‘Music & Art for Magical Nerds, Weird Western Swing, Cosmic Country, Fairy Metal, Cowboy Goth, Space Shanties, Stop-motion Animatrix, Quantum Court Jester.’ That is how Nashville-based artist Milly Raccoon describes herself on her Instagram page. It’s a wide-ranging and accurate representation of a free spirit whose fiddle playing and vocals have journeyed from classical violin from a young age to her current musical position as a somewhat left-of-centre country artist. Her most recent recording, FRANKINCENSE AND MYRRH, is a genre-swinging delight, moving from Celtic - influenced traditional music to classic country folk. She’s also very much at the heart of the thriving bohemian musical scene in East Nashville – fiddle virtuoso Lillie Mae and her brother, and splendid guitarist, Frank Rische both play in her band and contributed to her new album.
You’ve played in a variety of bands with diverse backgrounds from psychedelic rock, bluegrass, traditional Irish, and even Turkish and Egyptian music. That is quite a mixture.
Violin is a very versatile instrument and people in bands often want the sound of a violin for all kinds of things. As a child, I played classical violin in school. I didn’t really play any folk music growing up other than songbooks that I found around the house. I didn’t play in bands until late high school when a couple of my friends got a Grateful Dead band together and I got a taste for improvising with that type of music. After college, I moved to Seattle, Washington. That city has a very diverse music scene. I found a bluegrass jam online there and started going to those jams but I also just kept meeting people that were playing different kinds of music and wanted the violin with their music. Because of the versatility of Seattle, I got into a lot of different music genres.
I’m aware that you have travelled quite a bit. Was the move to Nashville to further your professional career?
My motivation to move to Nashville was around country music and bluegrass. I had been living in New Orleans for a number of years before that and got to play a lot of jazz and other interesting music there, but not enough country and bluegrass. I wanted to get to the heart of where people were really serious about those genres and improve my playing. Also, people really focus on the culture of expanding their careers in Nashville, more so than in other cities. So, I was attracted to the career possibilities of traditional country and bluegrass music. I’ve been here almost four years which is hard to believe. The pandemic makes it feel more like one year, or maybe two.
Was it easy for you to integrate with like-minded artists in Nashville?
It’s one of the more conservative places that I’ve ever lived, although some people from around Nashville would probably disagree. I’m coming from places like New Orleans and Seattle that are super wild and free, so I had to reel it in a bit until I understood how I was going to authentically represent myself here. I think I’ve gotten over a lot of those hurdles and found a balance and how to be my wild self without losing all of my community.
Do you enjoy a full workload?
I keep my workload full but in terms of paid work, it’s hard. I’m always working on art and music but not necessarily always for any commission or pay. There are a lot of avenues you can take to have a full workload here if you want to play music full-time. You can get involved in the Broadway touristy scene downtown where you can play for thirteen hours a day. That’s not for me right now. I’m building my particular art form and working on what I eventually want to be.
Your 2018 album – YOU’RE IN COUNTRY COUNTRY – had a jazzy feel to it alongside the country elements. Was it a conscious decision to seek a more country and traditional folk sound with FRANKINCENSE AND MYRRH?
I don’t think it was that much of a conscious decision. I recorded YOU’RE IN COUNTRY COUNTRY in New Orleans and there weren’t as many country players there as there are here in Nashville. For me, it’s like a half-country album. In some ways, I feel that FRANKINCENSE AND MYRRH, despite its different genres, is more country because of a lot of the players that played on it. I wasn’t moving away genre-wise. Whenever I make an album, I’m really showcasing my latest songs for the most part or rerecording songs, which I seldom do. My song The Fine Art Of Taking It Slow, is one I rerecorded and it’s on the last album but with a different style. The latest songs that I had for the new album included a few more swingy things. The songs often depend on what city I’m in when I write them. I was in New York when I wrote the more jazz and swing tracks.
You co-produced the new album with Grammy Award-winning producer Misa Arriaga. How did that connection come about?
