Kate Wolf has only recently come upon my radar as a musical genius, but I can say with little doubt that that short time has greatly impacted me. I wanted to find a way to spread her beautiful work to as many people as possible, and seeing as my musical posts on my Twitter typically gain little traction, I thought to write about it on my Substack, and hopefully reach at least a couple hundred of you in a more meaningful way. I will not be providing a biography for Kate Wolf, many others have written better ones than I could hope to; I am only going to dig into the words and instruments that make up her first solo album and the experiences I have had with them.
How This Is Going to Go
Much of what I will say in the following article will be my opinion and interpretation of the words I see and hear. This means you are quite welcome to disagree with what I have to say, and I would like to hear what you think. And as much as I love to say that I will be writing a less formal article on here each time I start them and proceed not to do that, I will certainly do it this time. I have no way to express what this album means to me in the rigid structures of my typical articles. If you are here to find a well-researched and informative article like my others, you will be severely disappointed to find a loosely tied-together paper that meanders on to the message like a back road (see what I did there). I also believe that this is most effectively read if you listen to each song once before reading what I have to say, then listen once more while reading. With all of that being said, I hope that you will enjoy what I have to say nonetheless.
Lately
Wolf opens the album with Lately, a song about herself and a lover. She finds herself feeling lost in the relationship, crying on her own because he is not around to comfort her. Throughout the song, she finds her own as her lover does and begins to doubt less. She questions if it’s her or him or both of them who need to change to, “Find the good times once again”. By the end of the song, she finds the way forward becomes clearer, realizing that the relationship must end rather than fight to change what they cannot stop.
Emma Rose
Waiting. Waiting is the theme of Emma Rose and it is the song that encapsulates the album perfectly on its own. Wolf describes Emma Rose and the way she has been left by everyone throughout her life: her father, her mother, her husband, her child, and others. In each chorus, Emma says, “How long, How long will it be till you’re returning” waiting endlessly for these people who have left her to return. This endless waiting has left Emma Rose bitter. I do not have much more to say about this song, it conveys its message beautifully with few and simple words and leaves a dramatic impact, carried by the voice of Wolf, who allows some emotional breaks to make it into the song, allowing the listener to join in the sadness of Emma Rose.
Sitting on the Porch
After Emma Rose, Wolf must have felt that we needed something a little more uplifting, and Sitting on the Porch delivers. Opening with the chirping of a bird and an uplifting instrumental, at times when listening to this song, you might lose yourself and forget that this is a part of the greater album, but that is strictly by design. Wolf reveals this to us in the third verse, “May not be here long, ‘cause, the night is bound to come, and who knows what roads we'll have to choose”, each song is representative of the difficult choices and hard times that people must face. Sitting on the Porch is all about enjoying and truly appreciating the simple times. It is a reminder to not lose yourself in all of the back roads.
The Redtail Hawk
This song brings the listener straight back to the ground after Sitting on the Porch with a mournful harmonica instrumental. Wolf sings of the golden hills of Northern California, the place where she spent most of her life. She strips bare this short story, letting her voice and a simple guitar chord carry her through it. The story itself isn’t much, there is a woman in a cabin, lonely because another has left her alone there, and a neighbor who assists her in fixing her road because “There's just some things that need a man's hand”. Each verse is followed by the refrain: “In the golden rolling hills of California”. This singer finds comfort in the natural world that surrounds her cabin and the songs it creates; the Redtail hawk, the flowing water, and the wind create an orchestra. She finds such comfort in it because she desires the way each has a defined place, “in the golden rolling hills of California”. Her neighbor also similarly has a very defined place there. Our singer by contrast feels lost here and yearns for that feeling of true belonging she had with whoever it was that lived in the cabin with her.
