Iron And Wine: Shepherding New Songs

09/28/07 4:30pm

by Matt Littlefair (CHARTattack)

With an ever-expanding legion of devoted fans and a growing heap of critical success, Iron And Wine's Sam Beam has just released his third LP, The Shepherd's Dog via Sub Pop. The record marks an aural turn for Beam, who spoke with us over the phone from his home outside of Austin, Texas about writing, family and the pressure to succeed.

ChartAttack: Can you shed some light on the title The Shepherd's Dog, because I took it as a statement steeped in politics after reading that this record was partially inspired by a state of "political confusion?"
Sam Beam: It was so open-ended. The easy answer is that it comes from that Wolves song ["Wolves (The Shepherd's Dog)"], but yeah, it kind of doesn't really mean anything. But at the same time, you could read it as someone with a sense of responsibility or importance. Or you could say "The Shepherd's Bitch," you know? It's just imagery or whatever.

Knowing you were going to include so many other musicians in the recording process of this record, did that change the way you wrote?
No, not really. Most of the songs were at least started, if not finished, by the time I was doing the Calexico stuff, and that experience taught me a lot about leaving arrangements open for people to work in. The songs were already worked on, but it started the same way all the other songs have. When it comes to recording, it's kind of endless options when it came time to arrange 'em. That's when I would get a little more creative with the songs.

With the Woman King EP, there was a theme that sort of tied the record together. Was that the case this time, beyond dogs popping up in a lot of the songs?
Not really. Honestly, it was kind of fun to put sequences together. I don't really write with albums in mind. You just kind of treat it like a craft and keep writing all the time, treat it like a job. Then when it comes time to put out a record, you see what you've got, see which songs fit together, which songs flow. With the Woman King thing, it worked because it had all these women characters. It just gives it this cohesiveness that's not really there when you're writing it.

You recorded most of this record at home right?
Yeah, I built a home studio. That's where we did it all.

So what prompted the move from Florida to Texas?
A lot of reasons. We wanted to get out of the city and we kind of have a place in the middle of nowhere now. It's nice as long as you don't need to go into town. But my wife has family here, there's a good school for the kids, it's cheap.

Does having a larger family change the way you approach your music — touring, writing, recording? It has to be a bit more of a juggling act compared to when you released Creek Drank The Cradle.
It changes your perspective on everything. I may not write lullabies for my kids, but it inevitably changes stuff.

I've read in the past that you always have a backlog of usable material. Is there any truth in that?
There's a lot of songs that I haven't put out, not so much lately as it used to be. I've got a few more responsibilities these days, but yeah I try to just treat it like a job, just keep workin'. In that sense if you sit there for at least five or 10 minutes a day, you might get a word or a phrase. Some days are better than others. But you look back after 365 days and you've got a lot of stuff.

You've had a lot of critical praise. Did you feel any pressure because of that when you were putting this record together?
I don't read the reviews. I mean I don't read 'em anymore. When I put out the first record I was really interested because I'd never done it before. But I think you quickly realize that whether it's a good review or a bad review, it doesn't really help you put the pen to the paper. If it's a real good review, you get kind of over-confident. If it's a really bad review, you get this silly self-consciousness. It takes a certain amount of fearlessness to just do it, at least just to get started. You have to be invested in it in a personal way. I can't really do stuff that I'm not interested in doing.