Carolyn Wonderland
Bloodless Revolution in Amsterdam
By Kelley Guiney 

Carolyn Wonderland is a vocalist, songwriter, guitarist/trumpeter – accent on the vocals – based in Austin, Texas, whose unique combination of musical mastery adds to the state’s impressive legacy of sonic genius. Wonderland is a devoted student of the blues, among other genres, and her live performance embodies the traditions of several blues legends – a transcendent showmanship reminiscent of Howlin’ Wolf; the versatility, quick wit and ability to make up lyrics on the spot in the tradition of Lightnin’ Hopkins; and the gut wrenching emotional intensity of Son House.

Wonderland is also an insightful, gutsy, intelligent songwriter with an extremely versatile talent that spans just about every genre you can name. With her well-balanced, highly original writing voice and incendiary stage presence she manages to come across as a hard core professional while never once taking herself too seriously – she’s as down to earth as they come with a great sense of humor. Wonderland’s songs are incredibly well-crafted and her vocal delivery can inspire you, break your heart and kick your ass all in the same set. Her talent is well-matched by her band, with whom she has released seven critically-acclaimed CDs and toured relentlessly. The band’s most recent milestones include a new release this past fall, Bloodless Revolution, and a trip to Amsterdam last month for a couple of live shows at the city’s blues mecca Malo Meloe. Wonderland has also recently drawn the attention of rock/folk legend Bob Dylan, and had the opportunity to jam with him last summer.

The strength of this band lies in not only their individual skill, but in their ability to work together like a basketball team effortlessly orchestrating a seemingly impossible winning play. They really listen to each other, creating a rock solid, rolling groove, and no one overplays. The band’s solos and jam sessions are consistently engaging, interesting, and, usually, amazing. Bobby Perkins is a versatile, highly skilled bass player -- along with drummer Lefty Lefkowitz, who can change beats on a dime, he keeps the groove’s foundation funky and solid. Scott Daniels is a master of electric guitar with a jazzy, improvisational style that is always unpredictable and fully complementary. Cole El-Saleh’s accomplished musicianship on piano is an absolutely gorgeous complement to the music. And in addition to blowing the room away with her vocals, Ms. Wonderland can play the hell out of a guitar.

Carolyn immediately won my heart at the first sound check I saw in early 2001, and I have been under her spell ever since. My sanity was questioned by many when, faced with a year of no local shows in my Northwest home, I logged hundreds of miles by car and plane just to get a continual fix of their highly addictive live performance -- I flew to Chicago in the fall, drove to Salt Lake City, Utah in the winter and drove to Eugene, Oregon in the summer. When I heard that the band was heading to Amsterdam for a couple of gigs (with a number of fans in tow) early in November, I signed on – Amsterdam from Seattle via Houston, with some time to catch a few shows in Texas before and after the European flight. I am happy to report that at last count my total Carolyn mileage is as follows: 2,304 driving miles and 19,544 flying miles. Trust me -- if you ever see them live, you’ll understand.

I was just as excited about seeing the band on their home turf in Texas as I was about the impending trip to Europe. I caught two of the band’s weekly gigs at Houston’s Last Concert Café and Austin’s Saxon Pub.  With their Houston drummer out sick, Carolyn and guitarist Scott Daniels held their own as a duo. Since Scott is the senior veteran of the band, they did a number of songs that aren’t usually part of the set, including a heart-wrenching version of the reggae classic Rivers of Babylon and Comfort Table, a gospel song that is a stunning showcase of Carolyn’s vocal prowess. At the Houston gig I also had the privilege of meeting Carolyn’s primary influence, singer/songwriter Little Screaming Kenny.

