Gillian Welch and David Rawlings are not the first musicians ever to name an album after a favorite studio or, in their case, the one they own and operate in East Nashville. But “Woodland” isn’t just a random title — it really does reflect the hardships and triumphs that came about over the last few years at the recording facility of the same name, which had its roof blasted off in the famous Tennessee tornado of 2020, right before lockdown made everything still more difficult. With that adversity as a backdrop for their new material, the wish that hard times would come again no more is as deeply rooted in these 10 songs as it was in the four-year rebuilding process for the studio where much of the acclaimed roots music of the last quarter-century has gone down.

“Woodland” is the first album of fresh studio material released jointly under both Welch’s and Rawling’s names, although that fact might go unnoticed. They’ve been co-billed on tour for decades, and fans know that every record by either of them has been deeply collaborative. Their devotees haven't been starved for music, since the duo released a Grammy-winning covers album together during the pandemic, and retrospective projects spanning back to Welch’s breakthrough in 1993 with the T Bone Burnett-produced “Revival” have filled any gaps, along with jointly recorded releases under Rawlings’ band moniker. But this is the first album of fresh material to come out with her name on it since 2011’s “The Harrow & the Harvest,” making it a very significant release in the worlds of folk and Americana, a distinction that could be said for any project they collectively work on.

Variety spoke with both partners in the collaboration by phone on the day “Woodland” was released in late August. First, let’s hear from Welch, then Rawlings:

GILLIAN WELCH

It’s good to talk with you on the actual release day for your record. Do you sit back and read any fan comments or reviews or anything like that on the day an album comes out?

Welch: I do check in some. It’s been long enough between our records that it is nice — well, more than nice; it’s absolutely essential and fantastic — that people still care when we put a record out.

I don’t want to jump right into heavy stuff, but I was thinking today about how there was this strange period during the pandemic that really, really hit the brakes. I feel like everyone I knew, and definitely around our house, went into serious survival mode. I was in that apocalyptic mindset, thinking “This is serious. Nobody needs what we do. They need food. They don’t need art, they don’t need music.” I have such respect for the arts, they’ve kept me alive so many times — I never really felt like what we do was unnecessary. But in that moment, I was truly shaken. And I actually called a DJ friend of ours, Rita Houston, who has since passed, and she helped me see things differently: Oh, no, music is how we get through the hardest times. And so I’ve tried to hold onto that, and that feeling stayed with us throughout this album. There was so much loss, so much destruction, and so much change. I never thought I would say so many times, “Wow, I didn’t see that coming.” You know, I never thought I’d get hit by a tornado. I didn’t really think about these things. Anyway, this is a strange way to start our conversation, but that’s where my mind was.

Of course people will wonder how much this record was affected by the times.

Perhaps I always feel this way, I don’t know, but I feel like this record more than any other record of ours is a product of the era in which it was created. Each song has a personal story, but they’re also kind of cultural narratives. When someone was asking me about [the opening song] “What We Had,” I think they were fishing, trying to figure out: Is this real? Was there a romantic breakup? But that’s kind of missing the point, because so much had disappeared, and so much was lost, that it would be an untruth to say that that song was just about two people. I was thinking about the decline of our entire lifestyle, and our ability to tour, you know? For a moment there, it’s like my entire life was just gone. So that’s in there too. And that’s often the case with us. It’s like if a song doesn’t function on more than one level, we don’t really like it.

Certainly it would not be unlike you guys to write songs about people who were dealing with calamity or had some loss or have hard times in some way. That’s kind of a fixture. You don’t have a whole catalog of completely happy-go-lucky songs.

No, we don’t. That’s not how my mind works. You know, it doesn’t mean I’m a gloomy person. It’s actually quite the opposite. It means that I’m kind of unfazed by life’s more challenging moments. I’m probably more surprised by the happy times.

Listening to these songs, there’s a bunch of cold weather references. And it’s not necessarily like you’re having like a hard freeze in Nashville all the time, but it’s like, there is weather in the album. And you certainly dealt with weather in a big way with the tornado…

There’s always weather, don’t you think? It’s the great constant. I’ve always been very aware and very moved by the weather. As a small child, high winds just scared me to pieces. But now I find… what is paramount? What has control over all of us? The weather. I feel like a lot of people are realizing there is some enormous force that is beyond our control — well, somewhat beyond our control. But also, weather is one of those beautiful things that can present itself in song and gives this beautiful kind of tangible structure.

We've become friends with Barry Gibb since he asked us to play on his country record a few years ago. He's a wonderful person, a fantastic songwriter, and I've loved our conversations. He was reading me some titles he was considering for his work, and mentioned a second verse, saying, “Well, there could be a weather event.” I thought, yes, this is the perfect go-to for a second verse: the weather event! And of course, in our world, what happens in the third verse? Well, you always have, like, death or the devil.

