Ani DiFranco, Gracie & Rachel, Pieta Brown, Jocelyn Mackenzie

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Daymon Gardner

Ani DiFranco in front of a gray background.

Ani DiFranco

The legendary “little folksinger” is back in Madison for a celebration of her most recent release, Revolutionary Love, and iconic music from over the years. Despite the nickname, DiFranco is widely known for a personal and hypnotic fusion of multiple genres. Her discography knows no bounds, featuring collaborations with the likes of Bob Dylan, Michael Franti, Utah Phillips and even Prince. With Gracie & Rachel, Pieta Brown, and Jocelyn Mackenzie.

media release:Overture Center for the Arts and FPC Live are pleased to present Ani DiFranco with The Righteous Babes Revue: Gracie and Rachel, Pieta Brown, Jocelyn Mackenzie on Saturday, Nov. 5 at 8 p.m. in Capitol Theater. Tickets ($39.50-$65) go on sale Friday, Sept. 2 at 10 a.m. at overture.org.

Widely considered a feminist icon, Grammy winner Ani DiFranco is the mother of the DIY movement, being one of the first artists to create her own record label in 1990. While she has been known as the “Little Folksinger,” her music has embraced punk, funk, hip hop, jazz, soul, electronica and even more distant sounds. Her collaborators have included everyone from Utah Phillips to legendary R&B saxophonist Maceo Parker to Prince. She has shared stages with Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Pete Seeger, Kris Kristofferson, Bon Iver, Brand Carlile, Billy Bragg, Michael Franti, Chuck D. and many more. Her most recent albums include 2021’s “Revolutionary Love” and the July 2022 25th Anniversary Edition reissue of her iconic live album “Living In Clip,” both on her own label Righteous Babe Records. Her memoir “No Walls and the Recurring Dream” was released in May 2019 by Viking Books and was a New York Times Top 10 bestseller.

Rejecting the major label system has given her significant creative freedom. She has referenced her staunchly-held independence in song more than once, including in "The Million You Never Made" (Not a Pretty Girl), which discusses the act of turning down a lucrative contract, "The Next Big Thing" (Not So Soft), which describes an imagined meeting with a label head-hunter who evaluates the singer based on her looks, and "Napoleon" (Dilate), which sympathizes sarcastically with an unnamed friend who did sign with a label. After recording with Ani in 1999, Prince described the effects of her independence: "We jammed for four hours and she danced the whole time. We had to quit because she wore us out. After being with her, it dawned on me why she's like that – she's never had a ceiling over her."

Her lyrics are rhythmic and poetic, often autobiographical and strongly political. “Trickle Down” discusses racism and gentrification, while “To The Teeth” speaks about the need for gun control, and “In or Out” questions society’s traditional sexuality labels. "Play God" has become a battle cry for reproductive rights while “Revolutionary Love” calls for compassion to be the center of social movements. Rolling Stone said of her in 2012, "The world needs more radicals like Ani DiFranco: wry, sexy, as committed to beauty and joy as revolution."

Over the years she's performed at countless benefit concerts, donated songs to many charity albums and given time and energy to many progressive causes. She has learned from and demonstrated beside Gloria Steinem, Jesse Jackson and Dennis Kucinich. In 2004, she marched in the front row of the March for Women's Lives along with Margaret Cho, Janeane Garofalo, Whoopi Goldberg and many others, later performing on the main stage. She has beaten the drum for voter registration and turnout with "Vote Dammit" tours in multiple presidential election years, including most recently in 2016. She's currently on the board of Roots of Music, an organization that provides at-risk youth with support and musical education in New Orleans, and the creative council of EMILY’s List, which helps elect pro-choice Democratic women to office.

As an iconic songwriter and social activist, she has been the inspiration for woman artists and entrepreneurs for over two decades. She has been featured on the covers of SPIN, Ms., Relix, High Times and many others for her music and activism. She is the idol of empowered women who came of age in the 90s and continues to bring younger fans into her fold. From Alice Walker to Amy Schumer, Ani is respected by wordsmiths across milieux and generations. She blazed the trail for self-directed artist careers and has been cited by musicians from Prince to Bon Iver as an inspiration to release their own art outside of the major label system.

