Amy Ray Issue #37

Didn't It Feel Kinder (Daemon)

By Catherine Cole
Published: September 1st, 2008 | 5:38pm

Amy Ray has a simple goal: to turn “this human yearning to be understood” into music. How does that happen? By not letting many things in life get by without deducing them into song.

Ray started writing her third solo album, Didn’t It Feel Kinder, while still on tour with the Indigo Girls in 2007 and mapped out songs in Garage Band backstage or locked herself in her hotel room to write. The album’s 10 tracks hold some of this roadie nostalgia, yet it still remains eloquently balanced with songs that are dedicated to other topics Ray knows a bit about (i.e. gender, politics, the environmental crisis, relationships, and the combination of all the above). “I’m on the bus tour bus bunk ... I got my phone on vibrate in case you call me” she writes in “Bus Bus.” Ray also gives a shout-out to the independent-underground of her Salt Lake City tour stop on “SLC Radio” (“Cause we heard about the kids from Salt Lake City / And how they fight to be set free”). She charmingly sings to her tranny friends on “Cold Shoulder” (“I hang with the deviants and the tranny nation / They don’t take the name their mama gave ‘em).

Musically speaking, Ray delivers her quintessential mix of classic rock with touches of folk, pop, and southern soul. The big names on this record are producer Greg Griffith (Le Tigre) and friends Kaia Wilson and Melissa York (of the Butchies). While there may not be a “Closer To Fine” on this album, her track “Out On the Farm” has similar star quality that makes you to hit repeat just to hear the chorus build intensity until you’re left in a puddle of its epic strength. She sings, “Didn’t you feel stronger?” during the record’s last song. In one word: definitely.

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