Ever since the release of her debut EP, back in 2007, Beki Hemingway has been quietly building a reputation as an artist with an abundance of talent. Together, with her husband, Randy Kirkman, they have proven themselves to be quite a formidable team, when it comes to negotiating the rapids of a career that has seen their music travel to many different corners of the globe. A writer of memorable songs and a singer that can stand right up there with the very best, Beki took some time to chat with us about her latest album, Earth & Asphalt, together with other reflections on her life journey so far.
It’s been such a quick year so far, despite the lockdown and Covid-19. Are you still enjoying the feedback from your new album release, Earth and Asphalt, in December 2020?
We have been really pleased with the feedback on the new album, ranging from small Americana blogs to the cover of Illinois Entertainer (Chicago’s premiere music mag), and airplay on some really great Americana shows, but in recent months, things have slowed down. That’s down to us as we do all our own PR and we have let the lockdown blues get to us, and we’ve had to focus on other projects to pay the bills! We hope to begin a new push over the summer months to let people know that Earth & Asphalt exists and we think it’s pretty good!
It was a challenging time to put out a new record, with all the distractions of Christmas. Was it a case of there never being a really ‘perfect’ time to launch the new songs, given the constraints of self isolating and the virus threat?
I can’t say I’ve ever understood market timing, even in a normal year but in 2020, nothing was predictable. What we did get is that we had just completed our first crowdfunded album, and we really felt a debt of gratitude to our fans and funders, so wanted to get it to them as soon as it was complete.
Once they all had their copies, we had thought about waiting a bit to release EARTH & ASPHALT officially, but crowd funders who already had their copy were starting to say such nice things about the album on social media and with free PR like that, it seemed a waste not to make it available right away...so with a whimper, it appeared on Bandcamp. Only recently, did we go the official route of making singles available on Spotify.
You have been very active over the last year with live streaming and online concerts. Is this something that has given you a sense of focus during these months of not being able to play live?
In April of 2020, we were live nearly every night with Song of the Night and it was a complete blast. We did theme weeks like “on tour in the house” and “what’s in my closet?” and it gave us tremendous focus, a reason to rehearse, dress up a little, and have virtual visits with friends and fans from all over. We also filmed a songwriter in the round concert with Gillian Tuite and Elena Duff (remotely, of course) to make up for a cancelled Workman’s Club gig, and were able to be part of Spirit Store’s video series as well as performing a few one-off concerts for venues in Scotland and the USA. It has been good to stay active, but I can see a real difference in my countenance between those early Song of the Night videos and recent ones. We are so ready for LIVE music and normal interactions to return, and thankfully, it looks like that may happen before too long.
Did the album come together over a short space of time or had some of the songs been in the creative cupboard for a while?
The bulk of the songs were written specifically with “the next album” in mind since WHINS & WEATHER (2017). Exceptions are Cost Me Everything which was rediscovered when I rifled through old Garage Band files one day. It had been there for at least 5 years, and I had forgotten about writing it. Birmingham was written with Jonathan Rundman a decade ago for a follow up to Tennesota - a sequel that we wrote most of but never recorded, but Birmingham just seems to fit nicely with the material on EARTH & ASPHALT. Cinderella Twinalmost didn’t get done in time to include, though the title had been rattling around my brain since we passed the sign on our last US tour.
Is the song-writing process something that comes easily to you?
I can go a year without writing a song, and then a few will come to me quickly. I’ve been very undisciplined and tend to wait until it DOES come easily. It’s either a concerted effort to make sure nothing sounds forced, or just lazy. However, during the pandemic with all touring and live music cancelled, I have taken a side job as a staff songwriter. While I mostly write lyrics for them, I find it is helping me to learn the discipline of powering through a block.
How did you find the process of recording in different locations, with both Dublin and Dundalk featuring at different stages?
We’ve used this process for the last few albums and it works nicely. We do the bulk of recording at home with Randy as producer and engineer, and then finish up with someone else in a different location - primarily to have that extra set of ears to help us determine when it’s finished, to break any ties, and keep us from killing each other!
Using Conor Brady and Camden Recording Studios, pre-lockdown, must have given you both the room to stand back and get other opinions on the songs and the direction they were taking?
Definitely. We really respect Conor’s ear, and enjoy working with him. Even during the lockdown weeks, Randy and Conor benefitted from sharing files and opinions of how things were shaping up, and his guitar work on Shape of My Face is one of my favourite things on the album.
The inspiration behind a number of the tracks seems to come from a personal perspective and originates in a period of self-reflection for you, Beki. Lay Your Burdens Down and Shape Of My Face bring images of having time to assess where you have been, where you are right now and the perspective gained?
Shape of My Face grapples with the aging process, which I have felt a little more acutely these past few years as I’ve been confronted with some medical issues, but Lay Your Burdens Down comes almost verbatim from something Randy was saying to me about a tough time he went through a while back - a fight with God, if you will. (A better wife might have been listening without lyrics in mind!). More often, only when I look back on what I’ve written can I see what I needed to learn.
There is also a great sense of the past and memories of youthful abandon on songs like Cinderella Twin and Birmingham. Were you revisiting the joys of being free to decide upon your own destiny back then?
There is a lot of nostalgia in both of those, as well as a lot of fiction. These aren’t my memories per se, but things I might have imagined around familiar settings when I was younger.
Having said that, songs like, California, yearn for a simpler time when there was still innocence and nobody was judging you. Have the years given a sense of something lost at the price of self-awareness gained?