Ani has been the recipient of many honors and awards, including a Grammy for best album package (Evolve), the Woman of Courage Award from the National Organization for Women, the Gay/Lesbian American Music Award for Female Artist of the Year and the Woody Guthrie Award. At the 2013 Winnipeg Folk Festival, she received their prestigious Artistic Achievement Award and an honorary doctorate from the University of Winnipeg. In 2017, she received a Lifetime Achievement Award from A2IM (a nonprofit trade organization that represents independent record labels) and the Outstanding Achievement for Global Activism Award from A Global Friendship. In 2021 she was named a Champion for Justice by the National Center for Lesbian Rights.

“It is such a pleasure to have Gracie and Rachel release their new album on Righteous Babe. Their ethereal and provocative songs are a cinematic addition to the RBR cadre of feminist artist/activists. They sing softly but carry a big stick.” — Ani

Gracie and Rachel are magnetic fields: Opposites who attracted and never looked back. A decade ago, when pianist-vocalist Gracie and violinist Rachel met as high schoolers in a modern dance class at their public high school in Berkeley—where they grew up among the city’s progressive politics and encouraging spirit of artistic community—they were quickly intrigued by what the other had.

Rachel was a transfer student from a classical music boarding school who had started on violin as a child, spending her Saturdays at the San Francisco Conservatory, playing chamber music. This strict, regimented background was a clear foil to Gracie’s freer-spirited approach to songwriting and self-expression. Gracie, meanwhile, appreciated Rachel’s knack for structure, theory and form. “We used to joke that Rachel gave me structure and I gave her freedom,” says Gracie.  “That was our foundation in a way. And then we just started to dance with the two.”

These tensions—classically-trained and open-ended, dark and light, timeless and contemporary, certainty and the unknown—have become hallmarks of the modern baroque pop Gracie and Rachel have made ever since. And the power of Gracie and Rachel’s particular alchemy—that of a secret language between musical sisters, with a preternatural melodic sensibility—has never been more potent or realized than on their sophomore record “Hello Weakness You Make Me Strong,” released through Ani DiFranco’s label Righteous Babe Records. “We wanted to bring a little more color into this record,” Gracie says of its expansive, beat-augmented sound, “to control the landscape sonically before opening it up to other people.”

And the results are tidal. With more focus on billowing electronics and hints of dusky but sharply-defined baroque-pop cadences, “Hello Weakness You Make Me Strong” bursts open the pristine emotionality of Gracie and Rachel’s self-titled debut from 2017. These 10 bold, oceanic songs chart the crests and crashes of feeling and thinking that one might encounter in the process of perseverance, in working through uncertainty and inner-excavation towards self-possession—towards clarity. “The songs ask us to look directly into the eye of the broken mirror reflection in front of us,” Gracie and Rachel write in a mission statement. “The music is less interested in fixing what’s fragmented than it is in putting value on imperfections for all they’re worth.”

Central to that journey, in “Hello Weakness You Make Me Strong’s” lyrics and music, Gracie and Rachel offer a profound inquiry into their own complex interpersonal dynamic, and with that, into communication in general: internal, external, how it is often flawed. Their relationship can be nearly telepathic when writing songs, but as with all deeply entwined collaborations—the duo write together, tour together and live together in the Bushwick loft where they moved in 2013—it can also be a challenge. “We live, work, breathe, everything together—the lines are so blurred in our relationship sometimes,” Gracie says. “Are we friends today? Are we collaborators? Are we strangers? It’s fueled the music, but there can also be a lot of conflict and confusion. You feel empowered, but you also forget your identity. These songs are notes-to-self on how to get through that. They knew more than we did.”