A highlight of the Austin show was Scott Daniel’s original “Gospel Song” from the Alcohol and Salvation CD, which turned into a full-fledged jam session. I have previously described Daniels as a guitarist “whose unassuming presence on stage belies a show stopping talent” – but that performance and the evolution of his rendition of “Meet Me in the Morning” prove that he has clearly come into his own as a lead vocalist. The Austin show was also graced by a performance of the completely lovely “Unbroken”, from Bloodless Revolution, which requires Carolyn to switch from vocals to a trumpet riff with barely time to breathe in between – and she always does it effortlessly.

As the band and about 20 fans prepared to board the plane to Amsterdam, a last-minute unforeseen glitch kept Carolyn in Texas for an extra day, which meant that she would have to take a 10-hour flight the next day, check into the hotel, and then play a show with her full band. It turned into another example of Carolyn’s commitment, stamina and talent, as we all knew it would. The band gave outrageous performances to a completely packed house for both their Saturday and their Monday evening gigs. People were subtly fighting for the prime viewing spots directly in front of the stage and there was barely room to breathe.

Both Amsterdam shows had the type of crowd that always inspires the band to transcendent heights of showmanship. Highlights of the performances included classics like “No Pollution”, a funky, sexy original, and the band’s arrangement of the jazz classic “Caravan” – which starts out as an stunning guitar tribute to the original, moves into a countrified version (influenced by Chet Atkins and Les Paul) that pays homage to the band’s Texas roots, and then goes back to the original. Selections from the band’s latest release, Bloodless Revolution, went over extremely well, particularly the fiercely moving “This Land,” the spooky, irreverent “Bloodless Revolution,” the hilarious and rocking “From a Waffle Booth Six,” and Daniels’ latest composition, “He Said, She Said”.

Bloodless Revolution shows a definite evolution in Carolyn’s songwriting as she addresses, for the first time, political issues, while beautifully retaining her fresh, original and sometimes ball-busting writing voice. On the plane back to the States I had the chance to talk with Carolyn about her songwriting, the new CD, and the Amsterdam experience.

HotBands - When did you start writing songs?

Carolyn Wonderland - I started writing songs in elementary school, about (age) 8.

HotBands - What is your songwriting process like?

Carolyn Wonderland - Every song’s different, sometimes it all comes at once, like I can hear every instrument, the bass, if there’s piano or a horn section or strings or whatever. And then sometimes it’s just a bunch of words on a piece of paper staring at me or a guitar riff staring at me for a year. Some of them take forever, but those usually don’t end up being recorded.

HotBands - So sometimes you’ll just write lyrics.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, I have a book for that so I can flip through it and giggle.

HotBands - Will you get a few lines at a time or sometimes just the whole thing.

Carolyn Wonderland - Sometimes the whole thing. Like “Bloodless Revolution” wrote itself in two minutes. The piano part, everything, and I wrote it on piano so the guitar part, I didn’t know if it was going to be that lick or not, but it ended up being that way, it works on the guitar. I was over at Ron Dyer’s house playing the piano and I just came up with this lick and I was like oh, okay you have to shut up for a minute and give me a pen.

HotBands - That’s amazing.

Carolyn Wonderland - I was pissed, I’d been thinking about that stuff for a long time and what I wanted to say and it just came out nice.

HotBands - I didn’t even realize you played piano.

Carolyn Wonderland - Not very well. I think it’s good to write on instruments you’re not very good at.

HotBands - Why is that?

Carolyn Wonderland - You don’t end up falling into the same patterns that you’ve learned. A little less is expected I guess.

HotBands - You don’t have preconceived ideas.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, you find your way out of the box.

HotBands - That’s interesting. So how old were you when you started playing guitar?

Carolyn Wonderland - About eight years old. My mom had a couple in the house, so.

HotBands - Did she teach you?

Carolyn Wonderland - She taught me three chords and she taught me to never touch her Martin with dirty hands.

HotBands - I remember you saying that.

Carolyn Wonderland - That’s right, don’t you dare use a pick on it.

HotBands - So why don’t you play with a pick?

