Proper Gander interview

EDITH FROST interview
a look at edith and her pilgrimage to her label’s hometown - chicago from new york

It’s easy for some music artists to do sterile generic promo pieces and interviews to help their adoring public see the person behind the music. So Mary Hart (or Leeza Gibbons, or…) is summoned poolside to have "an intimate chat" with the artist, where we discover that, outside of the recording studio, they’re just normal people. Probing questions reveal what club they were in during high school, whether they prefer cats or dogs, or hell, even what their favorite ice cream flavor is. While this may work for a Toni Braxton or a Jon Secada, Edith Frost is slightly different proposition.

It’s not because Edith couldn’t do such a thing; she is a very affable and friendly lady. But by listening to her full-length album Calling Over Time, it’s apparent that there’s a lot more to her songs. Throughout the album’s 11 tracks, Edith guides us through tales of longing, loss, contentment and transition, allowing her simple, poetic thoughts to act as a mirror of our own experiences.

Edith has a different explanation. "I’m always afraid people are going to recognize themselves in my songs," she said. "When I spot something that’s just too specific, then I’ll change it and make it more vague or general." Giving a song a sort of identifiable plot line or locale is, as Edith puts it, "not my forte." The lack of locale would seem to fit Frost well; after a childhood moving around Texas and Mexico — "spending six years here, and seven years there" — she found herself in New York City.

"I had gotten to where Texas was a drag for me to be there," Edith explained. "I had been there so long and I had visited New York and it just seemed so exciting, and I basically wanted to have the stars in my eyes and wanted to live there really bad. Of course, as soon as I moved to New York, I realized how cool it is in Texas!"

Still, Edith stuck it out for seven years, "paying her dues" as it were and collaborating with area country and rockabilly groups. It wasn’t until late in her New York sojourn that she stepped into the limelight on her own, singing and performing her own songs.

Soon, venerable indie label Drag City came calling, and Edith obliged with demos, after which Drag City requested more. The exchange resulted in Drag City signing Edith and releasing an EP in the summer of ‘96, consisting of demos which dated back to a decade before.

Just as Edith was getting attention that fall in the Big Apple, the itch to move sent Frost to her new label’s home… Chicago.

"I had a gig the night before I moved to Chicago at the Mercury Lounge and it was packed. It was opening for Royal Trux," Edith said. "It was like, ‘Finally, it’s a great club, it’s packed, I get a write-up in Time Out New York and now I’m leaving. Oh well."

Still, instead of starting anew as far as recognition is concerned, what momentum she started in New York seemed to snowball.

"Two weeks after I move here, there was a big piece in the [Chicago] Reader here. They gave a whole page about my music," she said. It wasn’t much of a problem to fit in Chicago’s bustling music scene either. "I’ve had no trouble getting gigs here, whereas New York you really have to prove yourself before they book you." Edith explained.

Her new family of sorts at Drag City made her feel welcome, too, by arranging a bevy of the city’s finest musicians to take part in recording her full-length album. (note from eda: actually we recorded that in September of ‘96, two months before I moved here.) Rian Murphy, who once drummed for Royal Trux and played with the Palace triumvirate, took the job after his work with the Silver Jews. "Rian set up the band — he figured who he wanted to have as a group," Edith said. "I didn’t know these people at all."

Two of those people were Jim O’Rourke and David Grubbs, who are Drag City mainstays with both the Red Krayola and their own project, Gastr del Sol. "I met Jim shortly before I went to record it," Edith recalled, "because he played a show in New York with Cynthia Dall, and it was, ‘Oh, I understand we’re doing a record together…’"

Other Drag City and Chicago luminaries were called to the task, including Eleventh Dream Day guitarist Rick Rizzo, and quite luckily enough, current Stereolab keyboardist and chief High Llama, as well as the former musical half of Microdisney, Sean O’Hagan.

"Sean was in town for that day," Edith said, "and I guess he was hanging out with Dan (Koretzky, ‘mayor’ of Drag City) and Rian said, off the cuff, feel free to come by to play a little, and he did, and he came by for an hour and laid a part down."