With an awareness of their divergent approaches to communication—Gracie is more extroverted and confronting, while Rachel is more introverted and less vocal—they let that push-and-pull into the music. Gracie calls the questing opener, “Trust,” a thesis for the record, a subtly-anthemic ode to trusting oneself in the face of self-doubt. It sounds like a testament to the wide-reaching impacts of believing in oneself: “Times up, times out, a whisper becomes a shout,” Gracie sings, a possible polemic, “Turn up, tune in, a revolution will begin.” This message of self-empowerment through self-knowing continues like a mantra on “Sidelines”: “Waiting for a sign is a waste of time,” she sings, “When I can find one in my mind.” The confessional “Underneath,” meanwhile, is about seeing hidden layers of meaning in the everyday: “We have these narratives about ourselves—how we have our coffee, the way we do an errand, all these mundane things,” Gracie says of the song, “and what is underneath that is maybe the more interesting narrative to confront.” The music of “Hello Weakness You Make Me Strong” benefits from Gracie and Rachel’s contrasting but complementary interests: Gracie is influenced by poets and writers like Emily Dickinson, Elizabeth Gilbert and recently Brene Brown’s writings on vulnerability, while Rachel points to the wordless transcendence of 13th and 14th-century choral music.

For Gracie and Rachel, it was crucial, this time around, to equip themselves with the tools to control their sound more fully than before. Following a “dream-shattering” experience with a team of outside male producers, the duo quickly realized they wanted to be more self-sufficient. Rachel dove into online tutorials, learning Ableton herself in order to achieve the subtleties they wanted: The album documents the process of Gracie and Rachel giving themselves permission to trust their own vision.

They channeled lessons from their label-head, DiFranco, too, who has become a champion of Gracie and Rachel’s work and a guiding force — the duo has played her festival Babefest, and toured with her as both an opening act and as onstage collaborators. “In the music industry, you’re met with so many people telling you how you should sound,” Gracie reflects. “Ani is a huge inspiration to us to write that story ourselves.” The duo sees their life’s work as a project of mutual empowerment, which has extended from their teenage years—playing open mics, practicing and giving concerts in Gracie’s living room—to their present career, one that has seen them share the stage with Gloria Steinem and release a viral feminist video piece, 2018’s “HER,” in tribute to Christine Blasey Ford.

As they equip themselves with knowledge, Gracie and Rachel also embrace the unknown. “It’s humbling to unpack what it means to not know and how much wisdom is in that,” Gracie says. “That’s been a driving theme lyrically. How do our perceived ‘misses’ give us strength? How does the unknown teach us?”

While facing such uncertainty, Gracie and Rachel have each other; a sense of camaraderie, of two women working together, “teaming up as a force to do things we couldn’t do on our own,” is built into every note of “Hello Weakness You Make Me Strong.” Rachel says the song “Speak” was the result of a difficult moment between the pair: her attempt at diffusing the tension of a dispute when words failed her. There’s hope in this bracing honesty. “It’s about trying to confront a difficult conversation and be outspoken about how you’re feeling and it’s my anthem to Gracie telling her that I want to show up, even if that’s not always translating,” she says.

The two artists are seen walking on seemingly never-ending sand dunes in the video for “Underneath,” with their backs to the camera, headed toward the horizon. On their path they begin stripping away articles of clothing until they’re completely bare before running off into the distance. This deeply compelling, stark visual also seems to be a metaphor for Gracie and Rachel as an artistic duo. Entering this partnership with differing perspectives, opinions and behaviors that preceded their meeting, Gracie and Rachel let go of any preconceptions they’ve had of themselves along the way until they are fully peeled down to their core – vulnerable, empowered and ready for their continued evolution together, headed confidently toward the unknown.

“This record marks a major shift for me,” says Pieta Brown. “The songs mirror so many transitions: in my musical life, in my home life, in my creative life, in my country. I’ve been hovering at a crossroads, and I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one.”

Recorded at Justin Vernon’s April Base studio and co-produced by Bon Iver drummer and acclaimed solo artist S. Carey, Brown’s lush new album, “Freeway,” is an utterly mesmerizing collection, a delicate yet forceful reckoning with change that’s marked by the push and pull of unabashed intimacy and a slow-burning intensity. Brown cut the album live in just three days with an all-star band that included Carey, bassist Mike Lewis (Bon Iver, Andrew Bird) and guitarist Jeremy Ylvisaker (Andrew Bird, Alpha Consumer), and the resulting recordings reflect the foursome’s seemingly telepathic bond, a deeply organic chemistry fueled by a shared passion for emotional exploration and sonic discovery. Due out this fall on Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records, “Freeway” is Brown’s most experimental collection to date, but it’s also her most confident and direct, an honest accounting of bittersweet endings and hopeful beginnings, of painful loss and traces of liberation in the aftermath, all captured here with a raw spontaneity and fierce self-assurance.