Carolyn Wonderland - From years of learning that way I guess. I was never allowed to use them on any of mom’s guitars, not the martin. I could use it on the Strat but at that point why bother, it was more fun to play with the fingers.

HotBands - That’s great.

Carolyn Wonderland - Super glue is my friend.

HotBands - So why wouldn’t she want you to use a pick?

Carolyn Wonderland - Cause it was really old. My mom had like a mid-forties Martin, it was like one of her favorites and then she had one that was even older than that that was just this beat up guitar of hers. That’s the one I’ve got now, it’s like a 36 Martin, it’s pretty cool.

HotBands - Was she a songwriter, too?

Carolyn Wonderland - She doesn’t write, she sings really well, though. She has a great voice.

HotBands - So was she singing and stuff while you were growing up? In bars and stuff?

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, she used to play in a band called the Badlands and they played in Bellville Texas at the pizza house, I’d go down there when I was a kid and take the quarters out of their tip jar and play video games until I’d fall asleep. It’s kind of funny now seeing people in my band bring their kids up, it’s like oh yeah, I remember that.

HotBands - I’ve asked before who your biggest influence has been and you always say Little Screaming Kenny. So what is it about him that was so influential to you?

Carolyn Wonderland - Well the first time I saw him play I was like 14, 15 years old and he was playing at this rock club Zelda’s, so it was the very first like live rock and roll guitar player I’d ever seen. I was taken aback by the fact that like every girl in that club wanted to sleep with him. And I didn’t, I wanted to be him, because it’s like he was writing his own songs, he was playing guitar and he had a tone that nobody else had. His guitar tone was just totally different from anything else I’ve ever heard, it’s very clean but very piercing. He typified rock and roll. I thought I was going to be studying classical music, which I still love, but after I saw him it was like fuck that, I want to write my own stuff.

HotBands - So he played electric guitar that night.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah.

HotBands - How does he get that tone?

Carolyn Wonderland - It’s in his fingers. I think it’s from years of being a bass player and hearing what he wanted the guitar to sound like and then finally getting over to the guitar to go all right, this is what I meant, you know.

HotBands - So he went from bass to guitar.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, He’s a great bass player, too.

HotBands - He’s a great songwriter, he’s amazing.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, definitely. One of my favorites.

HotBands - So you did it. You are doing what he was doing.

Carolyn Wonderland - You know what was funny, right before we left town, that show at the Last Concert, he sat down next to my dad for a minute, I about fell out. My dad never comes out to shows, so then it’s like, Screaming Kenny who rarely comes out to shows, then my dad, it was just – I thought I was going to puke.

HotBands - Oh that’s great. The two big men in your life sitting together. I asked Screaming Kenny if I could interview him, since he’s been such an influence on you and he said I could.

Carolyn Wonderland - Awesome, man. If he says anything mean you have to tell me. I’ll kick his ass. He knows better.

HotBands - I don’t think he will. I think he’s a little – what would the word be, a little stunned by the song “Bloodless Revolution.”

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah. I think so, too. I don’t think he was expecting that.

HotBands - I think he said it was freaky. I think that was the word he used.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, that song gets a lot of weird responses from people. I mean I was pissed when I wrote it. It’s funny cause we’ll play it at some clubs and it’s like you get people staring at you like you’re from another planet and sometimes you get a bunch of kids dancing. Bob Dylan had my favorite take on it, though, I didn’t have any of the titles on the record I gave him and he said “I really like that one that sounded like a mystery movie theme.” That’s the one. “Bloodless Revolution.”

HotBands - Yeah, it’s a little psychedelic and it sounds a little bit punk when you guys really get into it on stage.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, I like the cello on it, too, I thought that was really cool. That was Stephen Doster’s idea, and I was like oh that’s beautiful.

HotBands - Do you feel like each album has sort of a theme running through it?

