DRUNKEN HEARTS
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While the 2020 pandemic spelled doom and gloom for many a musician, it signified a new beginning for Boulder-based roots artist Andrew McConathy.
The guitar-playing frontman, lead singer and primary songwriter of the group known formerly as The Drunken Hearts initially thought a worldwide calamity meant the beginning of the end to a career he’s pursued since 2010. Then an angel of mercy from his past emerged, giving him a second chance to make things right in his life and his songs. McConathy’s story of give and take, rise and fall, and hope lost and found gets the personal treatment on Reckless Ways of Living, his new album coming out June 9, with a release show on June 10 at Meow Wolf in Denver.
Along the way to this career resurgence, McConathy decided to drop the three-letter word from his band’s name, even going solo as Andrew McConathy for a short time. Previously presiding over a group of ever-changing members through 2019, his evolution continues as essentially a one-man band that enlists guest players in the studio or on the road when he needs them. “The pandemic really tore the doors off of ‘The’ Drunken Hearts,” McConathy maintains.
“It’s difficult to make this an actual career that pays the bills,” McConathy concedes. “Even before COVID-19, I could have finally given up after dealing with several tragic experiences,” such as the 2014 death of Ted Welles, The Drunken Hearts’ cofounding member and drummer. Yet, while his band lineup continued to change during the pandemic, McConathy worked as a security guard at a hemp farm in Longmont, Colorado, to make ends meet while keeping his dream alive. “The odds have always been overwhelming,” he laughs. “I probably should have rolled over a long time ago.” Instead, a renewed sense of faith in his abilities and songs followed. Finding another album within as the pandemic dust cleared, McConathy realized, “There is something cathartic about putting everything that you have into something.”
After releasing Alive ‘n Free (with music from 2019 tour stops) on January 15, 2021, then the Wildflower Sessions EP on February 4, 2022, McConathy basically relied on a new cast of characters with a few familiar folks — and lots of luck, happenstance, and serendipity. Calling Reckless Ways of Living “a last-ditch effort to preserve my dream in this musical life, a la Sturgill Simpson’s High Top Mountain,” he reiterates “every last dollar and every atom of my being” went into this album.
McConathy and his future producer/cowriter Dave Pahanish, who has penned No. 1 Billboard country singles for the likes of Toby Keith, Keith Urban, and Jimmy Wayne, didn’t know each other until a mutual connection put them together. In January 2021, McConathy initially planned to celebrate the 90th birthday of his grandmother, Bettye McConathy, with other family members in Nashville. He was looking to line up a show of his own so they could see him perform as part of the weekend’s festivities.
Seeking assistance, he turned to his agent Derek Smith, a former drummer whose suggestion was an old friend from their high school punk band days in McMurray, Pennsylvania — Pahanish. After the omicron variant interrupted those birthday plans, Pahanish made up for the failed attempt by presenting McConathy with a promising professional offer — a songwriting session at his home in Lebanon, Tennessee, a short drive from Nashville. Appreciating the invitation and the help, McConathy quickly was impressed with his newfound collaborator’s writing abilities after listening to “Without You,” a popular single that Urban put on his 2010 album Get Closer. “I thought the song was great,” McConathy notes. “I read about [Pahanish’s] inspiration through the song. It was about his wife, about his family, and all these things. … I put together … my version of that.”
Their partnership yielded results the first time they got together last June to write “Falling Stars.” The moving song about fallout from “living fast, dying hard” was completed “in maybe two hours, maybe less,” according to McConathy, and wound up as Reckless Ways of Living’s second cut. Pahanish agreed to produce, engineer and mix the album at his Panfish Studios, describing it as “a really trippy, psychedelic barn” on his property. McConathy supplied his brawny baritone voice that has drawn comparisons to Eddie Vedder. He also discovered “a phenomenal musician” in Pahanish, who played acoustic guitar, bass, mellotron and percussion.
They ultimately shared songwriting credits on all 10 tracks, with The String Cheese Incident’s Keith Moseley (“Never Say Goodbye”), and Leftover Salmon’s Vince Herman (“100 Proof”) assisting on one track each. McConathy contends the final product is “our best yet,” adding, “I think I’ve been trying to go more for that, I don’t want to say pop country, but more like outlaw country, Americana. … The songs are reasonably more of an honest representation of me as a songwriter. … And I think Dave’s production style is great.” Herman’s name first came up as Pahanish gave McConathy a ride to the airport in his pickup truck after that June writing session. The producer asked his new cowriting partner, “Have you ever heard of the band called Leftover Salmon?” McConathy recalled with a laugh. “I’m like, ‘Yeah, I was a roommate with the banjo player. … And I’m playing with Vince’s son [Silas] tomorrow.”
That bit of coincidence further tightened their bond with Vince Herman, Leftover Salmon’s cofounder and acoustic guitarist. Pahanish cowrote a couple of songs for Vince’s new solo album, Enjoy the Ride, including the title track. So naturally, Pahanish and McConathy talked Vince into writing “100 Proof” with them. Meanwhile, Silas Herman, who lives in Boulder, contributed a scintillating mandolin on that country foot-stomper and two other songs. Vince Herman got into the instrumental mix, too, adding kazoo and washboard on another playful and raucous track, “Popcornin’ Percocets.” Another joint venture was finding more featured guest artists, including American Aquarium’s Neil Jones (who excels throughout on pedal steel), international banjo champion Kyle Tuttle (Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway), and Lindsay Lou (backing vocals) on “Forever Highway,” and fiddler Jason Carter (Del McCoury Band) on “Dark Times.”
McConathy utilized longtime Drunken Hearts drummer Alex Johnson, who moved from Colorado to Nashville last June, along with some of his most recent players. James Dumm (electric guitar) and Tyler Adams (keys/organ) “are two of the hardest-working musicians I’ve ever seen,” the bandleader says. While Drew Packard handles most of the bass playing, Adrian “Ace” Engfer happened to be in town to record two songs, borrowing Vince Herman’s upright bass for “Dark Times” and Pahanish’s electric Mustang bass on “Eventually.”
“Dark Times” fits a steady theme throughout the record, with McConathy aiming to “stick to a motif … to have some sort of common thread” as he explores death and his own quest for redemption. On album opener “Never Say Goodbye,” he addresses “the remains of my rowdy ways.” The love-gone-wrong song “Fall From Grace” remembers when “our love was a spark / We watched it burn away.” Yet it’s on “Good Graces” where the lyrics dig deeper emotionally, even if the song has what McConathy calls “this weird Dropkick Murphys, Irish Bob Dylan” kind of vibe.