• News

• All

Aug 24, 2020 By Samantha Small Bill Callahan

The time has finally come: Bill Callahan is releasing his new album, Gold Record, next week via Drag City. For the last two and half months Callahan has released a new track every. Single. Monday. This week, he offers his final gift, the ninth track out of ten: “Ry Cooder.” Listen below.

Ry Cooder is essentially a humorous ode to the famed slide guitarist. “He’s a real straight shooter,” Callahan coos alongside a sultry and sweet acoustic guitar. Among him joking about freeing Cuba, Callahan tries to channel Cooder into the song itself: “Now imagine him laying a part down right here where the song grows thin/Drawing all the listeners who tuned out right back in,” he sings. At the end of the day, however, whether or not Callahan is praising or dismissing the fanship of Cooder is but a mystery. And this ambiguity just goes to show Callahan’s songwriting excellency.

“Ry Cooder” sits alongside tracks like last Monday’s “Cowboy,”as well as “Breakfast,” which Callahan actually released a specialty coffee brand along with it. Prior to those he shared “Let’s Move to the Country,” a cover of a song by his old band Smog, and before that came “The Mackenzies,” “Protest Song,” “35,” and “Pigeons,” which humorously opened with Callahan declaring “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.” “Pigeons” was one of our Songs of the Week. Callahan also shared “Another Song,” a lovely melody about afternoon delight, meaning playing hooky from work to make love to your partner.

Gold Record is the follow-up to 2019’s Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest, released last June via Drag City. That was his first album in six years, since 2013’s Dream River, so Gold River represents a quick turnaround time for Callahan. Following Dream River Callahan got married and had a kid and after those big and happy life changes he had trouble tapping into his usual songwriting well. It seems like the songwriting is flowing more freely now.

While prepping to go on a long tour for Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest and contemplating being away from his family for a long time, he pulled out some sketches from his notebooks and finished some of them. These are the images you see in each music video for Gold Record. The basics of Gold Record were recorded live with Matt Kinsey on guitar and Jaime Zurverza on bass.

Support Under the Radar on Patreon.