Carolyn Wonderland - I don’t know, the last couple I think more so than the first few. The first few I think I was just so excited to get in there and, you know, record these things quick, before I die or forget them or whatever. And so with the last two, it’s like Alcohol and Salvation was named that because all the songs, looking back on it, it was like oh, well obviously these are all songs about booze or god. And then with this record it took me a few times of listening to it to decide that yeah, “Bloodless Revolution” was the most important thing that I wanted to say on there.

HotBands - And it’s the first time you’ve titled an album after a song, isn’t it?

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah.

HotBands - It’s very appropriate.

Carolyn Wonderland - Oh thanks, yeah you know, you don’t want to favor one kid over the others too much, but this time it worked out.

HotBands - Yeah, well I think especially because obviously that song was inspired by what’s going on politically.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, our judicial coup that took over the presidency, yeah, that started it. And just trying to find some kind of solution or some hope or something. I mean there was a lot of songs that fit in with that thematically but that offered no hope and no solution, it was just very negative and I tried to keep that stuff off of there, I threw away a lot of songs.

HotBands - Like what?

Carolyn Wonderland - Oh, songs you’ll never hear.

HotBands - Songs I’ve never heard.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah. Songs that are gone. But, that’s okay. If they’re really important they’ll surface again.

HotBands - Yeah, right. Who else besides Little Screaming Kenny has influenced your songwriting?

Carolyn Wonderland - Golly, well my mom a whole lot, a whole lot, and Doug Sahm, Bob Dylan, folks like that, Willie Nelson obviously, folks you grow up listening to. It’s a hard call, it’s mostly just local musicians in Houston that were so kind. I mean like “Homelessness,” that riff, actually the guitar riff on that I totally copped from Allison Fisher and Sam Massey, that’s why I put them on there, you know. So yeah, a lot of friends being kind enough to pass around guitars.

HotBands - I think that I heard you play Homelessness fairly soon after it was written. And then I heard you play Annie’s Scarlet Letter right after it was written, cause you wrote it on the way to Seattle, to Hempfest.

Carolyn Wonderland - It was that afternoon, yeah.

HotBands - And it was so interesting and also very impressive how they turned out on the album, cause they really evolved a lot it seemed to me.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, it’s very different.

HotBands - So could you talk about that process a little bit, for both of those songs.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, well with Annie’s Scarlet Letter I wrote that when we were driving up from – I think we had played in Tacoma the night before, I’m not really sure, or it might have been Portland. But I remember we were driving straight up there, though, and it was another one of those moments where it’s like, you know I had one of those little beater guitars, like a little three-quarter scale, and it was so funny, too, cause everybody in the van’s like talking and having conversations and I was like “shut up, shut up, shut up, I need a pen. Shut up.” I always feel terribly rude when a song’s coming on, but that’s just how it is.

HotBands - Yeah, you have to listen to it, right?

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, or it’s gone and there’s no recapturing it. It’s like “give me a pen.” It was funny though, so we got up to the stage and I was like all right, I’m going to do it, cause this is the place I wrote the song for and everything and they’re like are you crazy? It’s like ah, got to do it, though. It felt good, I’m glad we did.

And Homelessness I wrote that one sitting in my car, it was actually the Day of the Dead, it was the day after Halloween. I was sleeping in the van, it was hot as hell, it was really strange considering it’s that late in the year, but there in Austin it was hot as hell. And I don’t know what it is about everyone who’s homeless, whenever you become homeless a dog will find you and you will take on that dog. It’s okay, it’s a good thing, you keep each other company. My dog Bessie Mae, man, every morning at nine o’clock she’d jump on my bladder no matter what, it’s like somebody else in this van has to pee. So I still have all of my costumery from the night before’s gig, I had just driven down to the park to take a nap with her and I was like okay, couldn’t find a leash, couldn’t find anything, so I’ve got her with a pair of knit stockings I’m walking her along around the park and these policemen who have seen me there like every day for the last several weeks were just, finally, that was it, they’d seen enough of me, get out you know. So I was really mad. So I went and I wiped my Halloween makeup off, my frothing blood tablets and all that and sat there with her and wrote a song on the guitar. I guess it was the first and third verse came out, again it was one of those five minute things until they came and knocked on the window again, it’s time to go. And then it’s kind of strange, the first guy was very nice, he was like he was almost asking "do you want to go to jail for food or whatever". "No, no, you see I have this van and this dog to take care of, I’ll just be getting out of your way".

