First Listen: Wild Ponies – Galax

written by Alex Gallacher 22 August, 2017

Wild Ponies – Galax

Gearbox Records – 25 August 2017

On their new album Galax. Wild Ponies pays tribute to the powerful music and rugged landscape of Southwest Virginia, where both Wild Ponies’ members Doug and Telisha Williams were born and raised. There, in mountain towns like Galax, old-time American music continues to thrive, supported by a community of fiddlers, flat-pickers, and fans. The stripped-back album nods to the band’s history while still pushing forward. Recorded in the shed behind Doug’s old family farm in the Appalachians (steps away from the site where Doug and Telisha were married), Galax returns Wild Ponies to their musical and geographic roots.

We made this record in the shed behind my grandfather’s farm. Nobody lives there anymore since my grandparents passed away, but you can still feel their spirits. It’s a special place. I learned my first three guitar chords there underneath the old Catawba tree. Rode horses, fished in the ponds and Chestnut Creek, wandered around in the woods there. It’s where Telisha and I were married, and where we go when we need to disappear for a while.

Listen to the Galax in full below:

Galax Tracklisting

1- Sally Ann (Traditional)*

2- Tower And The Wheel (Doug & Telisha Williams)

3- Pretty Bird (Hazel Dickens)

4- To My Grave (Doug & Telisha Williams)

5- Will They Still Know Me (Ben Glover, Doug & Telisha Williams)

6- Hearts And Bones (Amelia Curran, Doug & Telisha Williams)

7- Jackknife (Jon Byrd)

8- Mamma Bird (Amelia White, Doug & Telisha Williams)

9- Goodnight Partner (Perry Frye, Alice Leon)

10- Here With Me (Perry Frye, Doug & Telisha Williams)

* Vocals on Sally Ann – Annelle Williams, Doug Williams, Sr, Patti Meredith, Phillys Smith, Snake Smith, Kyle Dean Smith, Mandy Johnson, Kelley Breiding, Doug, Fats, Will, Neilson and Audrey.

PRE-ORDER GALAX: https://lnk.to/wildponies

Doug and Telisha on Galax:

Doug: “This is a record we’ve always wanted to make. The farm is such a magical place- the rest of the world just fades away there. Time changes. It’s where Telisha and I go when we need to disappear. We were there writing songs alone a few years ago when we finally decided we needed to make this happen. We invited a bunch of our good friends from Nashville to meet up with us at the farm and make a record with several of the folks my grandfather used to play with. We set up a few mics in the shed behind the house and hit record. It’s definitely the most fun I’ve ever had making a record- just watching the interaction and mutual respect of all the players. If you turn it up and listen, I really think you can feel what it was like to be in the shed with us – you can hear the crickets, and the tin roof popping in the summer heat. My only regret is that we didn’t make this record when my grandparents were still alive. But, they’re still very much a part of this record in so many ways.”

Telisha: “It was one of those ideas that came with so much energy and urgency that we couldn’t WAIT to get started. We hadn’t even gotten in the studio to record Radiant, and we were buzzing with plans for making Galax. We were struck by how much we still carried from this very place, artistically. How the people that we like to play music with and are inspired by are STILL inspired by the folks we learned from in these mountains. How it’s true that every step you take is influenced by your previous steps. There’s no way around it. We couldn’t wait to blend our communities, bringing together the artists from Nashville that we’ve come to know and respect and those that first sparked our inspiration and love for music. We really had no idea what would happen, but we knew it would be amazing part of our musical journey. The whole process turned out to be better than we ever imagined.”

Jon Lohman of Virginia Folklife Program on Galax:

Anytime gifted artists forgo the usual studio settings to record in a place that’s near and dear to them there stands the potential for magical results. This seems even more the case when artists haul their gear out to the most remote and rural of settings. There’s a sense of place there that the keen ear can hear – it comes from old wood and sawdust, from nights filled with wind and crickets. But beyond those physical things, there’s a soulful quality that is harder to describe when music is made by artists whose hearts feel at home. This record was made in such a place – Doug’s grandparents farm outside of Galax. Doug and Telisha returned to this place with new and old friends to create a recording that draws from their deepest of roots, on a piece of Earth that Doug has known since he had the ability to know.

In returning to the family farm, Doug and Telisha take a similar journey made by other great artists in other places and times. But Galax is no ordinary place. Home of the oldest and largest Fiddlers Convention, where Doug’s grandfather would faithfully set up the family jam tent for 8 days each August, this small mountain city and the rolling Blue Ridge Mountains that surround it is, in many ways, the center of the Old Time and Bluegrass universe. From the first recordings of the “Galax Hillbillies,” a band formed in the town’s local barbershop, to the countless generations of remarkable musicians that have come after, Galax and the surrounding parts of Southwest Virginia and North Carolina are a veritable hot bed of traditional music. And most of this music is not the sole dominion of music professionals, but the remarkable handiwork of the guy who fixes your car, the lady who teaches your children or works at the bank. In fact it would not be an exaggeration to say that more folks in Galax play music than don’t, and many do it much better than those who make a living at it. It’s the heartbeat of life here – the center of social gatherings and cherished occasions, and the glue that binds the generations. It’s a special place, and this album deserves its name. I have loved Telisha and Doug’s music from the very first time I heard it, from their early days in Virginia. I look forward to all of their new musical offerings, but it’s particularly nice to make this journey home with them.

Wild Ponies European tour:

10/21 Ipswich – The Smokehouse
10/22 Lewes – Union at the Con Club
10/24 Tooting – The Sound Lounge
10/25 Birmingham – Kitchen Garden
10/27 High Wycombe
10/28 Bedford – Ents Shed
10/29 Portsmouth – The Square Tower
10/30 Sheffield – The Greystones
11/2 Plymouth – B-Bar
11/9 Garstang – Garstang Unplugged
11/10 Edinburgh – Cabaret Voltaire
11/11 Menai Bridge – Victoria Hotel
11/15 St. Jooslend NL – Theater de Wegwijzer
11/16 Nijmegen NL – Trianon
11/17 Steenwijk NL – Speelplaats Baars Baars
11/18 Berlin, Germany
11/22 Oldensaal NL – Cobblestone Club
11/23 The Hague NL – Musemix @ Soc. Engels
11/24 Saarbrucken, Germany – Rathaus
11/25 Oberdorff, France – Goetzinger
11/26 Luxembourg – T’Scheier
11/28 Sulzbach, Germany – Salzbrunnenhaus