To be a songwriter of Americana--that is, expressing human stories in the American vernacular--is to be caught often between sadness and satisfaction. The sadness stems from the sad-oh-so common stories that inpire some of the songs--death, divorce, joblessness, homelessness, the drudgery of common life, making/not making the rent, raising/losing children, ad inf.
I always try to find the resurrection, the fresh start, some joy or uplift in these sad stories and I believe I succeed, fairly often. Still, one can feel sad when an old song--once thought to be a topical song, fixed to a single sad time and event--shows fresh relevance again (sometimes, again and again . . .).
What of satisfaction? The satisfaction is that, as a writer--even of material as brief and trivial as a folk song--one has successfully tapped a universal truth, or reality, that transcends a single time and event. And, just as the sadness is always there, recurring over and over again, so is the resurrection, the fresh start, the potential for joy and uplift.
Just as the country went into 2020 pandemic lockdown, I released my first studio produced album in a long time. Some the songs are new. Some are fresh recordings of older songs going back many years. One song--More Rain--was written in a particularly devastating hurricane season for the Gulf Coast and up the Eastern Seaboard.
I cannot now recall which season, or the name of the storm. No matter, hurricanes and storms come every year and really harsh ones every few years. My radio says, this year looks to be a bad one right on the heels of our present troubles.
Below is a YouTube link to the song. No J-Lo, Lady Gaga, dancing video (I'd just hurt myself), just a little song of faith and fortitude.
Best wishes to all CE.