HotBands -  How long were you living in your van?

Carolyn Wonderland - Well, I was on the road so much it was really hard to tell, but I didn’t have an address for about two years. Right about two years.

HotBands - What’s it like to perform that song now?

Carolyn Wonderland - I still feel it, but I’m glad I recorded it when I did, cause I don’t think I’d ever want to include it on another record. Because that’s the closest I’ll ever be to that song – I mean I hope. I hope I don’t revisit that again.

HotBands - So I’m jumping around here with topics, but I’ve thought a lot about the difference between your recordings and your live performance and obviously it’s really hard to capture the same feel of a live performance in recordings. One thing I’ve noticed is the way that you kind of go off when you’re playing live and the scat and how you improvise a lot and stuff, I don’t think I ever hear you do that on a recording.

Carolyn Wonderland - Well, on this last one, at the end of Homelessness I scat a little on it, but I kind of wanted to keep it more concise and to the point and let it have something to grow into, like when you’re doing it live so it’s not the same four bars, yeah. And it’s fun, too cause that way if the voice is feeling like it or if this certain thing comes out and it’s a good lick you can just go off on it for awhile, it’s nice, it’s fun. In that song the boys just wait for the finger to come up, oh that’s the end of it, all right, she’s done.

HotBands - It’s hard to talk about this, cause it’s not something that’s easy to put into words, but when you play you really transform the energy of the place that you’re in. you really – you raise the vibration there, you change people’s moods completely.

Carolyn Wonderland - I try to.

HotBands - Are you aware of how dramatically you pull that off?

Carolyn Wonderland - No, I don’t know how it works for anybody else when I’m doing it, I have no idea what’s going on – I don’t know, I would hope that through playing music and making stuff like that happen that it effects people, so I try and make it positive. I do practice Reiki, I try to do that on my guitar before I play and that way whatever I’m sending out there I want it to be good.

HotBands - So you have a conscious intention.

Carolyn Wonderland - Sometimes, I’m not sure though if it’s – sometimes it’s hard to put a good or bad value on sound vibrations and what’s going on, but I try and be mindful of what I’m putting out there I guess.

HotBands - I guess what I’m trying to get to, too, is that I really think you’re a transcendent performer, and the whole band gets that way where it’s like the whole performance kind of moves to a new level at a certain point – usually, not always, but usually at some point in the evening it kind of like – it gets so improvisational and the energy gets so high. It’s just so interesting to me cause you seem to really lose yourself in the performance but at the same time you have a lot of control, obviously, cause you have to play and be technically correct and all that.

Carolyn Wonderland - Well you know, I’m sloppy as hell but I figure -- there’s a lot of that, like when you’re studying, when you’re doing stuff with music, I think so much of that is almost muscle memory or second nature that’s going on. Once you count to four the first time you don’t think about that anymore, you don’t think about the notes. Unless you’re consciously thinking oh, man, I’ve fallen into this trap a few times, I need to do something to spice it up, but even then you don’t know what it’s going to be until you jump in there. I don’t know how to answer, this is probably a terrible answer.

HotBands - No, it’s hard to put into words, I know. How do you feel about the Amsterdam performances?

Carolyn Wonderland - I thought they were fun. It’s always a good time. Last year I went and played just by myself, myself and Robby, I have a – Rick, who you met, Jan’s brother, he played bass and their drummer from the Lazy Sundays and that was fun. That was just like total self indulgent rock guitar trio, 20-minute solos, it was very fun because I never ever do that. And it was very cool to get to bring the whole band this time and go these are my songs, this is my band, this is who I play with and we are for each other and it’s nice. It was very cool.

