When the Right Chord Strikes: Author Michael Farris Smith’s Shattering Playlist

From Ryan Bingham's music video for “Southside of Heaven”

Editor’s note: Last, but certainly not least, in this week’s debut series “The Writer’s Guide to Music” is author Michael Farris Smith (whose novel Rivers will be on my nightstand before the weekend starts). Be sure to go back and read Brian Panowich’s entry from Wednesday and David Joy’s post from Thursday. Again, if any authors, writers, or musicians are interested in submitting a post for consideration, email admin@writersbone.com or tweet us @WritersBone.—Daniel Ford

By Michael Farris Smith

Over the past five or six years music has become as much an influence on my writing life as anything. Why? Because great songs are filled with powerful imagery, emotion, and the complexities of the human spirit that we try to understand but can't. This is the same thing I do when I sit down to create story or character or scene. How real can I make it?

Great songs make it real. You feel them. You don't forget the striking lyrics, the emotional attachment. Part of my morning routine is drop off my little ones, ride around and listen to the handful of songs that are ringing in my head at the moment, come home and strum a couple, and then write. It's my favorite damn habit.

Here are 10 songs that have either stuck with me as an artist, or that have had big impacts on whatever I've been working on. Or are perfect for late nights and back roads. Or all of the above.

Martin Zellar “Ten Year Coin”

I started listening to Martin Zellar 20 years ago when he was with the Gear Daddies. This song has a lyric that stays with me just about every time I sit down to write or think about what might hide in the dark shadows of all my characters. It's so strong: "When I was younger I used to wonder what could ever bring a man to want to kill, and it scares the shit right out of me to admit that I don't have to wonder still."

Steve Earle “Goodbye”

Well, Earle is just a badass. But "Goodbye" is a stripped down song about longing, regret, the fragile nature of loss. "Goodbye" was in my head the entire manuscript of Rivers. I attached Cohen to this song and I suspect that character and novel and song will always sit together in my mind. 

Ryan Bingham “Southside of Heaven”

The coolest thing about Ryan Bingham? Two summers ago he played in Tupelo in this little bar that held about 200 people. This was right in the middle of a tour when he was playing to thousands. I thought it'd be a paired-down set, paired-down band, maybe play for about an hour. Instead, they crammed the entire band on this little stage, took shot after shot in front the audience, and ripped and roared for two hours like it was Austin City Limits. Love this song because: "When I die, Lord, won't you set my soul upon a train. Send it southbound, give some ol' blues man name."

Ben Nichols “The Last Pale Light in the West”

If you are a fan of Cormac McCarthy, and he has had a big influence on my work, then you'll dig Ben Nichols. This song comes from the same titled album, which is based on McCarthy's novel Blood Meridian. You feel the burned out landscape, burned out characters. I love this damn song late at night with only the headlights out in front.

The Civil Wars “Dust to Dust”

This is the other song that stuck in my head during Rivers. Because of this: "You've held your head up, you've fought the fight. You bear the scars, you've done your time." The song twists you up. And then the video was two lonely people wandering around Paris. The City of Light sits right beside Mississippi as the two places that have had the biggest mark on my work.

Pearl Jam “Wishlist”

I was 21 when “Ten” came out and holy shit. But I didn't let the band come and go. I've held on to Pearl Jam over the years. Last year I saw them in Memphis and kinda forgot how hard they bring it. Their songs also are full of notions of identity and individuality. "Wishlist" grabs all that. The first line: "I wish I was a neutron bomb, for once I could go off." I feel like that about every other damn day.

Sons of Bill “Joey's Arm”

I've only recently come to discover Sons of Bill and thank God I did. "When you don't fit in at church or bars, you bite your lip and you hide the scars." How could the son of a preacher not just get all tied up by that line?

Jason Isbell “Traveling Alone”

Isbell's “Southeastern” is an album I listen to over and over. Honestly, I've gotten suckered by the single like everybody else, but this album has reminded me what it means to listen to a full album, feel the themes, and really get to know an artist. "Traveling Alone" is like so much other stuff I dig. It haunts you, drains you. You feel its grasp for...something.

Drive-By Truckers “Outfit”

Bottom line is "Outfit" pretty much describes the people I know, the towns I grew up in, and the hard-working, hard-loving people I've been surrounded by my whole life. It's damn near everything I love about the South.

Drivin' N Cryin' “Straight to Hell”

Forget "Sweet Home Alabama." If you don't know "Straight to Hell" then you don't know the true Southern rock anthem. Every band I've played with, every bar I've played in, if you want everyone to get up and raise glasses, then strike up "Straight to Hell." Drivin' N Cryin' is probably the best Southern rock band you have never heard of. "She took my hand and we walked into the sun, a new day's promise had begun, we'll make it along whether you like it or not..."

Rock on.

Michael Farris Smith (Photo credit: Chris Jenkins)

To learn more about Michael Farris Smith, visit his official website, like his Facebook page, or follow him on Twitter @michael_f_smith.