Telluride
For me, Telluride is the standout song of the album. Telluride displays much of what makes Kate Wolf’s music hers. After a commanding instrumental introduction from a violin that plays the song’s main tune, the singer begins the song on her way to work at the sawmill in Telluride, Colorado. She recalls a friend she once had when they were both young, a friend who left Telluride on the rails for another place. She explains that she could not leave Telluride, being expected and ultimately deciding to raise a family rather than chase her dreams. Fondly, she recalls her life through rose-tinted lenses, calling the Rockies “young and free”. She then reveals to us her true sadness when recalling the story, not that she wants her friend to stay in Telluride with her, but that she could “I'd love to roll with it (the river), but I've run out of time”. She cannot, in her eyes, leave Telluride, so she remembers the story of her friend who did it, both missing and admiring him.
Goodbye Babe
Goodbye Babe brings us back to the story of Lately, two lovers who must part ways, and this story reaches its culminating point here. Wolf describes the love as having brought her sunshine to the ever-changing sky that is life, but finds that the sun no longer shines how it used to. After the endless contemplation of Lately, Wolf is assured of this path forward, and, as such, explains it to her lover. She eloquently explains that the love was real, but that there was not enough time for them. While the story is bittersweet in nature, Wolf lines the entire song with hope for both her and the lover: that they might be friends and that they’ll learn to trust another from this.
It Ain’t in the Wine
It Ain’t in the Wine feels like an instant hit to me. The story infused in this song is one of sorrow and searching for the answers at the bottom of a bottle. Wolf is backed on this album by the band she was a part of, The Wildwood Flower, creating a wonderful instrumental and vocal backing to support the message of the song. Unlike many of the other songs we have discussed in the album, this song feels as if it has no real progression throughout. Listening to this song on repeat to write this felt very trapping and impossible to escape, no light at the end of the tunnel. This is an intentional decision by Wolf to make the song feel just as much like a hole as alcoholism is to escape sorrows. It Ain’t in the Wine is a deceptively simple song that displays most of its powerful message through a combination of repetitive lyrics and lack of progression throughout the song.
Tequila & Me
Directly after It Ain’t in the Wine, Tequila & Me can perhaps seem a little bit repetitive, seeing as it explores similar themes to the previous song. This song however uses tequila more as an object to explore a relationship, unlike It Ain’t in the Wine which explores themes of alcoholism. The song begins with Wolf receiving a call from someone she has some form of relationship with. The exact nature of this relationship is kept extremely vague throughout the song, but it is clear that whoever is on the phone is the one causing Wolf’s sadness. The final verse of the song ties the entire song together. Wolf first says, “Tequila’s my friend, she comes now and then. To stay ‘til the long night is through”. Wolf is comparing the way Tequila comes to stay the night from time to time to how the person on the phone treats her, likely not staying the night ever. She then says, “There’s more where she came from, more of the same one. That’s more than I can say about you”. It is clear that Wolf desires some form of consistency from the person on the phone, consistency that she ultimately finds in Tequila. The vagueness of this song is a great strength, allowing it to be molded in the minds of the audience to relate to their own experiences.
Legend in His Time
Legend in His Time has been the most difficult song on this album to write about because I didn’t know what I wanted to say. Kate Wolf sings of some singer who was, as the title suggests, amazing at what he did. She says “When he’d sing a song, you know I’d like to cry”. This story meets its end at the seemingly unexpected death of said singer as Wolf sings of how he has joined God’s choir in heaven. It is not a song that hides any of its true meaning, but it doesn't need to. It is simply a song meant to evoke the feeling of telling a story about a man’s life. Wolf draws the listener in to sit around a campfire with her and tell the stories of another life.
Riding in the Country
Riding in the Country fulfills a similar purpose to Sitting on the Porch did earlier in the album. The similar title structure seems entirely purposeful between the two songs with both titles following: gerund + prepositional phrase describing a location. These two songs are about doing the simple things and being in simple places that allow us to ground ourselves again after getting lost in the back roads of life. Wolf describes riding on the roads in the country as, “a pathway to another time”, which describes the way the album takes the listener on country roads through the stories of different lives and times.