I don’t think that self-awareness is the culprit here. It’s about contrasts and the sacrifices made living a life of constant motion. I grew up a military brat and have been a touring musician for a lot of my adult years. I’m used to moving, and I get the itch to rearrange the furniture a lot. The price is sometimes that I don’t know how to be still, I haven’t been able to be a constant presence in anyone’s life (except Randy) and there is a loneliness that comes with that. People who are trying to manage 2000 friends on Facebook instead of having three best friends in their community may relate to some of the same feelings. The main thought here was to recognize constancy - though I may not be good at it, I value it tremendously
We’re Not Going Anywhere is a testament to the enduring love that both you and Randy share, almost an ‘us against the world’ mantra for living. Has your journey since those early years in Chicago been everything you had dreamed of when you were first cutting your musical teeth together?
No way! First off, we were in separate bands for the first five years together and we said we’d never work together musically. Ha! No marriage is ever predictable and we are two stubborn commitment-phobic opposites, but we ride the ups and downs together, and I suppose that is the message of the song. Commitment wins the day. It has been both worse and better than we ever could have expected and here we are several albums and anniversaries later. We love each other. Aw.
You were initially attracted to a New Wave/Punk energy as a young performer, whereas Randy was more into a Hard Rock/ Metal direction. How did you initially meet?
I was a backup singer traveling through Chicago and a mutual friend introduced us at a church service the morning after the concert. We met again about six weeks later at a music festival outside Chicago, and Randy would NOT stop calling me after that. The first time he visited me in Denver, he had bought me a guitar, and I knew that if I didn’t marry him, he’d be really mad about the guitar.
Chicago was a vibrant music scene back in the 1990s. Were you aligned with acts like Tortoise, Eleventh Dream Day, Urge Overkill and Smashing Pumpkins at the time?
Those acts were a bit before my time, but Randy’s former band would have played at many of the same venues during the same era. We were regulars in the same coffeehouse scene that launched acts like Andrew Bird and Alice Peacock, and we often borrowed Dolly Varden’s rhythm section in those days. Michael McDermott was very much around, though always more famous. We played a few shows with him and were on a Chicago compilation CD together. (A few years back, he told me that his parents had a poster of me up in their house).
Your shift over time to a more classic Americana sound would seem to draw as much from bands like Lone Justice and Uncle Tupelo. Who were your influences as you grew into new musical directions?
Lone Justice is an early and persistent musical influence, as well as Maria McKee’s first three solo albums. We’re also big fans of Patty Griffin, early Gillian Welch, Wilco, and Emmylou Harris. I really like some of the Jayhawks’ music, and classic stuff like the Eagles, Paul Simon, Glenn Campbell, and Jim Croce have all left a mark.
Did you always find performing live to be a natural expression of your talents?
The singing has always been great fun. Talking between songs used to be incredibly awkward, but I took an acting class to help with that, and though I still find it a bit hard sometimes, I am able to relax and enjoy the interaction much more. It’s really a two-way conversation, anyway.
Your voice is so expressive, containing both gentle and warm tones, together with a powerful dynamic and range. Did you ever take singing lessons growing up?
I’m not very good with lessons, but yes - off and on, starting in high school. Usually, it was all drills and Italian arias, which I was not very good at. When we moved to Denver in 2005, I had developed some bad habits on the road, and found a teacher who taught me some really different warm ups and ways of thinking about the physiology of singing. I only spent six months with him, but it helped me break some habits and think about maintaining my voice a bit better. I’m probably overdue for some more lessons!
A song like Cost Me Everything appears to be the perfect vehicle for your talents, both gently reflective and yet laced with such power and controlled angst. How do you place yourself in the right space to deliver a vocal performance like that?
(No clue. I just sing it.) And thank you.
Travel is one of the cornerstones of career musicians. In your case you have made a conscious decision to couple this with a desire to serve communities in a Christian fellowship. Where were the roots of this direction born?
Well, certainly traveling and meeting all kinds of people makes one more aware of a world outside themselves and the many needs that go unmet. I’m not a political or activist kind of artist, but I do think that personally, we all long for our lives to make an impact in some way, especially as we grapple with that aforementioned aging process. For me being given a microphone is an invitation to sing, not to preach, but having said that, I don’t hide my Christian faith, and for all the uncertainty of the freelance lifestyle, one of its benefits is the flexibility to pursue work with causes we believe in between tours. Maybe this is just a natural side effect of growing up, and taking our faith more seriously.
Your initial introduction to putting down more permanent ties in Ireland came out of a friendship with The Sweet Sorrows, who also live here. When did you all first meet?
We met Sammy in Glasgow about 15 years ago, but were aware of his band the Electrics as early as the mid-90s when I worked at a record store that carried their music. It’s a wonder we didn’t meet sooner - we have several mutual friends and my band in the 90s played at the same festival at least once. We met Kylie in Denver after they married. About 8 years ago, my mother remarried a Horner from Belfast, so I think we might be related now!
It’s now been four years since you first settled in Ireland. Do you look back at your decision with great memories or has it been a more challenging journey for you both?
Both of those things ring true. It was a challenging move as it ended our “year of yes” adventure with a cancer diagnosis that effectively kept us in Ireland until I was healthy again. We had been visiting for years, and we had tossed around the idea of moving here before. Obviously, we decided to stay. We’re very happy to be where we are in Dundalk now, and can look back on our first two years in Wexford with good memories. We miss our friends there and look forward to traveling back soon.
The abiding message in your song, Comfort, the closing track on the new album, is one of acceptance and forgiveness; “May you have many to carry your load, And resolve to try again.” Is this your code of the road as you look towards the future?
Code of the road - that’s good Paul. I think it will be!
Congratulations on the new album and hopefully increasing numbers of new listeners will find their way to your superb music?
Thanks.
Are there any final thoughts that you would like to leave us with?
Buy it on Bandcamp or order the real CDs directly from us at www.bekihemingway.com
Interview by Paul McGee