Margaret Glaspy, the singer-songwriter and guitarist, took just a few days to record “Echo the Diamond,” her critically acclaimed rock album released in August.
“I’d prefer to not be in the studio as much as possible,” Glaspy said with a laugh on a Zoom call from her New York City home. “For better or for worse, I don’t really love to ruminate in the studio or hang.”
But reliving the songs in a visceral, emotional way during her current tour is a different story.
“It’s a wild, intense, cathartic and unique experience for me as a player to play this music onstage,” she said. “To be honest with you, I can humbly say that I’ve never experienced these kinds of feelings onstage before.”
Her songs from “Echo the Diamond” will feature prominently in her Oct. 11 concert at Atlanta’s Center Stage/Vinyl, part of her 25-city fall tour. Glaspy’s longtime friend and Lake Street Dive bassist Bridget Kearney will open the show.
“Echo the Diamond,” her third album, captures the rawness and immediacy of those few days in New York’s Reservoir Studios with bassist Chris Morrissey and drummer Dave King, as well as Glaspy’s conversational songwriting style and her love of guitar.
“This record is totally flying the guitar flag,” she said. “I come from such a heavy guitar lineage. It’s been in my family for a really long time.”
“Act Natural” gets “Echo the Diamond” off to a roaring start. A brash, bluesy guitar riff leads into Glaspy’s tale about trying to play it cool while meeting someone clearly remarkable: “Violet shines bright in both your eyes/that can’t be natural.” It’s wildly catchy and was a clear choice for the first single.
“It felt like a cool leader because it really put the guitar in the forefront and is a statement of where I’m at right now,” the singer said. “It was fun to wear my heart on my sleeve in that sense.”
Credit: Courtesy of ATO Records
Credit: Courtesy of ATO Records
The track’s video adds to the fun. Filmed at Glaspy’s former employer TR Crandall Guitars in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, the video is cut to look like she’s playing the song on dozens of the store’s electric guitars. The variety of axes shown is all the more humorous because of her strong association with the Fender Telecaster.
Another standout track on “Echo the Diamonds” is the relatable “Turn the Engine,” borne out of a particularly tough time Glaspy was having.
“It was time to find some compassion for myself and call it for what it was,” she said. “I was being hard on me.”
Nowhere is that more evident than in the line: “It’s easy to be/good to everyone but me,” a sentiment that will sound familiar to many people. Reflecting on the song’s origins coinciding with moving into a new house that had a nest of baby birds just outside, Glaspy summed up the feelings behind it: “A lot of change, a lot of joy, a lot of sadness, all at the same moment.”
“Get Back” is one of the new songs that she cites as especially powerful live, with its lyrics a reminder about keeping perspective and differentiating between what you need and what you want.
“Memories,” by contrast, is a challenge for her to perform.
“That song — really it’s a hard one for me to get through,” Glaspy said. “It hurts every single time. At the same time, it’s such a beautiful musical experience and it really takes me all kinds of different places, and the audience, too.”
Glaspy hasn’t discussed the circumstances behind the song. But its lyrics — “For an hour I forget/and then my heart starts paying debts” — about the connection between losses and memories will resonate for many listeners.
Having three albums of material for set list choices has given Glaspy an appreciation for her body of work.
“I feel excited to be a little more experienced and to have a catalog,” she said. “I feel like I have no allegiance to certain records or not. I just want to make a great set list.”
That open-mindedness should make for an interesting array of older songs performed alongside the new ones at Center Stage, given the variety between her guitar-focused first and third albums and the keyboard-heavy second one, “Devotion.”
Even though she’s just started her fall tour, Glaspy already has a fourth solo album on her mind. In addition, she and her husband — fellow guitarist and recording artist Julian Lage — have a joint project in the works. And 2024 will bring a full U.K. tour and a second North American tour in support of “Echo the Diamond.”
As she looks ahead to her next album, Glaspy said she always thinks she isn’t writing. “Then I go through my voice memos,” she said. “At least 10 songs … have been written since I’ve made this record that are contenders for the next one.”
In the meantime, Glaspy said she loves the freedom she’s finding in her live performances “to take it wherever it needs to go on any given night.”
CONCERT PREVIEW
Margaret Glaspy
8 p.m. Oct. 11. $22. Center Stage/Vinyl, 1374 W. Peachtree St., Atlanta. 404-885-1365, centerstage-atlanta.com.
