Concert Preview—

Amy Ray Hops Into Toad’s Place With A ‘Kinder’ Agenda

By John Voket

Supporting Didn’t It Feel Kinder, her newest and best solo work by far, singer-songwriter-activist Amy Ray is on the road with a decidedly different musical agenda than when she is backing Indigo Girls partner Emily Saliers. Not since the powerful Indigo Girls’ Come On Now Social have fans heard Ray digging so deeply, coming through with such rage, range and expression.

In an exclusive conversation with The Newtown Bee, Ray also expressed how happy she is to be on the road and going solo for awhile before reteaming with Saliers and starting the Indigo Girls bus up again with a planned new release from the duo, and extensive touring in 2009.

She said her return to New Haven for a Monday night set November 10 is a welcome homecoming of sorts.

“There are certain places we play that are historical,” Ray said. “Toad’s Place is a very relevant, historic and important place for me because it represents one of those early career goals for me and Emily: to play at Toad’s Place. So for me it holds a lot of good stuff, good memories. Playing there makes you feel like you’re part of this greater legacy, which is a good feeling.”

Ray’s new project also provides the greatest performance challenge of her career. She admits getting older is presenting its limitations on her voice just when she has turned a corner, producing a body of new work that requires raw, gritty punk vocals one moment, and delicate, plaintive almost whispering inflections the next.

“Vocal range is something I’ve been working on for the past couple of years, but I’ve been working on my durability for maybe the last five years because when I’d go out on solo tours I’d lose my voice so much,” Ray said. “So I started working with a DVD called The Zen of Screaming, because if I’m going to have that increased range, I need that durability otherwise I’d be losing it all the time.”

Ray said she’s also trying to limit her conversation after shows, and performs a daily spoken vocal exercise every morning, and a singing warm-up before sound checks.

“My voice is actually stronger now than it ever was,” she said. “So I think whatever I’m doing – the warm-ups and paying attention to the way I’m singing so I don’t damage my voice – I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing so my age doesn’t catch up with me. I know I’m going to lose range into my ‘50s, so I’ll just have to deal with it.”

Ray said creating her new album also offered myriad technical and emotional challenges from the process of songwriting, to recording to collaborating on the final production.

“Technically, it took me the longest to finish ‘She’s Got To Be’ and ‘Bus Bus,’ which is also the one I look forward to playing every night,” she said.

“Emotionally, it probably was hardest to complete ‘Stand and Deliver.’ And I think ‘Stand and Deliver’ was the most satisfying to complete because it was the hardest one to get right. We just kept working on it doing it over and over again, and I didn’t think we were going to get it, but we did,” Ray said. “That was the one where I could sit back and say ‘YES.’”

The artist said the minute she finished her last solo album, Prom, in 2005, she started focusing on a new solo project as an opportunity to grow and explore her untapped creative reservoir.

“I think I did what I wanted to do on Prom, but after, I needed to grow and work more. To pay more attention to some different things,” Ray said. “So I think having a producer who really kicked me in the butt made me do it.”

Politically speaking, something she and Emily Saliers do passionately both independently and together as Indigo Girls, Ray was looking forward to the outcome Tuesday’s historic election having already worked with John McCain when she lobbied (unsuccessfully) over nuclear power and global warming issues. (Ray’s interview occurred Sunday, November 2.)

But when asked what she would say if invited to spend a few minutes with President Obama, if he became elected, Ray was uncharacteristically taken aback for a moment.

“Oh my God! First I would thank him for being a great visionary and a great humanitarian,” Ray said. “Then I guess I would ask him to make a list of all the values and promises he started with, and to keep it on his desk and reference it in every decision that he makes so power won’t corrupt.”

It’s obvious that the newly elected President has made an impression, because in her advance for Didn’t It Feel Kinder, Ray looks back on her experiences, and sends her new work out to the world with a sentiment of hopefulness that sounds like it came straight out of an Obama speech.

“What ties the record together for me is this human yearning to be understood and the yearning to become empathetic with other people: how to love each other and be kind even when we’re brutally angry.” Or, as the final words of this album ask:

“Didn’t you feel stronger

when you let love grow?

Didn’t it open you up inside?

Hey let love abide...”

Amy Ray and her band play Toad’s Place in New Haven on Monday, November 10. Advance tickets are $15, or $18 the day of the show. Doors open at 7:30 for the 8:30 opening act Jennifer O’Connor. Visit ToadsPlace.com or call 203-562-5589.