Winner of the Ameripolitan Music Award for Best Female Outlaw and christened The Honky Tonk Queen by Rolling Stone magazine, Sarah Gayle Meech has recently released her third album, EASIN’ ON. The Nashville-based artist has been part of the traditional country music fabric in the Music City for over a decade; her twice-weekly four-hour shows at the legendary Robert’s Western World continue to draw huge crowds, both local and tourists. Her new album, directed towards self-examination and forged from modern and traditional country roots, is arguably her most impressive work. ‘Putting the songs out there healed me; I had to put the songs out for myself, get them off my chest, and get on with my life,’ she explained when we recently spoke with Sarah via Zoom.
Hi Sarah, how are things in Nashville today?
It's raining today, and we're experiencing a cicada invasion. Cicadas are enormous insects that typically emerge in summer, but they've arrived early this year. They've taken over outside, and you can hear them everywhere, buzzing around in swarms. They look like little aliens.
Whereabouts are you living in there?
I live in Old Hickory, about thirty minutes north of Nashville, right next to Old Hickory Lake. I bought a house here in 2020. We have a half-acre of land out here, and it's quiet.
You arrived there over a decade ago by way of Longview, Washington and Los Angeles; why Nashville?
I was playing country music in Los Angeles but was obsessed with Nashville. I wanted to be immersed in it, learn the history and be around the fantastic players and writers. I figured it was time to step up my game and move on.
How long did it take to get booked for your twice-weekly residency at Robert's Western World?
Getting into Robert's took me about a year and a half. I first started playing next door at Layla's, and some of the guys who played at Robert's, like David Tanner and Chris Scruggs, started playing in my band. They introduced me to Robert's owner, Jesselee Jones. He came and saw me play, and I started filling in for other people and eventually got my own spot there. I've been there for about thirteen years now.
Have you noticed a change in the audiences over the years at your shows there?
I have, yes. When we're playing the late shows at Robert's, 10 pm to 2 am, it's usually very crowded, and there are a lot of young people there in their early to mid-twenties. I started to notice in recent years that they were requesting all these old songs, and that hadn't happened before so much. If all the young people want to hear old country music, it must be coming back.
Do you have a free hand to play what you like, both covers and original songs, at Robert's?
The only thing I'm expected to play is old country. I've been playing my original stuff since I started there; the owner encourages me to. We've been playing some of the new album, and it's getting a good reaction. I could play my whole albums if I wanted to, but I don't have four hours of self-written stuff. I get requests, and when you're working for cash and tips, and someone wants to hear Merle Haggard, I'll play it.
Does the residency compromise your tour options?
No, If I want to go out and tour, I can. There are other artists there who also tour. Joshua Hedley does a bit of touring, and I've got some dates coming up with my new record. I haven't been on the road for a while because I hadn't anything to promote, and I've been going through some changes in my life. Robert's has always been cool. I can go out and tour, and I'll always have a slot when I come back.
Have you missed touring in the past number of years?
I do like being out on the road, but not all the time. I'd love to come to Ireland; I've never been there. I love going to new places, but it can be difficult if you're not getting a huge bunch of people out, as it's very expensive to tour.
The new album EASIN' ON is your live journey over the past few years. It's an extremely brave and open project.
Well, the whole album is about moving on and healing. It starts with the track Time For A Change, which is about things that needed to happen. With the songs, I’m moving on, rocking on, finding love again, and experiencing the pain of losing love again. At the very end, I just decide that it's time to party again with the closing song, Come and Gone.
Were the songs written at the time you were experiencing divorce, the death of a friend and other trauma or written retrospectively?
Both, some of them were written spontaneously and at a time when things were happening to me. Others were written retrospectively because some things were too hard to talk about then. I couldn't even bring myself to play some of those songs live at the time; I'd probably start crying; they were too emotional. Putting the songs out there healed me; I had to put the songs out for myself, get them off my chest, and get on with my life. As a writer, I definitely felt that the songs were therapeutic, and I hope that someone else might gain strength from them.
Your debut album, ONE GOOD THING, has similar titles, such as Unlucky In Love and Drink Myself to Sleep. Were they also autobiographical?
Most of my songs are autobiographical; There are always personal experiences flavoured with a little bit of imagination. With that first record, I was so hellbent on making a badass honky tonk, rough and drinking album, and that's what it was.
EASIN' ON is a departure from your previous albums sound-wise. You've gone for a richer and bigger sound with this one.
The sound is exactly what I wanted to do. I wanted to have a whole orchestra but couldn't afford that. I was listening to a lot of singer-songwriter stuff from the '70s and '80s and a lot of the countrypolitan stuff like Glen Campbell's music when he had string arrangements and Barbara Mandrell's stuff that also had strings and big arrangements back in the day. Eddie Rabbitt's ANY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE, is also a hugely lush track; I've loved that sound since I was a kid. I wanted the record to have a big, lush sound but wasn't necessarily a honky tonk album per se; I was looking for something that involved the production more than my previous records. We recorded it all at my buddy Shawn Byrne's Great Hill Studio and got some great sounds without hiring an orchestra.
Billy Contreras can take the credit for that.
Yes. What a phenomenal player; Billy has played on all my three records: ONE GOOD THING, TENNESSEE LOVE SONG and now,EASIN'ON. He is one of the most amazing musicians I've ever heard; he came in and did all the string tracks on the album, one at a time. There were twenty-five fiddle parts; he did it with three different fiddles and one viola; the guy is just a master at what he does. He created all those big string sounds on the record.
Eddie Lange and Tommy Hannum also have some classic pedal steel on the record.
Tommy is my regular steel player; he's been with me for thirteen years. Both he and Eddie played on different tracks. Some of what Eddie did is layered and sounds huge; he did double and sometimes triple tracks on Time For A Change and Love Me. Shawn (Byrne) played almost every guitar track; he played percussion and did some background vocals and bass on a few tracks; he's a proficient and very talented person. It took about a year and eight months. It didn't happen quickly because we were working on a tight budget, and we had a setback in 2023 as I had back surgery, which took me out for a few months.
You staged the album launch at one of our favourite bars, the 5 Spot at Five Points.
Let me tell you what happened on the day of the album release show. A tornado happened. There was a tornado watch, and it touched down in a few places outside of Nashville. There was flooding everywhere and road closures on the day of the show. Sirens were going off, and alerts were on TV. Thanks a lot, Mother Nature, but despite the weather circumstances, quite a few people came out and travelled for the show. I had friends from Florida, Indiana, and the West Coast come over, but a lot of folks couldn't make it because of the downpours and road closures.
In addition to your twice-weekly shows at Robert's and your recording pressures, you've also been performing on music cruises that have become very popular.
Yes, we did the Outlaw and Country Music cruises last year, and we're on a new one next year called Boots On The Water with Big and Rich, Gretchen Wilson, Jo Dee Messina, Pam Tillis, Lone Star, and Suzy Bogguss. It's good to break up the winter, which can be the coldest time in Nashville, so it's nice to get on a ship and go somewhere tropical for a while.
Interview by Declan Culliton