Baby Robot Media

John Lilly

by

RIFF Magazine interviews Sara Rachele about her new April Fool LP

 

Sara Rachele describes her music as, “Like somebody dropped Emmylou Harris down a well, and she’s mad about it,” but otherwise she’s difficult to pin down.

“I’m at a place where I’m ignoring what’s happening in the industry because I don’t think anybody knows,” she says.

Her latest project is an album, April Fool, recorded in Nashville with guitarist Johnny Duke.

“I wasn’t even really trying to go into it with the idea to make an album,” she says. “It’s such a huge stressful thing.”

“I’ve been restoring this old Airstream, and it doesn’t need three steering wheels and 15 sets of brakes. It needs a couple things that become components of this piece of work,” Rachele says. “Albums are a lot like vehicles; there’s components that if you took them away it wouldn’t make sense. Not everything is a complex idea.”

April Fool is more of a folk-country album, suiting the backgrounds of the contributors: Duke has played guitar with Mary Chapin Carpenter, Miranda Lambert and Lee Ann Womack. Rachele credits Bob Dylan as her favorite songwriter, and she even has a dog named Hank Williams Sr.

“This really fantastic writer named John Lilly from West Virginia wrote the title track ‘April Fool’—a really talented guy—and I met him across a campfire,” she says. “I heard the song, and that’s really where the record gained cohesion. I said I really want to do something like that.”

Next, though, she’s going in a different direction.

“I recorded some things in New York; I went into this tape studio and got to work with some beautiful people who are just honkin’ soul and jazz guys. It’s really cool to bring what I do and let those guys take it to a totally different place. I’m excited to get those tunes out.”

And this time it won’t be another album. Continuing her former metaphor, “Sometimes it’s nice to just have an A and a B side. It’s just a motorcycle, not an RV. I love music that was made to be short form. I like songs that don’t necessarily sit on a full-length album.”

She appreciates the flexibility to switch influences and structures. While some musicians are fighting against the chaos in the music industry, she embraces it.

“I have a family member who always tells me to never miss the opportunity in a good crisis,” Rachele says. “Yeah, we’re not making quarter million dollar albums anymore, but that’s okay. If you’re fortunate enough to be able to sustain that, there’s a lot of opportunity. Things have gotten easier in a lot of ways if all you want to do is create recordings.”

And that’s all she wants to do: “I sell songs to support my recording habit,” she says. READ MORE…

 

Baby Robot Media is a music publicity and media service agency with employees in Los Angeles, Memphis, Atlanta & New York and represent musicians from all over the world. We specialize in promotional ( PR ) campaigns for albums, singles and videos, tour press, radio, music video production, music marketing, social media campaigns, Spotify campaigns and creating promotional content. Our mission is to help great unknown bands reach a wider audience and to help already successful artists manage their brand identity and continue to thrive. Our music publicists have over 50 years of combined experience in the music industry. We are known as one of the best in the business.

by

Earbuddy premieres Sara Rachele’s rendition of Bobby Helms’ classic, “April Fool”

On November 10th, indie folk musician Sara Rachele will release her sophomore album, April Fool. The album is a nine-track collection of atmospheric indie-Americana songs propelled by sparse instrumentation, keeping the focus on Rachele’s haunting Southern croon. On the album, you’ll hear Rachele’s renditions of classic songs, including the album’s title track, “April Fool”, originally performed by John Lilly. Rachele puts her own spin on the classic song by giving it a modern edge while maintaining a vintage aura. Listen to “April Fool” via our premiere below.

Sara Rachele on the song:

I heard “April Fool” for the first time around a campfire in East Nashville, TN. There was a picking party going on. It was quite late and the party started to die down. One of the gentlemen by the fire was playing some of the most special tunes I’d heard in a long while. I found out later his name was John Lilly, hailing from West Virginia, and he was playing a few songs he’d written about the different states he’d been to on the road over the years. Idaho was my favorite. Anyway, as we sat fireside, I heard “April fool,” his very first cut as a songwriter (sung by Bobby Helms), and just thought to myself—what a fine song. I felt the need to sing it.

I just thought it was so dang sad, and so sweet, with such a simple turn of phrase, and love passing like the seasons. This album is about the songs that speak to me as a recording artist. They’re all very engrained in something spiritual, basic, awful and gut-driven, and I’m obsessed with chasing these kinds of songs. I had “April Fool” in my heart and my mind for days after hearing it. It got real late, and John sang lullabies early into that Nashville morning. As the embers cooled, I remember him saying, “I’d like to play one more song.” That kind of dedication made me think, “Man, that’s a real songwriter.” That one evening became the epitome of what Nashville could be for me: Spontaneous, musical and unique.

Incidentally, that late night bonfire session took place in late March, when I heard that song, and my relationship at the time ended pretty soon after. As a matter of fact, it ended April the first. That tune, had such a timeless effect on me—it’s magic! I don’t know if John has ever heard our version, but I hope wherever he is, he’ll soon know how thankful I am to have met him, and for a tune like that one. READ MORE…

 

Baby Robot Media is a music publicity and media service agency with employees in Los Angeles, Memphis, Atlanta & New York and represent musicians from all over the world. We specialize in promotional ( PR ) campaigns for albums, singles and videos, tour press, radio, music video production, music marketing, social media campaigns, Spotify campaigns and creating promotional content. Our mission is to help great unknown bands reach a wider audience and to help already successful artists manage their brand identity and continue to thrive. Our music publicists have over 50 years of combined experience in the music industry. We are known as one of the best in the business.