Dar Williams to play two nights at Iron Horse Music Hall

The popular singer will perform on Friday and Saturday nights at the Northampton club.

Dar Williams  

Dar Williams hardly needs an introduction to most music fans in the area. Williams has performed numerous times up and down the Connecticut River Valley over the past two decades and even lived in Northampton for a number of years.

The New York state-born folk singer will be appearing for two nights at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton on Friday and Saturday. She took a few minutes to chat about her songwriting routines and her latest album.

It's hard to believe that you been doing this for more than 20 years. Over that time, has your approach to songwriting change at all, and if so, how?

It really hasn't. If anything, I've gotten clear on the fact that I don't need to pressure myself to write. I need to pressure myself to create opportunities to feel inspired to write. I have friends who force themselves to sit down and write every day and that would drive me crazy. So I've let myself off the hook, but when I am in, say, Northampton, for example, I will go to the Smith Museum or go do something that challenge the right side of my brain. Something that will get me out of the everyday business of life. I try to create the conditions so that inspiration can strike.

How difficult is that? Do you go for periods where it doesn't strike? And do you get fearful about that? Losing your muse?

Yeah, but even that has happened so many times that I've learned that it's cyclical. The fear that the muse has left the room is something I can look back and say, "well that happened to me when I was young, and then it happened to me when I was living here or there, or it happened to me when I was friends with so-and-so." But that's not the way it works. If you can find a way to show up, it will always show up.

Let's talk about your latest album, "In the Time of Gods." I really like this song "I've Been Around the World." Talk a little about about that one.

I was with my friend Rob who is a keyboard player and he's just a really thoughtful, funny, really supportive guy and I was talking and talking and had the scraps of melody and I wanted to write something about my new life for the past 10 years. My husband is really into food and we travel all the time and we tend to prepare our own food rather than just going and eating crap. Which is different for me because the first 10 years of my career I think nothing but crap. And it's important to me because support community gardens and local farmers and the local food communities, and all those things. And I just wanted to make a benchmark about this part of my life where I have a chance to bring all these things into my world and into my home.

On the new album you worked with producer Kevin Killen, who is worked with Elvis Costello, U2, and Peter Gabriel. What was it like working with him?

He's a producer who puts the artist first and has a really great ear. He has a great vision for rock 'n roll and he didn't want to have too many bells and whistles. He wanted the album to be very clear and very focused. And even though when he's produced U2 or Elvis Costello that may be more things going on, there's still a clear focus and a front and center character. But he's very polite very professional and he really goes for clarity. So it was very harmonious.

How did you choose the title "In the Time of Gods"?

We live in a time of extremes. It's more like "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey." It's really not like "Pilgrims Progress" anymore where we have to worry about a swamp or a temptress. It's more like there are now big falls from grace, and big challenges from our egos, and empires crumbling before our eyes. So there seems to be the sort of epic quality through these times, and I wanted to address that.