Author Brian Panowich On How Musical Exploration Fueled His Writing

Van Halen's "Fair Warning"

Editor’s note: Last week, I noticed authors Brian Panowich, David Joy, and Michael Farris Smith having a lively discussion about music on Twitter and I butted in like a teenager looking to crash the cool kid’s table. I pitched them an idea for a post on writing and music and our new landing page The Writer’s Guide to Music was born. Since Brian’s entry landed in my inbox first, he has the honor of leading us off. Be sure to tune back in for David on Thursday and Michael on Friday. If any authors, writers, or musicians are interested in submitting a post for consideration, email admin@writersbone.com or tweet us @WritersBone.—Daniel Ford

By Brian Panowich

First of all, the entirety of my novel, Bull Mountain (due out July 7), sprang from the first line of The Band’s “Up On Cripple Creek.”

“When I get off of this mountain, you know where I wanna go…”

So knowing that, let me give you a little history behind my love affair with music and how it’s part of every word I write.

The first record I ever bought for myself was Van Halen’s “Fair Warning.” It scared the shit out of my mother, and although my father was deeply rooted in the Outlaw Country movement of the 1970s, I could still see the devil smiling through my old man as he watched his little boy try to get his head around something that would soon alter the rest of his life.

Eddie Van Halen and his band didn’t call that album “Fair Warning” for nothing. It was all sex, violence, excess, and debauchery. All the shit my mother had hoped to shield me from, but from that point on, it was off to the races. “Fair Warning” served as my gateway drug, leading me to my current state of being a hopeless musical addict, or as I like to think of myself, a musical explorer. I dig though copious amounts of regurgitation in search of my next obsession. I can never settle on default favorites. Sure, there are bands I love, and songs that I can compile into lists I consider to be the best stuff ever written, but I have a burning need to discover something new and challenging on par with my need to breathe, or eat. It gives purpose to my free time and more often then not saps my not-so-free time. 

I spent a lot of time in my youth trying to make music. Armed with three chords and the truth, I tried to channel the passion of Bruce Springsteen and the utter cool of Joey Ramone. The results were less than stellar. There’s a reason those two guys are who they are, but still, I used music as a way to pay the bills and separate myself from the herd. I called it a badge of honor back then, but realize now that it was more like a protective barrier that kept me safe and blind from the frightening world of adulthood. I liked being Peter Pan and I liked the heft of a Telecaster. It was a good life.

But goddamn it, everyone has to grow up at some point.

In the second act of my life, much like my father, I find my musical taste somewhere between Jennings and Jones (hat-tip to Jamey Johnson). It was a natural progression for me, like father like son, from the punch-in-the-face of rock-and-roll to the snide swagger of Americana and country.

Son Volt, The Drive-By Truckers, and similar artists, serve as the soundtrack to my current incarnation as a novelist. I don’t need music as a shield anymore. My skin is thick and worn. So now my music is more akin to a comfortable chair. A small plot in the universe I can sink into that exists just for me.

The funny part of that is I write in silence.

So to set the mood of whatever scene I’m fixin’ to dive into, I binge on whatever record I need to fuel it. Bull Mountain was written to a soundtrack as varied as it’s characters. Clayton Burroughs, my protagonist, was written to classic country songs by Waylon, Sturgill Simpson, Hank Jr., and Jamey Johnson. They helped me voice him. His brother Halford’s themes, on the other hand, were a little more brazen, like Whiskey Meyers, Skynyrd, and Blackberry Smoke. Another main player in the book, Simon Holly, wasn’t raised on Bull Mountain, so his soundtrack was equally as unique to him. Live and Northcote, Chuck Ragan, and the post-punk of Frank Turner helped me form his personality.

I built Clayton’s wife, Kate Burroughs (my favorite character in the book) directly out of Maria McKee’s unparalleled voice, and Brandi Carlile’s “Bear Creek” record. I even named the main waterway that cuts through Bull Mountain after that album. Like everything else in my life, Bull Mountain, the novel, wouldn’t exist without the music that inspired me to write it. It flows through the whole story.

David Joy once told me that the last chapter to his debut novel, Where All Light Tends To Go, was the closest he’d come in his life to writing music. I get that. For me, there is only a slight shift in pitch between the two mediums. It’s easy to see the influence through the genre as well. Look at all the thinly veiled references to Waylon Jennings and the Drive By Truckers in Bull Mountain, or in Frank Bill’s Donnybrook (What? You didn’t see them? Go look again). Whenever I read something like that, I feel like the author is speaking directly to me, like I’m in the club. And it’s fair to say, that feeling of inclusion is the best reason to read anything.

Every now and then I revisit that Van Halen album. I pull it out of the sleeve and listen to the vinyl pop under the needle, and just for a second I get just a brief glimpse of that little kid who thought his dad was made of steel and that girls were made of stars. But like some asshole said once, “You can never go home again.” So I march on, always looking for my next fix.

For those interested, check out the comprehensive playlist that inspired Bull Mountain. Maybe a line in one of these songs will inspire you to write a novel of your own.

Brian Panowich 
Photo credit: David Kernaghan

To learn more about Brian Panowich, visit his official website, like his Facebook page, or follow him on Twitter @BPanowich. His debut novel Bull Mountain, a southern crime saga, is available July 7, 2015 from Putnam Books. Look for our interview with the author closer to his Pub Day.