A Conversation With Annie 4

PM: Part of the tapestry of life--and I'm kind of interested in it with my songwriter friends and interview subjects these days--would you mention what else it is you might do to pay the bills, and between gigs? I think it's good for songwriters to hear that.

AG: Yeah. Well, I have a lot of visual art background. And I've always done some illustration. But at the moment I have a wonderful freelance illustration job. I am illustrating medical products, orthopedic implants. I'm doing hip stems, shoulders, knees, trauma products.

PM: Trauma products, a lovely phrase.

AG: Yeah. Like the plates that repair broken legs, and the screws that hold them in place.

[laughter]

AG: I've just started this in the last couple years.

PM: And it's a good gig, right?

AG: It's a wonderful gig. I like the visual world, and I'm learning a lot of skills on the computer that are useful to me for promotional things and graphics.

PM: Right. So some of those programs that you've come upon for this other work are--is it like Corel or--

AG: Photoshop is the main one. Yeah, the man that I work for sent me to the Community College in Ann Arbor to learn Photoshop, which was a brilliant move for both of us.

PM: Well, that's always been part of your story, to learn how to do things. You've entered quite a few different areas, in your time. And you're good at learning something new.

PM: In a recent private conversation, we talked about how hard the music business is becoming. Do you feel like talking about that today? Is that at all relevant, how hard this business of being a singer songwriter seems to be getting?

AG: Well, I think I would put it in the big context of how hard the world is right now. I don't think we can, as singer songwriters, single ourselves out. Yeah, I just think the world is complicated. The rules have changed, and are changing.

PM: I think, also, specifically, we have to, as songwriters, figure out this download thing better and better.

AG: Or invent this thing better and better.

PM: You've been, for instance, on small labels for some time now. But people who are selling their own record--like on CDBaby, channels like CDBaby are making downloads and digital distribution possible. And so I think more avenues have to become available for that. I was very surprised, having dinner with Mary Gauthier the other night, when she told me that her sales at CDBaby are now, money-wise, nine-to-one, download to CD.

AG: Huh.

PM: And that was the first artist I heard that from. It was like, "Oh, here it comes." Because, I mean, that's not Eminem talking.

AG: Right.

PM: So that's got to get handled.

AG: Yeah, a shift in the model.

PM: Would you say something about your take on spirituality or faith, or your alternative, or just how you view that part of life?

AG: Yeah. Oh, I'm on this little internal meditation at the moment. Coming from a family where religion was not even a topic, I got to invent my own perspective on it. It's really just a little internal conversation with myself, who we are, why we are here--all the big questions. I think all of these thoughts, spirituality and faith, I exchange it with the words "survival instinct."

[laughter]

AG: Looking at the kind of biological, psychological origins of religion, this is my inner meditation. [laughs]

PM: I know you to be an avid reader with, past and present, a life devoid of television. Read anything inspiring lately?

AG: Yes, I have. No, I've read a lot of things lately. Susan Sontag's In America --interesting writing. And I've been reading Annie Proulx' Wyoming Stories .

PM: Oh, that's a good one.

AG: Yeah, really interesting writing.

PM: The boxing metaphor in "The Contender" was very surprising and beautifully played. How did that come up? And was there a certain male friend or friends that you went to for, like, "Give me a little lingo"?

AG: Yeah, I did.

PM: Because I remember that we've had this conversation before about--not boxing, but like, "Give me a little lingo on X."

AG: Yeah, yeah. No, I definitely do research when I'm talking about a topic that I know nothing about. [laughs]

PM: And this boxing one, like who did you call and say, "Give me something"?

AG: I know I talked to my friend Ewart in Ohio.

PM: And is he a boxing fan?

AG: Yes. Yeah, definitely a boxing fan. And I had picked up a book in a used bookstore just because it caught my eye, and it was a photo book of Muhammad Ali and his career.

PM: Just amazing, some great pictures of his career.

AG: Amazing pictures. So, yes, that's why I was thinking about boxing. And Ewart gave me the Jack Johnson book for Christmas. Yeah, so I think that song came up about the relationship between all these boxing pictures that I had in my head.

PM: Yeah. That one amazing picture of Muhammad Ali standing over Sonny Liston with that look--oh, God, I love that! I mean, that's one of my favorite pictures of all time.

AG: Yeah, that's in that song for sure.

PM: I've watched that fight many times. It's a classic.

AG: Yeah, boxing is such an archetypal idea. There's such an archetype in there.

PM: I'm amazed that, on a regular basis, late Saturday night I'm often watching the fights.

AG: That's the beauty of TV, these things come right to you.

PM: Are you now, or are you sometime planning to write a novel?

AG: I've started writing some short stories--unintentionally, but there they are. I used to write stories and then call them songs and put a guitar track to them.

PM: [laughs]

AG: But there are some now that just belong on the page. So will I write a novel? Who knows. Who knows what I'll get tired of not doing next.

PM: Right.

[laughter]

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