You had the double whammy that many people in Nashville did, of the tornado — which wrecked your studio — coming just before the pandemic. Did that just slow down your process, or was there any silver lining where it give you a differet kind of impetus?

The tornado certainly did slow us down. You don't expect to spend two years just rebuilding. But honestly, it was such a fascinating period — a complete stop. We couldn't tour due to the pandemic, and our studio was gone. So what did we do? We sat in our living room and focused on just playing music, not on a stage, not into microphones. It was like rediscovering that kind of playing that often gets put aside once you have a career — the simple joy of playing in your living room with no audience, the kind of playing that defines who you are. Dave and I often said how much it reminded us of when we first moved to Nashville, broke and with nothing to do, and not many friends. We'd just sit in my living room, play, sing, learn other people's songs, and work on our own. There was a certain purity to that time, and it definitely influenced our music. You go through big changes in life, and I feel like we entered a new phase while working on this record. All that time of stillness was the beginning of it. Great change happens when you pause.

How did you make the decision to make this a true duo record? Your fans know that the records under either of your names are done together, but for anybody who looks up your discographies afresh, there should probably be a giant asterisk that says, “it’s complicated.”

Yeah, we just couldn't keep arguing about whose name should be on it. It felt absurd, especially after spending time simply playing together in our living room. I don't know how else to say it, but putting one of our names on this record would have been ridiculous. As you said, people have known for a long time that, regardless of the name on the album, we work together as a team.

Everyone who follows you does know you’re busy and there have always been projects and retrospective projects and new things. But if we were to actually look back at the last time that you had your name on the spine of an album of all original material, it was 2011.

Yeah, it's been a while since I've sung lead on new original songs. I mean, we're always busy. It's not like we take vacations. But there's just been a lot going on.

And sometimes, I think my perception of time differs from others. Even when Dave and I are working together, time seems to stretch out for me. He'll work on a song, dash into the bathroom to brush his teeth, and come back saying, “What about this?” He works in bursts, while I need these expansive periods of time. I'll sit on the sofa, watch the sun move across the sky, and that's my work window. Dave's can be while he brushes his teeth. It's one reason we work so well together. We have very different approaches, but our standards are aligned. We always agree when something is right and truly finished.

I would think this billing could be freeing in some ways, if in the past, you might have working on things spontaneously, but then if it doesn’t exactly fit the format of whose record it’s gonna be or what style of record it’s gonna be, you’d think, “Maybe we can’t use that right now.” I don’t know if you think that way.

You're absolutely right. That's another aspect of simply calling it “Gillian Welch and David Rawlings.” This record includes songs that, if it were solely a Gillian Welch album, we might have abandoned before they were finished, or shelved them. Even a song as personally successful as “Hashtag” might have been set aside if we were making a Gillian Welch record. We struggled with it, with me singing lead, and couldn't get the tone right. But as soon as Dave sang it, everything fell into place—the guitar arrangement, the key, everything that contributes to a particular sound and emotional feel. It's a tremendous relief and it is freeing. I hope people can sense and appreciate that by doing this, we're expanding our artistic palette in a way that's very true to who we are as individuals.

Looking at the credits, you notice that about half the songs are just you and Dave, and half involve extra instrumentation, like pedal steel and drums or a string section. Was it deliberate to have the album balanced between those approaches?

Honestly, we thought we'd make a double album. As you mentioned, time has passed, and we had accumulated 18, 19, 20 songs. We weren't sure how to split them. Maybe all the duets on one record and all the band stuff on the other. Or maybe all the songs with me on lead on one disc, and all the songs with him on lead on the other. In the end, Dave is our album sequencer, in addition to being our producer. We'd been trying to figure this out for a while, and then he came up with this test sequence, on his very first try, and that's what we went with. My hope is that maybe the remaining material will form another album. And maybe the next one won't be so far off—wouldn't that be nice?

“Howdy Howdy” ends the album with a true duet between you and Dave, trading off lines. You haven’t had that many of those before. It’s almost sweet, almost a love song.

No, the first time we traded vocals on a song was on “Cumberland Gap” from the 2017 album “Poor Richard’s Almanack,” which was credited to Rawlings. It seemed to work well, as our vocal ranges are similar. So, “Howdy, Howdy” is truly a duet, which was nice because the lyrics are like riddles in a conversation.

