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M adeline Adams has one of Athens' most musical, valu
able instruments, matchless in both clarity of tone
and richness of timbre. And it's her voice that has
always provided the initial come-on to most listen
ers, from her early days as a girl with a guitar at
house parties, an Ingrid Bergman fresh-face among the sweaty
punk crowd, to her recent big-stage 40 Watt shows. But it's
Madeline's generous, intelligent songwriting which provides the
heft that only reinforces initial impressions.
On her new album, White Flag, that voice—such a voice!—a
little Joni Mitchell, a little Mary Chapin Carpenter—is again
front-and-center, a musical anchor and the album's focus,
while her lyrics are more perceptive, intelligent and emotion
ally honest than ever before. She's able to capture a moment
in a way that's decidedly Southern. Her
tunes are sweet, but not cloying. Her lyrics
are sharp, as cn the richly evocative song
"Jive Talking," or on the cutting take-down
of a would-be casanova in "Dirty South (Tie
One On)." And the album's title track ties
together in an un-naive way the disparate
ways that relationships can live or die on
time, surrender, growth, honesty and, yes,
drinking.
Thing is, though her voice and lyrics
are the focus of White Flag, this is also a
first foray into recording with a full band
for Madeline, who performs under just the
one name. The recently named White Flag
Band—Jacob Morris or Caleb Darnell (bass/
banjo), Theo Hilton (keyboards), Jim Wilson
(drums), Jason Trahan (guitar), Laura
Carter (clarinet, horns) and Robbie Cucciaro
(horns), with Claire and Page Campbell
(backing vocals), give or take a few—has
been backing her for two years, deftly aug
menting Madeline's country-inflected folk
starting back with the show celebrating the
release of her last disc.
On that 2007 album, The Slow Bang, recorded with the
aid of Phosphorescent's Matthew Houck, Madeline built up
her songs around her guitar melodies, basing the roles of the
album's percussive instruments around the demands of the
six-string. This time around, however, Madeline flipped that
script, letting the rhythm section of her full band shepherd the
White Flag songs to completion. "There was something very
freeing in following Jim and Caleb's beat," she says. "It was a
lot easier to let go, and I think that you can hear that in the
performances."
The expanded crew in the studio also allowed for expanded
creative input on Madeline's songs. "Everyone provided their
own parts," says the 23-year-old Athens native, "most of which
we had already been performing for some time. They were
discussed and altered in the studio, but it was always a group
decision. My musical communication is pathetic. The best I
can do is give painfully vague comments like, 'What if it builds
there? Like, in intensity?' Thank God I worked with such killer
musicians."
Madeline also credits Dark Meat/Ginger Envelope musi
cian and White Flag producer Jason Robira with much of the
album's sound. "[He] had so much input with the attitude of
the accompaniment," she says, "once it came down to editing
and mixing."
Madeline says she spent a lot of time listening to the 2005
girl-group box set One Kiss Can Lead to Another put out by
Rhino Records, and those hundreds of layered, sweet pop har
monies inspired her to work backing vocals into the recording
session. She considers the tracks on this album "more confi
dent than others, especially vocally. I say 'especially' because
as a vocalist that's what I notice the most... this is the first
album where I truly had back-up singers. Having the Campbell
sisters work with me was so dreamy. I was obsessed with the
idea of having female vocal back-up."
There's a precision to White Flag, a deliberateness, that
hasn't been present on Madeline's past recordings, and upon
the first few listens it can register as a little staid, a little too
meticulous. A longtime listener might wonder: Was Madeline
intimidated by her first time in a studio? Why does everything
sound so... careful, so controlled?
Consider that the bias, though, of an observer who's
heard many of these songs live and many times, and is used
to Madeline's regularly beguilingly effortless stage presence.
That's one of the things about hometown favorites: when
you've seen a band live so many times and you finally get
around to hearing a fixed version of a song, it can sound alien,
surprising. Madeline says, though, that it's no unnatural thing.
"It's normal for me to play songs for years before I record
them, but this was a little more extreme than usual," she
says. "In general, my sdngs tend to change over time. I like to
test out new ones solo for a while and allow them to change
depending on how I feel during their performance, although I
think I'm developing a different approach now that I'm regu
larly playing with the White Flag Band."
Following last week's release of White Flag, Madeline &
Co. set out on a week-long tour of the Southeast with fellow
Athens act Haml opening. Whenever Madeline announces her
tour dates, though, inevitably she gets barraged by young
fans on MySpace eager for her to play their
hometown. It's an evolution of the direct
contact she cultivated on her many house-
show tours.
"I've got such a love/hate relationship
with the Internet. If it were up to me, Clear
Channel would have never taken over the
radio waves, MTV would show music videos
all the time, music would be sold on vinyl
and tapes..." says Madeline. "The Internet
has created a grass-roots effort among musi
cians, and once I started to take advantage
of it, lots of new opportunities opened up."
Part of Madeline's changing with the
times involves the expansion of her team,
and not just when it comes to musicians
in the studio. After years of touring and
recording on her own, Madeline has recruited
a publicist to help spread the word, and
a record label (Athens-based Orange Twin
Records).
"The funny thing is that I'm doing more
non-musical work than ever," she says.
"The naive hope is that once you have more
people helping you, you'll have more time to
focus on playing music. Honestly, though, at home I spend way
more time behind the computer than behind the guitar."
After returning to Athens for an April benefit show for
Camp Amped, which also serves as her official CD release party,
Madeline will box up some copies of White Flag and hit the *■
road for her first tour of Europe, opening for longtime friends
Defiance, Ohio. It's another first for an artist who, since
first playing songs in front of friends back in her teens, has
been consistently and successfully evolving at a comfortable,
organic pace. White flags are traditionally signs of surrender.
But what happens if it's flown high enough, more prominent
than all the rest, with a voice raised just as high? Now that
may just catch a few more eyes. v
Chris Hassiotis
welcome our new stylist
Killy
Republic
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MARCH 18, 2009 • FLAGPOLE.COM 19