Oklahoma Going Home
This song is a work of art. Listening to this song will almost certainly give you a sense of whiplash, which is absolutely intentional. Oklahoma Going Home feels like two competing songs slammed together into one. The song is about the concept of going home, and this mix of feelings from the song conveys it masterfully. Going home is an exciting and great time, seeing people you haven’t seen in some time. Going home is also scary and uneasy, times have changed, and your old life seems to be gone. We find Kate Wolf grappling with this in the last verse, saying, “Some things haven’t changed… I still have my shotgun and my long hair”. She tries to find comfort in the things that are still the way she remembers them, but is unsuccessful in the end. This song also masterfully subverts what one might have initially expected it to mean. By the end of the song, Wolf reveals to us that the “going home” she speaks of, is actually her returning to the mountains away from Oklahoma. Oklahoma is where she is from, but it has moved on without her, and she has made herself a new home.
Back Roads
This song… Telluride may well be my favorite individual song on the album, there is no doubt that Back Roads is the song that makes this album. While this seems obvious, the song is the album’s namesake, I believe that this song is what tied all of these songs into an album for Kate Wolf as well. Back roads, for Kate Wolf, are about spending that time to take the correct path to your destination, that destination in the context of the song being “home”. The lyrics, “a back road is so easy, it just rambles on and on… drifts through things it cannot change, and doesn’t even try”, is Kate Wolf quite telling the listener what the album is all about. Each song that led up to here was a story, not one of great importance, a back road, that said something about life.
If you will remember, Lately, the song that opened the album, spoke often of change, something it shares with Back Roads. Masterfully, Wolf ties the album together, contrasting the strain and heartache caused by her trying to change what has already happened with the back roads that “drifts through things it cannot change”, and learns something from them. We see this occur throughout the other songs that line the album. Emma Rose waits endlessly for the people she loves to return to her, hoping to change that which she cannot control. Redtail Hawk tells us of a woman who can’t find her place, and attaches herself to the unchanging natural world, almost waiting for it to change and accept her into it. The singer of Telluride reminisces endlessly over a lost friend, one that she holds some resentment toward for leaving, partially because she wanted him to stay, but more so because she wishes she could have left too. She replays it in her mind, changing what she should not ultimately try to change, him. Oklahoma Going Home is at its very essence about accepting that which has changed without you and finding your place in the world. Both Sitting on the Porch and Riding in the Country, as I touched on earlier, give the listener a reprieve from the almost stressful message that the album is trying to teach us: that we cannot and should not fret over the things we will never be able to change. They provide real and tangible activities that provide a sense of grounding and peace for those who allow themselves to enjoy their simplicity
“What you’re headed for, someone left behind”, is a powerful and poetic way of saying that we’re all living life and that nobody is truly alone in an experience. By taking a back road, we can learn from others. Emma Rose is not a real person; she is many. Telluride is the story of thousands, not one. The stories of Lately, Goodbye Babe, and Tequila and Me tell the stories of specific relationships, yes, but they are relatable to a vast audience. These songs are stories coming from hundreds told to one another. The similarities between these songs are their strengths, not their weaknesses. People must face life, but what they face, someone has faced before.
Back Roads is about that: the network of people, stories, and lives that are shared and connected across thousands of miles. Wolf invites us to sit around a campfire, in a living room, in a crowded bar, to a boat on a lake, or any more hundreds of places to listen to the stories of these people. reminding ourselves that people and their stories are just like many back roads, traveling far from one another, but eventually, reaching another back road and crossing it.
And We’re Done
You made it! Thank you for joining me on this journey. I am glad that you were able to take part in this with me. I hope you were able to feel for this album at least in some way like I do. It is also my hope that maybe you found some power in the message I pulled from the album.
Please provide feedback on this so I can know if I should do more like this in the future. It has been great writing this and I hope you have had a great time reading it, thank you very much.