There is sweetness, and it's kind of a love song, but a humorous one where they say, “Yes, we will always be howdy, howdy, [but] we'll always walk that lonesome valley,” but... It's simply par for the course on the record. There's plenty of conflict and contradiction throughout the album. Writing “Trainload of Sky” was what essentially initiated the whole thing. From the outset, the record had this odd “is it empty or is it full” contradiction that kind of runs through the entire record: Is it lost, or is it transformed, or is it renewed?

Maybe that accounts for the song “Turf the Gambler,” where the title character seems to be dead by the end of the first verse, but then apparently comes back to life.

Yeah, “transfixed, but not dead.” Which, amusingly enough, is actually the Welch family motto, which we chuckle about all the time. Nothing could be more fitting for me, prone to extended periods of silently staring into space: transfixed, but not dead.

DAVID RAWLINGS

Was it a relief for the two of you to kind of finally settle in on: Yes, we can put both our names on this, and there can be different lead vocals and different even styles or instrumentation on the same album? I don’t know if you’ve ever felt in the past like you kind of had to limit things because of whose record it was or if was a preconceived notion of what the record should be.

The record just came out earlier today, but so far, the initial reception in the world has seemed to be good, and I don't think it really feels like too much of a dramatic shift to anyone, which is nice. I would say that on our other records, there were small... concessions is a strong word, but (adjustments) due to the name we were recording under. But you can also say that there was a degree of freedom given when we were making a record under one or the other of our names, where we might just delve a little deeper in one way or another because we knew that was the task. It was like, OK, what does that imply? What choices need to be made to make that the best it can be?

We found ourselves in a unique place. For example, on the “Harrow and the Harvest” album, “The Way It Will Be” was originally a song I was going to sing, but I wanted to hear Gil's voice on it. It's exciting to be in a situation where we felt free to experiment and create something truly our own. We questioned how to arrange the songs, how to incorporate two lead vocals… it became a new challenge within the strict framework of our music. These limitations, like those in most creative endeavors, are actually a good thing. The challenges of making a blended record led to decisions we might not have made otherwise. I believe the vocal exchanges were a great solution for songs where we weren't sure how they'd fit with one of us singing alone. It felt like a fun and fresh approach.

Aside from the artistic work of the album, all the work you had to do to rebuild the studio after the tornado had to involve a great deal of pure menial labor.

Yes, there was nothing glamorous about it. Constant worries about leaks, spending days keeping equipment dry, cleaning up construction dust that permeated everything — not an ideal studio environment. There was also a profound sense of isolation, especially during lockdown and the pandemic. But the world, in a way, moved on from that. (Meanwhile at) Five Points, my daily route from home to the studio went straight through the tornado's path. It was years of demolition and rebuilding everywhere, with structures being torn down and replaced or restored. The emotions of loss and renewal were woven into everyday life, and I couldn't escape them.

I remember one time in the studio — I was in an isolation booth in the B room — when I suddenly felt uneasy. I had this feeling of anxiety, and I thought, “What's going on? What's happening?” After a few seconds, I realized that the jackhammering outside had stopped. You know, for months during reconstruction, the jackhammer noise was constant, and now the sudden silence felt strange, something I wasn't accustomed to.

Something about the jackhammers had come to be subliminally comforting somehow?

Yes, precisely. It's like when sailors spend too much time at sea and get seasick when they're back on land.

Did all of that affect the tone of the writing?

It certainly infused a personal touch into it. Our music has always had a resilient optimism. It can be quite dark in many ways, but there's usually something coming - maybe it's just in the afterlife! - that people are clinging to. And I think being closer to that and perhaps just being closer to a lot of people in society and culture, where everyone was going through this collectively, influenced it. There's a lot of duality in the record. Lyrically, there's a lot of ambiguity about what things might mean, are they good or bad? And I think when you experience challenging things in life, you feel the need to find some good in it and try to accept that you don't know if it's for good or bad... to look for a reason or purpose in things. And I think some of that found its way into our lyrics as we were writing.

There were certainly a lot of different songs written during that period. We thought we were making a double album, and there's a lot of material that didn't make it onto 'Woodland,' but the material that did had those elements, and that's what held it together as a whole. Most of those themes were impacted or created by the experience of being in the same building for 14 hours a day, for four years, going through different struggles and trying to create music in less than ideal conditions.

What were your thoughts when it was possibly going to be a double album?

We considered every way we could release a record: Would it be a double album? Would it be two albums, like when Bright Eyes released 'Digital Ash' and 'This Morning' simultaneously? Would we each release an album under our own names? Everything was on the table. I didn't want to dictate anything. I let the work guide itself. And then, at a certain point, I started sequencing some of the music that I thought would be on one of the collections, and I started to see a real thread. And when those ten songs were put in order, and I could feel it, I just shut the door, because I felt it was a work of art. That's how all the records have been: everything stays open, and then suddenly it clicks, and you know you've found something. And then I'll fight tooth and nail to not change a thing.

