At the age of 33, Bill Callahan — still releasing music under the name Smog — recorded “Permanent Smile” as the last song on the 2000 album Dongs of Sevotion: It’s a gorgeous song, propelled by loud, intermittent drums and a tinkling piano that is reminiscent of the irregular Philip Glass-y piano on “All MyContinue reading “747”
Author Archives: Recliner Notes
Son of the Sea
After 2013’s Dream River, Bill Callahan did not release an album of new original compositions for six years until Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest came out in 2019. During that time, Callahan and his wife had their first child, and it impacted Callahan’s mindset in many ways as he told The Creative Independent in 2019:Continue reading “Son of the Sea”
Summer Painter
In a 2019 interview, Bill Callahan was asked by The Creative Independent about the act of songwriting and if it had altered for Callahan since he first started: “I think for me that’s something that has never changed. When I’m in the flow of writing, I feel like I’m working on my first record allContinue reading “Summer Painter”
Spring
There is a line running through Bill Callahan’s songwriting that is similar in approach as nature writing, one that was previously referenced in an earlier Recliner Notes post. Another good example of Callahan working in this mode is the song “Spring” from his 2013 album Dream River: The song opens with a riff on electricContinue reading “Spring”
One Fine Morning
In a 2019 entry of Nick Cave’s indelible Red Hand Series in which he responds to questions from fans, Cave was asked about his favorite songs. He instead shared a list of what he called “hiding songs,” those songs that he felt were written exclusively for him. Cave further defined hiding songs by saying thatContinue reading “One Fine Morning”
Universal Applicant
Apocalypse, Bill Callahan’s 2011 album, begins with two songs, “Drover” and “Baby’s Breath” (explored previously on Recliner Notes), that can’t help be read as extended metaphors about the founding and settling of the American West. Those two songs are followed by “America!”, a hilarious accounting of reasons why to love the United States. The humor,Continue reading “Universal Applicant”
Bill Callahan in Asheville, NC – February 26-27, 2023
With the release of his album YTILAER in fall 2022, Bill Callahan shared during an interview with Paste the instigation behind writing the batch of songs featured on the record: “I started becoming more interested in rock music again, so I started thinking more in terms of a band type of record….It seemed like, afterContinue reading “Bill Callahan in Asheville, NC – February 26-27, 2023”
Drover
In 2011, Bill Callahan released his most critically-acclaimed album, Apocalypse. Recorded in the border town of Tornillo, Texas, the tone of the album is informed by Callahan’s relocation to Texas a few years before as he recalled in a 2022 interview with Uproxx: “When I first moved to Texas, I always felt like I wasContinue reading “Drover”
Eid Ma Clack Shaw
“Eid Ma Clack Shaw,” the second song on Bill Callahan’s 2009 album Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle, starts with minor chords on a piano: An ominous beginning to be sure! Callahan sings the song’s first line a cappella: “Working through death’s pain.” It’s a heavy line to match the foreboding nature of theContinue reading “Eid Ma Clack Shaw”
Jim Cain
In April 2009, Bill Callahan released the second album under his own name called Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle. Asked about the significance of the title by Interview, Callahan replied: “It’s a phrase that I thought of a few years ago, and wasn’t sure what to do with it. I held onto it.Continue reading “Jim Cain”
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