On her new album, "The Loving Kind," Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith takes on some big topics.
The title track is a story song about Richard and Mildred Loving, a white man and black woman who were the subject of a landmark 1967 Supreme Court case that ended the ban on interracial marriages in the U.S. The rest of the recording includes a heartfelt meditation on the death penalty, tunes about a couple of former presidents and a bittersweet tribute to Texas songwriter Townes Van Zandt.
But there's also some swinging honky-tonk music and an ode to artistry and inspiration.
Griffith will perform with her band at the Atlanta Botanical Garden on Friday.
"We love playing there," she said during a recent call from Nashville. "It's such a great gig. It's so beautiful, and we always get to spend some time in the gardens before the show."
Here are few of Griffith's thoughts on "The Loving Kind":
This album is quite politically outspoken. Was that a conscious decision or are you just feeling feisty these days?
I think it's a combination of both. So many things came up for me over the past eight years that it just all came flowing out.
The title track is a poignant story song. Is it also meant to address the subject of same-sex marriage?
That was an accident, because I was inspired to write that song from reading Mildred Loving's obituary in The New York Times. I just sat in tears and the song just wrote itself. It all came at once, and it didn't occur to me until later about the same-sex marriage issue.
"Across America" is a rousing, Woody Guthrie sort of song. Where did that come from?
That's another song that just wrote itself. I really like that song, even though it's probably one of the more commercial things I've ever written. I can hear it in many voices. I can hear someone like Brooks and Dunn doing it.
Along with the serious stuff, you also have a couple of good old rowdy Texas songs by Dee Moeller and a boozy song by Edwina Hayes. Are those fun to sing?
Yes. Dee Moeller was my hero. She was rocking during my teenage years in Texas, and "Party Girl" and "Tequila After Midnight" are real honky-tonk songs. Edwina has been such a friend over the years, and she's such a great writer. "Pour Me a Drink" is certainly a different one for me, in terms of what people are used to me singing, but it's almost like Edwina wrote my life down.
In the liner notes you talk about writer's block. What did that feel like, and how did you finally get past it?
I spent the whole Bush administration with my pencil in the sand.
I couldn't get over the direction my country was going in, and I just couldn't get inspired. I spent most of my time touring abroad because it was just too frightening for me. Getting past that, with the election, really opened my heart and my mind, and set me free to pull my pencil out again.
You have a birthday coming up in July, when you'll be 56. How are you feeling about that?
I feel 33. Everything is just fine with my health, and I feel good. I'm a lucky girl.
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