We’ve all heard musicians tell nightmare record label stories, but Shannon McNally’s tale seems particularly egregious. Currently based in Northern Mississippi, McNally was shuffled around endlessly by Capitol Records and Back Porch, one of its subsidiary labels, before she finally decided to see if she could do better on her own.
“It was torture,” she says of her time with the original home of the Beatles. “I did manage to make a number of records there, and put them out, but it was torture every day of my life. There were long periods of them just making me wait. I mean years.”
The Charlie Sexton-produced Geronimo, perhaps McNally’s best known work, was recorded in 2003 but not released until 2005. “Charlie and I were on the same label for about a minute and a half,” she laughs, then tells the story of how Back Porch was sold “as soon as the ink on my contract was dry. They made a lot of money by sort of fattening the pig for sale. I didn’t know it at the time. I was living in New Orleans and this was all post-Katrina, so I was a little bit of a basket case.
“I was living in temporary places. My shit everywhere. They called me and said, ‘There’s a new president. Nothing’s going to change, don’t worry.’ They still put Geronimo out and did a fairly good job, but they could have done a lot better.”
Around that time she recorded an album with famed producer Jim Dickinson and his sons Luther and Cody, who lead the North Mississippi All-Stars, that will never see the light of day. Tired of the major label game, McNally, who makes a stop at the Continental Club tomorrow night (July 1) with her band Hot Sauce, decided to strike out on her own. Late last year she self-released Coldwater, perhaps Dickinson’s last appearance on disc before he passed away last August.
“He might have done a little bit more, like one or two more,” she explains. “We knew he wasn’t well, but we didn’t know how bad he was. We basically cut the record in a day. We would do a take and if Jim would say that was it, then that was it. I produced the record, but even a word or two from him helped me steer. He still feels so present to me. I’m still friends with Mary, his wife, and Luther and Cody.
“He really was one of those people that came out of the Sixties in a very genuine way. Like Dr. John and other people who truly believe in spiritual freedom and freedom from social constraints and above all freedom from music. He was an ardent worshiper of soul music and country music. So for me he was the perfect combination. I’m always trying to get a soul band with pedal steel in it. Like if Otis Redding had lived another ten years, that’s where he would have gone.”
After much time in limbo, McNally seems to be making up for it with two new albums: One’s her own material and the other is a collection of songs written by cult soulster Bobby Charles and recorded with Dr. John.
“Basically I just got tired of waiting and with all the resources out there to do it yourself, I thought I might as well give it a shot and I’ll figure out how to do it. I figure if you keep finding a way to get the stuff recorded, when the universe finally settles down, if you just keep walking, eventually all this shit will be behind you and the music will come out. That’s my philosophy for survival.”
This article appears in June 25 • 2010.