While Music Row in Nashville primarily remains the hub for mainstream pop/country music, head across the Cumberland River to East Nashville, where you'll find an eclectic and diverse music scene. It's not all Americana either; other genres that have not yet been sucked into that snowballing classification are very much alive and kicking. One such strain is simply what used to be called 'rock and roll', and many artists and bands in East Nashville still fly that flag. Music bars like the 5 Spot, Dee's Cocktail Lounge, The Vinyl Tap and The Underground regularly host 'rock' acts like Tim Carroll, Brian Wright, Jon Latham, David Newbould, Buck n Stuff and many more that you're unlikely to find playing the bars in Downtown Broadway. It's not all the boys either; Sophie Gault's heart and soul are in a similar musical cosmos. Her sophomore album, BALTIC STREET HOTEL, is a gritty treasure chest of songs with hard-hitting and unguarded lyrics that address her journey over the past decade. Not afraid to lay bare her mental vulnerabilities, Sophie addresses the issue on an album that is often directed towards self-examination. Calling on five-time Grammy Award winner Ray Kennedy to produce the record and with Joshua Grange (guitar), Steve Mackey (bass) and Lynn Williams (drums) joining her in the studio, the end result is a dazzling body of work that unreservedly combines anguish and fulfilment.
You are not originally from Nashville?
No, I'm originally from Washington, D.C. I spent half my childhood there, and we then moved to the country to the eastern shore of Maryland. It's quite rural. There is a city called Ocean City, and we lived about twenty minutes outside of it.
You took up the guitar at an early age before writing songs.
My first draw was the guitar. My dad, my uncles, and my cousins played the guitar, and at family parties, it was a way to hang out with my relatives, have fun, and share an experience. I was mostly playing twelve-bar blues, and whatever else was easy to play with a bunch of people. We'd play some old Neil Young, Beatles, and Stones songs, but it was really taking the twelve-bar blues all the way around.
Was your move to Nashville primarily to pursue a music career?
Yes, but I had no solid plans and didn't have enough songs to search for a producer. I had a loose idea about learning how to write songs, hang out with songwriters, and eventually develop enough material to record albums.
Did the move meet your expectations?
It was what I expected it to be. Nashville is a funny place because there is so much commercial and pop country going on, but I found a little community that is more eclectic and draws influences from different music genres. But this battle is going on in Nashville between more commercial-sounding music and more rootsy music with different influences. Nashville also surprised me in a lot of ways, especially in how strong the East Nashville community is with a lot of rock music going on. It is really a mecca for musicians and songwriters.
You had an interesting encounter with Julie Miller at Bobby's Idle Hour in Music Row, leading to your first band's name.
Bobby's Idle Hour was the only bar on Music Row for some time. They have a new location now, but it is still on Music Row. I met Julie Miller there one night some years ago. I had been a fan for a while, and it was one of those surreal experiences you have in Nashville, running into people whose music you know. She's the type of person who takes the time to listen to you, and I also like her music. At that time, I was trying to form a band and looking for a name, and I thought The Broken Things, the title of one of her albums, was a cool name.
On the subject of bars, was the song Churches and Bars on your debut album, DELUSIONS OF GRANDUER, written about Nashville?
No, it's a reference to a small town in Upstate New York called Oneonta, where I went to college. It could also be very well about Nashville. Oneonta is very similar, with a lot of churches, a lot of bars, and a lot of going out at night drinking. It's so cold up there, and everybody drinks a lot.
The new album BALTIC STREET HOTEL contains some very brave writing. Our review described it as 'beauty born out of chaos.'
I needed to get some things out of my system with the album; the most personal song was Christmas in the Psych Ward. When I gave Ray Kennedy, my producer, a song demo, he really liked the song's concept but thought I should write more. I only had a couple of verses and what I considered the chorus, but it had less detail than I have in the song now. I'm glad Ray pushed for that because I ended up digging a lot deeper about that time and that topic.
Is it easier to write about mental illness than to discuss it?
It is a lot easier to write it down because there is so much that can get misconstrued and misunderstandings about mental illness. It's not something that you can solve in one conversation; that's why I wrote the song to put a shared experience out there to do my part. There has been a lot of that in recent culture, like TV shows, and that has also been really helpful. One small vignette at a time to show what mental illness can be, I think that is important.
The album's sequencing is impressive; it follows your road from acceptance to healing and rehabilitation.
The sequencing is important, and it's interesting because I started out with an entirely different sequence with Ray Kennedy, and we thought we had nailed it. I had a new manager, Alex Torrez, come on board who wanted to do his own sequence and came up with the final one, which I think makes a lot more sense. He's going to be thrilled that you said that (laughs).
Where did the album title BALTIC STREET HOTEL come from?
I started thinking about the songs I would write for this album when I was promoting my first album, DELUSIONS OF GRANDUER. I was in New York promoting that album and staying in this little hotel in Brooklyn. I was messing around on the guitar in the hotel and came up with the song Lately, which is on the new album. It was the first song that I wrote for this album, and the album's title is taken from a line in that song.
Why that particular line?
I had spent a lot of time in Brooklyn because one of my old band mates and boyfriend grew up in New York. I had a whole friend group in New York, and when I underwent all my problems with bipolar mania, I lost a lot of those friends, some of them I haven't spoken with for eleven years; there has been no communication. I've come to understand that there is a lot of hurt involved in mental illness on both sides. People surrounding you might not understand and get really hurt when your behaviour and personality changes, which alienates people, which has happened to me. I hope it doesn't happen again because now I'm on top of it. Going back to New York after so many years brought back a lot of those old memories, and that is what the song Lately is about, as well as a lot of the album.
That track was a duet with Gabe Lee, and you also included a duet, Trouble, with Logan Ledger on your previous album. Was Lately written with a duet in mind?
Pretty early on, while writing that song, I decided I wanted it to be a duet, which made writing it a lot more difficult. With Trouble, I had been singing that song by myself for years, and then I decided later on to make it a duet for that album. Gabe had me on the road playing guitar in his band for a couple of shows, and I also opened for him a few times, so we spent a lot of hours in a van together and became good friends.
Are duets something that appeals to you?
Yes, I love the community building of duets; it's fun to sing songs with people you don't know well. It's also a great way to get to know people and make your album more fun having guests on. I'd love to do a full duets album.
You brought Ray Kennedy on board to produce the new album.
Yes. When I got my record deal, John Sopkia, who owns the label, said that I should link up with Ray Kennedy, whom I didn't know at the time. We got him on board to mix the first album, and he was really excited about my music and eventually asked me to do an album with him.
The album has gone down a grungier road than your debut record. Was that a Sophie decision or a Ray decision?
The sound is a departure from the first album. We were both on the same page about that, rocking it up a little bit. There's this thing in Nashville where everybody thinks that when you move here, you want to be a country singer, and that automatically gets projected onto you by a lot of people. The band we used also made a difference. Joshua Grange can play all different styles on guitar, and he is a really rocky guy.
You also had Steve Mackey on bass and Lynn Williams on drums. Were they players that Ray brought in?
They are on Ray's top list of people that he calls. I had never had somebody else call all the musicians before, and I had not met these musicians until the first day of recording, which freaked me out. I like to have rehearsals, but with Ray, it was all one fluid motion. I had anxiety leading up to it, but once we got started at Ray's Studio, Room and Board in South Nashville, it was a beautiful experience, and some of the songs were first takes.
What's next for Sophie Gault?
I don't want to dwell on this record for too long, and I want to get started on the next one.
Interview by Declan Culliton