“When you’ve got a pile of songs and only a few days and nights in a studio, you go into a hyper-focus,” reflects Brown. “You lay all you’ve got on the line, and that’s where a lot of the energy in this album comes from. We were all fully present in the moment with these songs, and we recorded each of them in just a few takes.”

That approach stands in stark contrast to the way the Iowa native recorded her last album, 2017’s “Postcards.” A sprawling release featuring remote collaborations with friends and mentors like Calexico, David Lindley, Mason Jennings and Carrie Rodriguez among others, “Postcards” explored isolation and distance in the creative process, with songs written alone in hotel rooms around the world and recorded piecemeal like an international game of telephone. This time around, though, Brown leaned into the power of human connection and physical presence. The players heard the songs for the first time in the studio, forcing them to rely on their gut instincts and to react to the tunes (and each other) in real time.

“The recording process was eye opening for me because it was so different from the way I’ve worked in the past,” says Carey. “Pieta would just nail her vocal takes while she played live in the room with all of us, and I’d say, ‘How are you doing that?!’”

Hailed as a "self-styled poetess, folk goddess and country waif" by the BBC, Brown first came to international prominence with the release of her self-titled debut in 2002. Over the course of the ensuing decade-and-a-half, she’s gone on to tour the US and Europe extensively and release another seven critically lauded records, prompting NPR to applaud her "moody, ethereal" songwriting, and the New York Times to praise her “sweet, smoky voice.” Perhaps even more importantly for an artist as fiercely independent as Brown, her work continues to garner praise and support from a wide array of peers and mentors, including legendary producer Don Was, filmmaker Wim Wenders and Bon Iver mastermind Justin Vernon, who called Brown’s 2014 album Paradise Outlaw his “favorite recording made at our studio.” In addition to the mountain of acclaim, Brown’s music has also earned her co-writes with the likes of Iris Dement, Amos Lee and Calexico; tour dates with an astonishing array of artists, including John Prine, Brandi Carlile, Emmylou Harris, JJ Cale, Neko Case, Richard Thompson, Ani DiFranco, Mavis Staples and Iris Dement; and festival slots everywhere from Bonnaroo to Mountain Jam.

While music has always been in Brown’s blood (her father is the beloved Midwestern folksinger Greg Brown), she decided to embark on something of a bold new chapter after Postcards, relocating to Europe for the better part of a year in order to star in her first feature film as an actress.

“Acting turned out to be a great detour for me,” explains Brown. “Playing the lead role in a foreign language film challenged me in ways I couldn’t have imagined. Everything was in French, but the character I played was a singer, which made for some interesting parallels with my own life. I collaborated on the music for the film, too, and the whole experience is still opening new channels for me.”

As one chapter was beginning abroad, Brown found herself grappling with major shifts on the home front, both professionally and personally.

“I was in a pretty fragile state of mind when I came in to the studio, but the guys in the band were the most perfect and open shelter I could have asked for,” says Brown. “They’re all true musicians. They were extremely sensitive and really listening so that an open conversation was able to form without any words exchanged.”

That musical conversation begins with the ethereal album opener “Ask For More,” a gentle, tender tune that contemplates our simultaneous resilience and insignificance in the grand scheme of the universe. Brown draws much of her language here, and on the album as a whole, from the natural world, frequently invoking images of the sea, the sun, forests, fire and water.

“Nature is a major player on the album,” explains Brown. “We had a microphone going outside the whole time capturing the sounds of the woods while we worked in the studio. It created a sense of anti-isolation for us. The record starts with those sounds and they’re woven throughout the tracks really subtly.