HotBands - And it was so packed.

Carolyn Wonderland - I couldn’t believe that, on a Monday.

HotBands - That’s what I was wondering, you know, did you – were you expecting that, or --

Carolyn Wonderland - No.

HotBands - It went over so well.

Carolyn Wonderland - I was kind of surprised at the Malo Maloe to have the crowd singing along on the gospel song, that was very odd. The whole thing’s English, you know.

HotBands - That’s right.

Carolyn Wonderland - It was very interesting.

HotBands - That was cool.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, it was man, like three and four-part harmonies, I was shocked. It was very cool.

HotBands - That’s great.

Carolyn Wonderland - Last year it was like three days, period. That was it, I flew in, played that night, the next night and the next night, flew out in the morning. So no time to think about it. One live show in the back room with the big rock band kind of thing and then the other two were in the front doing acoustic stuff, so it was very different this time.

HotBands - So getting back to what I was kind of talking about ,the albums sort of having, not necessarily a theme but sort of a feel, like a cohesive feel, my first reaction to Bloodless Revolution, even just initially with the cover and the design, it’s a more sophisticated package I think – it seemed that way to me. The flower power kind of theme and the – even the colors are sort of retro, you know.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, I couldn’t decide between like you know does that look like a Blue Note theme or does it look more like an Atlantic reissue from like you know the late sixties, but yeah, I like that kind of feel. It was clean. Our last album cover was more just art, nothing for you to look at. Not everybody saw that there’s a shot glass in it. It’s one of those things like oh, if you see it you do, if you don’t you don’t. With Bloodless it was just fairly, you know, a straight ahead like here it is, rock and roll guitar.

HotBands - And even the pictures of you and – it just seemed more sophisticated to me, somehow.

Carolyn Wonderland - Thanks, man. We figured we may as well spend the money on this one since we could.

HotBands - And also just the feel of the music, too, it seems more sophisticated, the material, the actual subject matter.

Carolyn Wonderland - I don’t know, I guess that was just what I was writing that year. It’s hard to – I never know, I mean you know like the next thing we’re hoping to do is going to be a kids record, so maybe taking the sophistication completely backwards you know.

HotBands - Yeah.

Carolyn Wonderland - Start eating with our fingers.

HotBands - Banging on pots and pans.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, it’s going to be fun. Well, kids deserve good rock and roll, you know. They’re smart.

HotBands - “Bloodless Revolution” and Annie’s Scarlet Letter and the Homeless song and then This Land”, they’re all sort of political statements in their way and it seems to me, and I don’t know every single song of yours, but I know a lot of them, it seems like that’s the first time you’ve approached that sort of subject matter.

Carolyn Wonderland - Well cause I’d always – I don’t know, and again it’s hard to say always ,but it seemed like typically in the past I was more concerned with the live show and people being happy and that being what I do, and then I started to think about it, it’s not necessarily that I want them to be happy, I want them to be, I mean comfortable and happy to exchange ideas, but in the same breath happy to receive ideas, you know, and think about them. And it’s not always the easiest thing to do in a big smoky bar full of drinkers. Nietzsche is not exactly at the top of the discussion list at 2 a.m., you know. But in some sense I just figured it was time to do it, try to bring it in and be, I don’t know –

HotBands - So that was – I mean obviously it seemed this way, that that was sort of a conscious evolution.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, it became something where it was like okay, if the truth is in front of you and you don’t say it for so long then it’ll bite you in the ass. So it’s like okay I’ve got to say this or it’s just going to drive me crazy that I’m not saying it. And for a really long time I hadn’t written anything like that because I’d kind of taken the David Lee Roth credo of you’re here to entertain, and that’s the deal, don’t take yourself too seriously. And it’s like well, I don’t take myself seriously at all, cause fuck it, you know I’m just a lucky twerp who got away with it, but when you see something and you want to say it I think you have to.

