Sarah Lee Guthrie & Johnny Irion – Gathering stones together
“I still love punk rock, and I’ll get into it with my nephew,” she says. “He’s 13, so he’s in that phase. That’s what it was for me, a phase, and I’m glad I went through that. But it’s not something I’d go back to at this point. As a teenager, punk seemed like a natural thing to me. I always say Woody was the original punk rocker. His ideals were really a lot like that even if his music wasn’t. So there’s a strain there, I think.”
During Sarah Lee’s formative years, the Guthries jokingly called themselves “the Addams Family” because they were pretty unconventional. She found herself tagged as a showbiz kid early on, subject to classmates’ requests to sing “This Land Is Your Land” (which she avoided by claiming not to know the words). Her father was famous, thanks to “Alice’s Restaurant” and his 1972 hit recording of Steve Goodman’s “The City Of New Orleans”. But they were hardly rich despite what the neighbors thought.
“My dad has always believed in the slow, steady climb,” Guthrie says. “You know, the 45-degree angle up is better because if you go straight up, there’s nowhere to go but straight down. Or you can just live your life and go more slowly. We’re really grateful that he didn’t become so hugely popular to the point where it took over our lives. My dad’s really good at giving advice, and he’s given me a lot of good advice — by example more than anything.”
As fathers often do, Arlo Guthrie has a slightly different take on the advice that has passed from him to his daughter over the years. He says that Sarah Lee’s understanding of the word advice does not necessarily mean the same thing it does to other people.
“Often what she really means is, ‘What do you think of this idea?,’ rather than asking for any ideas you might have,” he says, chuckling fondly. “But the great thing about Sarah Lee is her willingness to go out on a limb for ideas she thinks are right. I love the way she’s been able to gamble her own ideas in front of the public. That takes courage that a lot of other people with taste or talent might not have — and sometimes, the pure guts to go out and do something even if you’re not sure what you’re doing will get you farther than either.
“I took all my kids onstage without rehearsing, because you’ll never learn faster than when a lot of people are looking at you. Sarah’s been willing to do that, and they’ve grown in extraordinary ways in the few years they’ve been playing together.”
Guthrie and Irion started out as an acoustic coffeehouse duo, and her name was an obvious draw. But they’ve gone far beyond that curiosity factor, evolving into more of a full-band act. One person who thinks that’s the right direction for them to pursue is Exploration co-producer Louris.
“They have a certain life they can continue on, if they choose,” Louris says. “But what they might need as artists is to break into a little different field or a new vein. I’d like to see them get out of the comfort zone of the Guthrie clan umbrella and into more of what I would consider a rock situation. Sarah is part of a lineage that’s very easy for people to latch onto, so it’s not something she should necessarily sit on. She needs to establish her own identity, which she’s doing.”
Irion and Zeke Hutchins met 28 years ago, after Hutchins’ family moved to Irion’s neck of the woods in Durham. Irion’s parents brought over a welcome-to-the-neighborhood six-pack to Hutchins’ parents, and they hoped to get their kids together. But young Zeke had other ideas.
“The first time I went over to Zeke’s house, he had locked himself in the bathroom and wouldn’t come out because he was mad at his mom,” Irion remembers. “She wouldn’t give him a Coke or let him go fishing or something. So we never actually met that first day. Even at that point, he was mysterious.”
Between little-league sports and skateboarding, Irion, Hutchins and Ryan Pickett all got together soon after that. The trio started their first band in their early teenage years, and later formed Queen Sarah Saturday (named after a character on “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood”) with Chris Holloway while attending Durham’s Northern High School.
By the early 1990s, Queen Sarah seemed like the right band at the right time. Loud, fast songs that cut to crashing waves on the chorus were in style, and Queen Sarah had a boatload of material just like that. But even then, Irion betrayed hints of the folksier direction he would someday pursue. Irion used to sing a dynamite live cover of Carole King’s 1971 classic “It’s Too Late” in Queen Sarah, and the band’s original song “Dreamer” could almost pass for the contemplative folk of Sufjan Stevens (before the revved-up outro, anyway).
Queen Sarah got the major-label brass ring and recorded an EP and 1993’s full-length Weave for Thirsty Ear/Columbia. But neither record sold much, and the band eventually succumbed to the usual pressures, dissolving in 1996.
“I think we were just about to make a great record, because we were only figuring out how to really write songs by the end,” Irion says. “It’s a shame to see bands break up, which is probably why you see everybody doing reunions all the time — you know, you really didn’t have to break up! Just get past the funk, take a break, chill. But when you’re 25 or 26, you’re ready to go.”
Post-breakup, Hutchins went to the University of North Carolina, where he would meet an English major named Tift Merritt and talk her into starting a country band called the Carbines. Irion joined the Chapel Hill pop band Dillon Fence, which toured as an opening act for Hootie & the Blowfish and the Black Crowes. Dillon Fence was also close to the end of its run, but the connection proved fortuitous for Irion. Crowes frontman Chris Robinson was impressed enough with Irion to bring him out to Los Angeles to play in a band he was producing. The band was short-lived, but the move brought Irion into contact with Guthrie.