Such favorable occurrences were aplenty during Calling Over Time’s creation. Edith credits the good fortune on "having the same group of people for a whole week in the studio, and we just locked in this….vibe." (Apparently, Gastr del Sol agreed; Edith is scheduled to do a bit of vocalization on a future Gastr project.)

It certainly didn’t hurt that Edith’s own songwriting skills were flourishing at this point. "We’d picked 25 songs to choose from (out of 60) that we really liked, and we ended up having time to record 14 or 15," said Edith. But Edith kept writing. "We went to record and I had five new songs that were even better, so we ended up doing those and not relying on the [initial] list so much."

Listening to Calling Over Time, there’s a noirish sense of community, yet the songs represent a separate work of their own. Apparently, its creators agreed. "We were going to have other tracks on there, like demos and stuff," Edith recalled. "We had recorded so many great tunes that week and they all had this one vibe and we decided to cull them from just that…"

These connected songs, though not specifically unified by a common ideology or protagonist, all have similar pulling points. The backing band mostly plays against form to provide Edith with a simple yet moody landscape she could warp her words around. From the brooding harmonium in "Denied" to the eerie fiddle on "Temporary Loan" to more expected places like the jovial piano on "Too Happy," the band matches Edith’s lyrical mood. When Edith coos a cover, such as on "Follow," the listener feels like a voyeur in a conversation; when she murmurs phrases like, "Loving hands turn blazing sand to water," the words gain immense visceral strength from her understated delivery and simple strumming of her guitar.

Such a universal viewpoint have led many critics to connect Edith to her avowed love of country, and in particular bring up comparisons to the legendary Patsy Cline.

"I love Patsy Cline and I sing tons of her songs," stated Edith. "It’s a really high compliment to hear that, but on the other hand I think people use that because it’s the one country singer they know well enough to compare me to."

For the record, Edith finds the country-like aspect of her songcraft more realized by pioneers like Bonnie Guitar, Janis Martin and particularly Skeeter Davis.

Even calling the album country isn’t quite getting the point. "I do have a really great country background, but I don’t think that record is all that country," defended Edith. "It has shades of country in it." For every country element heard in Calling Over Time, there’s also a homage to folk music, to Dylan, even to Nico.

Not to say Edith doesn’t find kindred spirits with the "Insurgent Country" movement of some of her fellow Windy City neighbors. "I have a lot of friends in that scene now that I’ve moved here," said Edith. "I am a part of it in that I’m playing with these people and friends with them. In the past I’ve done lots of country, and I fit in with that crowd pretty well." Edith would stop short of calling herself a member. "I would not lump myself in with that, but I have a great affinity for it."

Something Edith might gain an affinity for as well is touring. Oddly enough, for all her relocations throughout her life, it was only this summer that Edith played the first show in a town where she didn’t live. Other small touring schedules developed (the kind where, as Edith put it, "I had driven so far that I couldn’t come home to spend the night"), and more touring will follow. But Edith seemed willing to hit the tour circuit, whether playing normal shows or a festival like Lollapalooza ("I’d be on the second stage, I’m sure, playing with the Tibetan Monks").

Lilith Fair, Sarah McLachlan’s huddling of female artists to tour this fair country, is another story.

"I have an attitude problem with lumping a bunch of women together …. segregating it from other music," Edith explained. "I’d rather have it be where the vibe was similar rather than the fact that they’re women. For me, that’s kind of cheesy."

Such a statement, in retrospect, isn’t surprising. A listen to Edith Frost isn’t listening to a woman per se; rather, it’s a culmination of the human experience, of buyers and sellers of the universal commodity of feelings — particularly love. And Edith isn’t about to show the cast’s faces, either.

"When I’ll do a love song, I’ll claim — it may not be true — that this is every man, every guy that I’ve ever been with…not my current boyfriend or whatever," Edith said.

Perhaps that’s why Edith’s work is so personal and yet so encompassing; she lets the listener in, whether to converse or perhaps to eavesdrop, maybe even to just pass the hours. Calling Over Time won’t rock a party or light up the Hot Alternative request lists, but after a few listens, it becomes an old, familiar addition to someone’s life, a soft and downy security blanket to wrap yourself around in.

Oh, and by the way, Edith’s favorite ice cream flavor is chocolate. Never got around to asking her high school club history or her pet preferences. Maybe next time.