HotBands - I’m glad you’re doing that and that is why I say it feels more sophisticated to me. It feels like your songwriting has really evolved.

Carolyn Wonderland - Cool.

HotBands - Which is really cool. And plus, you know you seem really well read and politically aware and intelligent, why not express all that to a greater degree.

Carolyn Wonderland - There’s just a lot to be pissed off at, there’s good and bad in it.

HotBands - I think you do it in a way that all the stuff that makes your music really good is still there. It’s not like your music has suddenly become preachy or anything like that, you’ve really maintained all the strengths of your writing.

Carolyn Wonderland - I hope so. It’s hard to tell when you’re in the middle of it. You never know, throw it on the wall and see.

HotBands - So that’s another question is what is it like when you finally have a song ready and you play it for an audience for the first time?

Carolyn Wonderland - It’s hard – every song is different sometimes it might be a phenomenal thing and other nights it might be a completely flop, you know. I have this new song I’ve been doing for the upcoming kids record, it’s called Go Eat Worms.

HotBands - Oh yeah, you played it the other night.

Carolyn Wonderland - And some folks they’re parents, are like oh my god. It’s like listen to the lyrics, she doesn’t eat the worm, it’s okay. I don’t know, it’s fun sometimes.

HotBands - Did you make up “Penitentiary Blues” the other night?

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah.

HotBands - You made it up on the spot?

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah.

HotBands - Do you do that a lot?

Carolyn Wonderland - Sometimes. If I’m doing solo stuff or something if it just strikes me. That’s all I used to do. I used to not have practiced songs at all. Then like I said last year when I came to Amsterdam it was like I’d do the first few songs of mine that would be weird songs and I’d get the bass player and drummer up there and go okay, whatever you – you know call a key and count something, however it is that they fall into it, that’s how the song’s going to be and they’d just pick something. There’s, you know, there’s an endless supply of stuff to write about around you.

HotBands - So you just improvise it right there.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah.

HotBands - Cool. Did you keep a record of Penitentiary Blues? I liked it.

Carolyn Wonderland - I think it got recorded so – and there’s – some of those lines I’m sure I’ve used them in other make-up songs. Cause the good ones, you know, you’ll retrain, they come back to the surface.

HotBands - Okay, so I wanted to ask you about the song Unbroken.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah.

HotBands - Because God, I just love it. I thought I was going to get evicted from my apartment because I couldn’t stop playing it. I don’t think I’ve ever listened to a song so many times in a row for so many days. And I’m fascinated by the structure of the song and how, first of all, it’s bittersweet, it’s just painfully vulnerable and the music matches that feeling in the way the ending is kind of open.

Carolyn Wonderland - It’s a luck of the draw with that a whole lot, because we were in Alpine, Texas hanging out at Eldridge’s mom’s doing the first round of pre-production, and I mean this was way, way pre pre pre-production. We were still writing song and so Scott and I were in the room and I had my book and Unbroken was finished lyrically, I had written it with a specific thing in mind.

HotBands - So it was all words.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, it was all words. And Scott had this guitar thing that he’d been working on and trying to write words to and so he had some words he wasn’t happy with. And I had a melody, but it was beginning to be very typical, very – I just didn’t like it, so it was driving me crazy. I kept throwing it away. And we sat there together and it came out, and again it was one of those oh, in five minutes you know you’ve got your chocolate, my peanut butter.

HotBands - It was really quick.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, and there was the quick song, just cut out, you know, just make it fit towards the end where the lyrics were.

HotBands - And it matched the words, you didn’t have to change them?

Carolyn Wonderland - No, I think the music was almost more molded or bent into shape around the lyrics than the other way around. Cause if there was anything to be cut, I was so afraid to cut any of those words and Scott was like I’ll make this happen. It was beautiful.

