Dan Wilson
Dan Wilson is renowned in music circles for the elegance of his melodies, the intelligence of his
lyrics and the purity of his voice. The onetime member of storied cult band Trip Shakespeare and
the critically acclaimed Semisonic is now debuting as a solo artist, working with a collective of
musicians from the Twin Cities and elsewhere. This new phase follows an intense period of
songwriting collaborations—in the past few years Wilson has written songs with the Dixie
Chicks, Mike Doughty, Rachael Yamagata, Jewel, Jason Mraz and others. Wilson’s recent cowriting
work with the Dixie Chicks earned him a “Song of the Year” Grammy® in 2007 for
“Not Ready To Make Nice” from the album Taking the Long Way. He co-wrote six songs on the
album, which won the Dixie Chicks a total of 5 Grammy® Awards, including “Album Of The
Year” and “Country Album Of The Year.”
Wilson is now ready to unveil his first solo work, Free Life on American Recordings. The
collection of songs began as a self-produced project in Minneapolis, and was finished in Los
Angeles by Wilson and executive producer and label chief Rick Rubin.
Free Life features contributions from Sheryl Crow, who provides the harmony vocal on “Sugar”;
Sean Watkins (Nickel Creek), who plays the finger picked acoustic guitar on “Free Life” and
“Baby Doll;” and Gary Louris (the Jayhawks), who contributes a guitar solos on “Cry” and
“Come Home Angel.” Eric Fawcett (N.E.R.D.) plays drums on many of the tracks, and Benmont
Tench (Heartbreakers), provides piano on “Against History” and several others.
“The best thing about my album, in my opinion, is the incredibly intimate feeling it evokes,”
says Wilson. “These songs sound like they already existed, but at the same time, they project the
feeling that they’re about somebody’s life.”
While he was writing the songs for what would become Free Life, Wilson was living in a house
built in 1903, and the place served both as a subtle influence on the writing and a perfect setting
for the recording. “I found a few books of sheet music from that era at antique stores and spent
lots of time singing the songs at the piano: chords and melodies the house probably hadn’t heard
for a hundred years,” he says. “‘Sugar’ and ‘Honey Please’ both seem to have that spirit, as
though they were written by the house as much as by me. When the batch became big enough, I
hatched a plan to borrow a recording studio and set it up in the living room and ballroom of the
place.
“I’d learned a lot about digital recording over the couple of previous years, but I was determined
to use very little of what I’d learned,” Wilson explains. “I had just finished reading the book
Shakey, a biography of Neil Young, and his insistence on live recording, capturing the moment,
starting with the vocal, avoiding overdubs…all these things inspired the hell out of me.”
“For the sessions, I called about 10 musicians whose playing and personalities I love,” Wilson,
recalls. “We ended up playing about 20 songs live, vocals were all cut live with the band, and
most of the songs on the album stayed that way. I had met with the musicians separately over the
weeks before the sessions—taught them the songs, ran through them one-on-one, but never
brought the band together until the first day of recording. This made for a great vibe, because the
songs were very familiar, but the musicians’ ideas were new to each other. And I think that led to
a certain sound of the album—the songs are really about an experience of a bunch of people
together in a room. I think that communicates on a more soulful level.”
After hearing what Wilson had done on his own, Rick Rubin enthusiastically agreed to help him
complete the project, saying of Wilson, “Dan’s music touches my soul. He is/has the perfect
combination of inspiration and songcraft. He is a timeless artist whose music will feel as good in
50 years as it does today.”
“When Rick and I started working together, eight of the songs were already recorded, and
several of them needed only a little thing here or there,” Wilson recalls. “Some of his
prescriptions were really subtle and helpful. On the other hand, several songs that had puzzled
me—’Cry,’ ‘Free Life,’ ‘Come Home Angel’ and a few others—I either re-recorded with Rick or
completely revamped with his help.”
When asked about his favorite songs on Free Life, Wilson immediately names “Sugar.” “Writing
‘Sugar’ was everything I love about songwriting—making something profound and emotionally
affecting out of almost nothing,” he explains. “That song was the starting point, the song that
told me I had to let go of all my assumptions and methods from my bands and do something
completely unfamiliar.” Opening with mournful and wide-open chords from Wilson’s piano and
guitarist Bleu’s rolling acoustic, the recorded version of the song slowly rises to a glorious
bridge. The performance defines a loose, intuitively American sound that is somehow not
Americana. It’s a far cry from the tightly structured pop rock that Wilson has been known for in
the past.
The recording of the song “All Kinds” exemplified the change to an open and unpredictable
recording process. “That track happened so fast, I didn’t know what hit me. One night, after a
long day in the ballroom, I told the remaining three musicians that tomorrow first thing we’d
record ‘All Kinds,’ and I sang them the song. Bleu, who’d played guitar that day, got a wild-eyed
look and announced that we were going to record the song right now. It was late, but we ran back
upstairs and put on our headphones. Ken Chastain, our percussionist, picked up a Fender bass.
We did three takes of the song, everyone ran out to their cars and the day was done. I didn’t
know that anything special had happened until the next morning when I listened back and
discovered we’d nailed the perfect version. And we’d done it with the spontaneous, free methods
I’d read about in Shakey.”
While Free Life is in some ways a departure from Wilson’s previous work, it also perpetuates
certain of his tendencies—the elevated, chill-inducing melodies, the thoughtful yet
straightforward lyrics, the striving for honesty of expression. “I’ve always loved songwriting that
sounded like truth,” says Wilson, “like first-person confessions, like confidences whispered in
your ear. Even if I’m willing to tinker with reality and my own history, I want the song to feel
true.”
More than ever before, Wilson has achieved this goal on Free Life, which serves to culminate
one stage of his career and initiate the next, as if he were living out the memorable payoff of his
song “Closing Time” - “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.” There’s
no doubting the truth of that. www.danwilsonmusic.com
