"This record was an experiment."
At 40 years old, Kelley Smith released her first EP called Moon Child in 2022 (find the 2022 KAXE interview here). On the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic, Smith recorded those songs while quarantining at home, alone, working remotely with a producer.
For her debut full-length album Flowers, released Friday, Nov. 6, she took a different approach, recording at various cabins before landing at Bellows Studio in St. Paul with Adam Krinsky (Trampled by Turtles, Ingeborg von Aggasiz, Keith Secola).
As someone who previously had a hard time in studios, Smith said, "I struggle with this anxiety thing that I don't agree with, but it comes to visit me all the time still. It's very annoying."
Smith said Krinsky's approach "really helped me to open up ... in a studio environment."
Throughout the conversation, Smith dives into the song "Little Match Girl" that features Jed and Ariana LaPlant of Wild Horses, the heartbreakingly beautiful "Flowers"; and "Lydia," a deeply moving song about her grandmother seeing her own mother for the last time in the 1930s before being taken away by the Nazis in Poland.
"I think this record overall ... is my grief splayed out here," Smith said. "The grief that is expressed here was not planned. This is just what happens when you become middle-aged."
"Being a mom. Being a woman. Being middle aged."Kelley Smith on her new album "Flowers"
The songs are intimate, vulnerable and incredibly relatable not only as a parent, but as a human being navigating this life.
Part of the conversation aired on Headwaters, but I urge you to take a listen to the whole thing above. Hear about Smith becoming an official Pisgah banjo artist, fighting off flies while attempting to record in a cabin, hearing a whippoorwill for the first time, what playing a banjo feels like and so much insight into the challenges, beauty and hardships of middle-aged life.
Smith will be playing a show with Kelly Hunt Thursday, Nov. 12, at Sampaguita in Aitkin. Her album release show will be Friday, Jan. 8, 2027, at the Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis joined by Jed, Ariana and Emily LaPlant with the Mike Munson Trio opening.