HotBands - Oh, it’s lovely. So when that – as you were writing it were you aware of that, just the kind of the openness of the ending. You just don’t expect it to end when it does with that last line.

Carolyn Wonderland - When we were first doing it it was very quiet and I was almost thinking more of a Joni Mitchell kind of feel, just because of the way I was singing it and I was like wow, man, I’ve never tried to sing like that before. It was very fun. But yeah, the end, I wanted everything to break on the word unbroken, you know like there’s this is the most, yeah, this is the spot.

HotBands - That’s exactly what I mean.

Carolyn Wonderland - It took a few times, but it was cool. It worked out.

HotBands - Will you play it Friday night when we get back to Houston?

Carolyn Wonderland - Sure, I’ll finally have my trumpet with me. I forgot to ask Bobby to bring my little pocket trumpet to Amsterdam. I’d given it to him to learn how to play. Because I still think it would be cool for us to come out one night and do two horns and two snares, marching out to the gig like a mariachi band or something.

HotBands - That would be great. What’s it like when you and Guy Forsyth write together?

Carolyn Wonderland - He usually comes and kicks me in the ass and says "Carolyn, I have a book and a guitar, we should go to a coffee shop, sit down and write."  He’s very good about it. When I moved to Austin, initially I had moved there cause a lot of the songs I was writing sounded the same and I was like ah, it’s time to go somewhere else. And I had spoken with Doug Sahm that summer at the High Sierra Festival and he was talking to me about you should move to Austin, you know, we should get together and you should meet these guys in the Gourds and you should do this that and the other. So I moved to Austin. Unfortunately, Doug passed away right as I was moving there. He was definitely one of my favorite folks, he was just an incredible guy all around. And he was one of the few people who can pull off every genre of music and you listen to it and it’s like oh, that’s obviously Doug Sahm doing whatever it is, whatever kind of music. So it was very cool to run into Guy, who when I lived in Houston I had met him cause we were on a touring package together in Oklahoma one night and we just hit it off. He’s so very good at what he does. It’s just good to have him come over and kick me in the ass, cause I wasn’t so prolific when I first moved there, I was just more kind of bummed for awhile. On the one hand thrilled to death because you’re in the land of free guitar lessons, but in the same sentence, I’m the new kid what’s going to happen.

HotBands - A big change, yeah, that must have been kind of scary.

Carolyn Wonderland - Yeah, it was very strange. There were lots of people who were like – who were convinced I should have gone there with a big press kit in hand or a proclamation in hand, but I just didn’t see that that would be helpful at all. I think it’s time to start over from the beginning when you go to a new city. Nobody knows and why should they.

HotBands - How long have you been living there?

Carolyn Wonderland - I’ve been there almost four years now. So the two in the middle kind of here and there, but yeah. But still, even when I was in the van, I’d mostly park it in Austin just cause it was, it’s a very friendly place to be that way.

HotBands - Can you think of a song you wish you’d written yourself, maybe a song that every time you hear it you’re like –

Carolyn Wonderland - Oh wow. Let’s see, half of the Bob Dylan catalogue. Most Los Lobos songs, especially the beautiful ones. I don’t know, it’s hard to say. God, there’s this one Tracy Nelson song I really really love. I don’t do it anymore hardly at all, I haven’t done it in years but it’s a song of hers called “Down So Low”, it’s such a beautiful song, I wish I’d written that. She’s a really great, amazing singer, great songwriter. Sarah Brown writes a bunch of great songs I wish I’d written. Oh god, I don’t know, there’s a million.

HotBands - What are your goals with your music right now?

Carolyn Wonderland - Just to get better at it. Suck less. Play more and suck less.

HotBands - You don’t suck.

Carolyn Wonderland - The more you play the less you suck, it’s true.

For more information on Carolyn Wonderland, CLICK HERE

Top of Page