post Traumatic Stress thing. I needed a way in there, partly for current events, partly just--I don't know, I just needed to talk about it. And it was a strange song--it was written a lot subconsciously. I don't know, really, where the story came from. A lot of it kind of came out of dreams. And the chorus completely came out of a dream. I was trying to find the right three-syllable word. And I was using "castaway." And then I dreamt that the chorus was "Avalon." And after I sang the "Avalon" chorus, I looked at the song, and it had so many references to the King Arthur legend.

PM: Really?

AG: Yeah. Even the protagonist was Artie.

[laughter]

AG: And the references to the sword, and I think there was a rock and a sword.

PM: Right.

AG: Yeah, yeah. And the idea of Avalon being the island where King Arthur was sent away to die after he was wounded in battle. And I was thinking of all these vets coming home with no support system, really, just come back broken and alone.

PM: Your songs run so deep compared to most songs that I hear. "Free," the record closer, is an amazing song. What would you share with the readers about your process on that composition?

AG: Well, it was obviously very tongue-in-cheek song, thinking about--well, yeah, I really just wrote it to crack myself up at a time when I was feeling like relationships were inherently self-destructive.

PM: [laughs]

AG: It had a lot of hesitation in the performance. It just had to be really, really, really slow. I played it for Louise [Taylor] when I first wrote it. And if I hadn't played it for her and she hadn't reacted so strongly to it, it might have been a song that slipped through the cracks. But Louise really understood the whole ironic humor of it. So I guess I put it on the record for Louise. She reminded me of it.

PM: It has an attack on the guitar that I've never heard you do before. That was fantastic. Were you coming direct, or through an amp, or were you just hitting it really hard? What was going on?

AG: Oh, we had a great setup when we recorded this. Yeah, that guitar sound, that was through a pod into a great old Mesa Boogie amp that was at the studio where I was recording. But we messed with it, and dialed in that sound so I could get something really dirty, if I went there.    continue

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