I met Misa through Frank and Lillie (Rische). They had worked, recorded, and played with him and were very close to him. It was really a friend connection and the way that this album came together wasn’t really a clear plan that we executed. I originally recorded half of it at another studio and ended up not using that half. I had self-produced all my past albums but I learned so much from Misa about what producing actually means. I didn’t know exactly who he was and intended only going to do a song or two with him. I didn’t realise what he could do when I started recording with him, but once I started working with him, I saw how he could take a song’s idea and turn it into something I could never even imagine. I thought that I should do this with all my songs and make it continuous across the whole album. Misa allowed me to co-produce the album with him and that was a great learning experience.
Did you record in Nashville?
Yes, Misa has a home studio in Nashville and it was recorded there. Sometimes you think that a home studio is not state of the art but Misa has some amazing equipment at his studio.
I detected some wonderful Celtic influences on a number of the tracks.
One song that does sound Irish is The Offering To The Fae. I wrote that song right after my grandmother died. I was back in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where I grew up, for her funeral. I wanted to write a song that had some Celtic influence to it because my grandmother was English and Welsh – her husband and my grandfather were Irish. I thought writing a song with her heritage and my own heritage would make sense at the time. A lot of the heritage of American country and bluegrass music comes from Irish and English music so I think it was a fairly natural progression. Also, when I researched the song, The Girl I Left Behind Me, I found that it was related to an old Irish tune.
I understand that the album’s title is a reference to the collaborative nature of the project.
Yes, it does. Those two herbs, frankincense and myrrh, are traditionally used together in a lot of sacred churches and holy ceremonies. That goes back to ancient times. They are related plants and their resins alchemise together to create a new experience. I’m just interested in incense and herbal things and the title connected with the whole idea of collaboration with Misa as producer and Frank, who plays on every song and also has a co-written song on the album. In the past all my albums, even though I hired other players, it was just me putting everything together, whereas this album felt much more like reaching out to the community for ideas and ways to do things better.
One of the most intriguing and interesting songs on the album is Walk Down The Stairs. I watched your YouTube video (readers should really check it out) where you explain in detail the background of the song and how personal it is to you. It touches on karma, missed opportunity and fixation quite spectacularly. Did the writing and recording of the song put closure on the matter?
Yes, writing and recording that song helped me get that out of my system and there’s even a lot of detail I left out of that story. But that song was a healing process for me. The fact that I co-wrote the song allowed me to get out of my normal patterns of how I explain things in a song.
It must be a source of encouragement for you and your peers to see like-minded artists Sierra Ferrell and Billy Strings doing so well at present.
It is encouraging for all of us bluegrass and roots musicians to see Sierra and Billy Strings doing very well, people that I’ve played with and been in the same circles when we were younger. It’s great seeing them loved by such a large audience. I do think that they both have something very special. A big part of their success is how unbelievably talented they are. Not everybody doing that kind of music would be able to be that successful, so they are in bringing so many people to roots music which they might not have heard otherwise.
You held your album launch at our favourite bar in Nashville, Dee’s Cocktail Lounge.
Yes, the launch was there on July 1st. I like playing there. It feels like a real local scene and you know your friends are going to come out and see you play. I have to think about which venues are more open-minded when it comes to my particular type of music and know that they are going to be open to what I sing or talk about. I can’t say that for every venue, so I feel comfortable and accepted there.
Have you been on tour much lately playing music from the new album?
I’ve been touring a little bit recently, mostly near my state of Tennessee. I’ve gone to some nearby states like Ohio, Illinois, and Iowa. Not too far from home lately. Sometimes I play solo and sometimes with my regular Nashville band. Both Frank and Lillie Mae Rische, and Misa play in my band. Frank and Lillie also play regularly with Jim Lauderdale.
Is Nashville a permanent home for Milly Raccoon now?
I seem to stay in each city for around five to six years. It’s possible that Nashville might go the same way but I don’t have any immediate plans to leave Nashville right now. There is a very supportive music community here and I feel that I’ve been accepted by and have worked with a lot of like-minded musicians, I would miss that if I were somewhere else.
Interview by Declan Culliton