Single Girl, Married Girl EPK
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PRESS LINKS
The New York Time Playlist (review from Jon Pareles)
The Bluegrass Situation Music Video Premiere
Bio
L.A.-based pop/folk/Americana outfit Single, Girl, Married Girl writes songs that are simultaneously beautiful and devastating with poetic, perceptive lyrics that astutely capture what it means to be human.
Steeped in a folk songwriting tradition that harkens back to Pete Seeger and Joan Baez mixed with modern songwriting elements in the style of Jenny Lewis and Brandi Carlile, the band’s new sophomore album, Three Generations of Leaving, fearlessly tackles issues ranging from loss and drug addiction to insecurity and depression, as it chronicles the trials and traumas of the same multigenerational family over several decades.
"It's exciting to be part of a movement of women singing about substantive issues—about themselves, their families, and their communities," Coy says.
Coy’s bright and clear voice offers a beautiful juxtaposition on these tracks that tackle weighty themes. Many songs were co-written by Coy’s husband, Gary Knight, a former music journalist turned songwriter. They drew on personal struggles including the death of close family members, health challenges, and battles with depression that paralleled the Coronavirus pandemic. "Art happens on a subconscious level and sometimes it's only after you've written the songs that you look back on them and realize what you’re processing," Knight says.
Haunting track “The Flood” was written about Knight’s brother and tells the story of a distraught woman looking for her son who’s off getting high (“Looking all over town for him/My hope is fading dim/Looking out for a boy who can’t swim/A needle lost in a stack of needles lost at sea/When I find my love at the oceanside how will I be relieved?”), and how substance abuse touches nearly everyone: “When the moon goes up with the rising tide, the water touches them all.” Knight’s brother died of a drug overdose in December of 2020, and the last lines of the song proved prophetic: “Have you ever watched the sun come up just before you’ve gone to bed?/It’s the prettiest lie, it’ll fill your eyes with every tear in your head.”
"Hurt Her So" tells the story of a woman grappling with insecurity who ultimately digs deep to find her confidence: “One day she said to me, her lips grown bolder/Could I reveal her pain she hid so deeply, inside her hindered soul we looked down further, for what could render her unable to be able to… brush off all her cares when she was alone/brush off every little comment.”
Recorded primarily in New York at Rift Studios with Grammy-nominated engineer Tom Gardner, who also serves as producer, the album features lush instrumentation, catchy melodies and sweeping musical arrangements that bring the songs’ poignant lyrics to life. Pierre de Reeder of Rilo Kiley tracked the main vocals and some of the instrumentation at his Los Angeles studio, 64 Sound.
Fronted by singer/songwriter and banjo player Chelsey Coy, Single Girl, Married Girl’s 2017 album Spark was an auspicious debut, but Coy has evolved and come into her own as a songwriter on Three Generations of Leaving. As with many new bands, they struggled to gain notoriety early on, which they documented in the song “Starlight.” Ironically, the tune took off and received half-a-million streams on Spotify, breathing new life into their career.
Music has always been in Coy’s blood. Born into a musical family, her grandfather studied music at Stanford, her parents met in a folk singing group, and her aunt played 17 musical instruments. It wasn’t uncommon for her family to spend hours singing together after meals with her grandma on piano. A gifted vocalist, Coy also sang on '80s children's albums, an ABC television series, and a Beach Boys commercial, but it wasn't until recently that she found greater confidence in songwriting.
“Music was one of the most important aspects of our lives—it was always at the center of everything my family did,” Coy says. “We would spend hours playing and singing together growing up, but it wasn’t until much later that I became serious about songwriting. I didn’t have the confidence. So I guess you could say I was a late bloomer.”
Named for The Carter Family’s song of the same name, Single Girl, Married Girl has been confused for a dating site on occasion for obvious reasons, with people seeking love connections on the band’s Facebook page; something the band finds ironic, considering their own pursuit of an audience.
Three Generations of Leaving also features longtime band members Charlie Rauh on guitar, Oskar Haggdahl on drums, John Gray on upright bass, and Shannon Soderlund on backing vocals, with guests Thad DeBrock on pedal steel and baritone guitar, Mary Lattimore on harp, Philip Kronengold on piano/organ, Burt Levine on banjo, Callie Galvez on cello, and Haruka Horii on violin.