So that's what happened with this album. After recording those songs together, we considered calling it “Empty Trainload of Sky,” but it didn't feel quite right, and we struggled to find a unifying theme. Then one day, I was thinking, what about “Woodland”? It immediately felt resonant. It captured the essence of the studio itself, even in its renewed state. We could record strings again, or more intimately than before, because we had improved the sound isolation. It was peaceful, and I could even operate the tape machine myself, sometimes without even needing an engineer. All these aspects of the studio and the recording process were reflected in the music.

With this record, you had a lot of options before you settled on your song sequence, but it’s kind of half and half, as far as songs that are really just the two of you as, and then half that have a little more going on as far as string parts or pedal steel or drums. But a record kind of balanced between those things felt good to you.

(Creating more expansive songs) also tied into the Woodland feeling, which was about experimenting with different musical styles in the studio. Having the freedom to do that was a hard-earned luxury. And it was a luxury to have the ability to do a string session in this beautiful, open space. It hasn't been a single, large room like that since the 1960s. It had been divided up into booths and things, but I took all that out when we rebuilt it, because I prefer playing in one big room. I have a bit of a mischievous side, and I liked the idea of starting the album with “Empty Trainload of Sky,” which sounds like something we would (normally) do, with my guitar similar to a typical song, and the bass and drums, but then the next song, “What We Had,” is much more produced with strings and pedal steel. I thought, well, they'll hear that and wonder if we've gone crazy? I wanted them to be concerned, wondering if the whole album would be that produced. And then I wanted to immediately go back to (the stripped-down sound).

The vinyl and CD won’t be out for a few months. Did you feel okay with, or even an urgency about, putting it out digitally before the vinyl was available?

I believe that's the way things are nowadays. Ideally, I would have liked to accomplish everything concurrently. However, considering time constraints and other factors, I feel life is too short to wait around to release your music. Just the other day, I was frantically trying to get the vinyl records cut, preparing the lacquers for shipment… You see, I've been rebuilding the lathe and the entire mastering system for lacquers. So, even though the music is out in the world, I'm still under pressure as we speak.

One thing I’m truly excited about is our partnership in this pressing plant in Denver. We’ve essentially built it and now we largely own it. This gives us more freedom to act quickly, keep things in stock, and create fun, unique products. Before, we had to plead, bargain, and call constantly to get our records pressed by the best companies in the country. Now, that company is part of our team. This could lead to a revival of those kinds of projects for us because we have the capacity and the ability now. But the interesting thing is, if you truly want top-notch jackets, you need to work with the best, and they have long waiting lists. The lists just keep growing. If you’re not aiming for the highest quality, you can get things done much faster. And that’s kind of the story of my life.

Gary Alstrom is the guy you were talking about, who’s at your pressing plant?

Yes, absolutely — he really cares. He puts the same high level of artistry, craftsmanship, and detail into pressing records as we do when we write, record, and perform our music. It's a beautiful thing. I love that we're now fully integrated into the production process. It's like we're a self-contained unit, taking care of everything from start to finish.

It’s interesting, and refreshing, to think about the enduring popularity that you two have, and how the odds might have been against that in some ways.

Did you not think that delving into old-fashioned folk music in 1993 was the path to wealth? [Laughs.] A terrible idea! But you just pursue what you enjoy and strive to do it as well as you can. And if you're lucky, people connect with what you're expressing, if you can somehow translate something folks want to hear, you're truly fortunate. I mean, I've never felt better than perhaps the first time we played the Station Inn and we were opening for Peter Rowan, and we were able to perform for that room, which was probably 200 people, and have them all genuinely appreciate it... Then shortly afterward, maybe a month or two later, we played our own Station Inn show and the people came, and I thought, “Well, we'll be able to do this as long as we want.” If you can get 150 people to come to a room to hear you sing, then that's what this job is to me - you've achieved it. Anything beyond that is just a bonus.

The audience for what the two of you do is so strong that it feels like it doesn’t matter so much what name you put on the record or if there’s a while between records — that audience will always be there waiting for you. Other artists are subject to the usual laws of fickleness, but with you guys it seems so reliable.

Well, I truly appreciate it. I mean, we haven't exactly inundated the market either. We've given ourselves a bit of an easier task than those who've released 25 albums. But we have a good amount of material available. When we played live recently, we performed four or five songs that weren't on the record, and they were well-received. So hopefully, we'll have something else out soon, and it won't be as long a wait. We can test your theory that they'll always be there for us.