Subtlety is one of Brown’s specialties, both as a songwriter and a producer. While she called on the band to experiment with her pop sensibilities for the project, her music has long been defined by nuance and incremental change, slight evolutions in arrangement that grow into seismic shifts over time. On the new album, keyboards hinting at hip-hop and R&B influences come and go like the breeze, layered harmonies drift in and out like the tide, and images—of war, violence, liberation, shelter—flash by like scenes through the car window. The songs are alive, breathing, always in flux and constantly in motion. The driving “Morning Fire” finds love even in the ashes of despair (“In the smog of apocalypse / I reach for you as the horizon slips,” she sings), while the cinematic “Only Flying” finds a fresh start in a sorrowful farewell, and the infectious “The Hard Way” (which features a guest appearance by Mark Knopfler) reflects on the growth that comes from pain.

In the end, “Freeway” is all about that emotional alchemy, that intangible magic that transforms our ache into understanding and our doubt into belief. The initial seeds for many of the songs came to Brown in dreams, and it’s easy to hear that otherworldly quality in her delivery. She sings with grit and grace in a raw and all-encompassing voice that seems to flow effortlessly from within, a bubbling spring of feminine strength that celebrates the beauty in our brokenness. “If music is love, we’ll have enough,”

Jocelyn Mackenzie is a Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter, artist and psychic medium. Her conviction to craft creates music, art and messaging that is sensual, personal and powerful. Holding intimate balance between vulnerability and strength, the self-taught songstress delicately constructs bold melodies that weave universal stories straight to the heart.

Her debut solo album “PUSH” is a chamber pop homage to healing through radical self-love, to be released on Righteous Babe Records. Written entirely for string quartet in collaboration with five talented composers, each song on “PUSH” bravely shines light on dark spots of her past. The fearlessness in her songwriting combined with the orchestral arrangements of each song alchemizes her pain into a poultice, making the album itself a testimony to hope, heartbreak and what it means to be human.

Likened to the sounds of tUnE-yArDs, Kate Bush and Regina Spektor, her sonic world traverses diverse terrain, making no stranger of the pop earworm, the humble singalong and the orchestral tearjerker. With a versatile library of influences including Sia, They Might Be Giants and ambient soundscapes, her songs cure melody, meaning and instrumentation into fine blends of the sacred and profane.

In 2007, Mackenzie co-founded indie-folk trio Pearl and the Beard, with whom she enjoyed a rich national and international touring history over the span of their eight year career. Their infectious blend of soaring instrumentation, soulful harmonies and genuine lyricism anchored their songs into their listeners’ bones with depth and longevity. Musicians’ musicians, Pearl’s powerful stage presence shepherded them to perform alongside legacy artists such as Ani DiFranco, Neko Case, Bastille, Iron & Wine, Ingrid Michaelson, Lucius, Dar Williams, Lady Lamb, David Wax Museum and Sharon Van Etten.

In the years since Pearl released their farewell album, Mackenzie continued to write and produce music independently, launching her solo career with 2016’s juicy pop offering the “Unlovely” EP. The release’s five songs, including “Centenarian,” co-written by Ani DiFranco, openly touched on intimate personal trials Mackenzie had endured. Her musical ability to reveal intimate emotional truths with an unwaveringly buoyant sound was the fertile ground in which “PUSH” was planted.

In addition to her own catalog, Mackenzie has been commissioned to write music for commercials and theater. She has blossomed in the theater world as a performer, writer, songwriter and curator, collaborating with such established theater makers as The Trusty Sidekick Theater Company, Sinking Ship Productions and The Bengsons. With the thread of music knitting her creativity together, she professionally pursued her passion for wearable art after graduating from MICA with a degree in Fiber (2005) and has worked as a production knitter, crocheter, jewelry maker, costume fabricator, performance artist and stylist for fellow musicians and theatrical performances. Her knitwear creations have been seen on the likes of Martha Stewart, on screen on puppets for the Mr. Roger’s film “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood,” and on the runway for Helmut Lang, Calvin Klein, Edun, Yeezy and more. Most recently, she has also tuned her senses to offer readings as a psychic medium. Familiar with utilizing channeling and clairaudience as a central facet of her songwriting, she connects the curious in the physical world to departed loved ones and spirit guides from other realms. She has also developed intuitive songwriting workshops that utilize deep listening, meditation and improvisation to provide creative writing tools for musicians and non-musicians alike. All of her work in music, making and mediumship is rooted in the core value that creativity is our universal birthright and that life is a song that must be played by all, for all. Her life’s work is to create harmony.