This was the last photo I took of David Olney. He stopped by for a quick overdub so we could polish off the album. I spun around mid-song to snap it, prompted by some subconscious notion that this moment was very important. And indeed, it was.
I was first unknowingly introduced to David’s writing back in the late 90’s, when Emmylou Harris recorded his song “Deeper Well” on what quickly became one of my favorite albums of all time, Wrecking Ball. I was too naive back then to thoroughly read liner notes. I just assumed Emmylou had written it, along with all the other songs.
It wasn’t until years later, upon moving to Nashville, 3 or 4 beers in at Bobby’s Idle Hour on Music Row that I heard the author himself, whose esteemed reputation within the songwriting community had long preceded him, chanting “We-ee-ee-eell, looking for the water from a deeper well.”
Of course, my rookie reaction was to holler to the bartender, quite jovially, “He’s playing my favorite Emmylou song!”
Being new in town, I was really proud of myself for knowing that little tidbit of fake news. It was either the bartender or another patron that gave me the dunce glare, albeit narrowly veiled by the customary Southern politeness. “It’s his song, man. He wrote it.”
Ok so let’s just say it was years later before I could summon the cajones to step back into that sacred building. In the meantime I started doing my homework. If this guy wrote THIS song that I’d held so dear, surely there were others. And there were, many.
His work seemed to constantly dance between the mystical and the real. I found comfort in the feeling that I wasn’t alone in these philosophical explorations. I lost my dad at a young age. To say I was maybe just a little fixated on the “Great Beyond” since childhood would be a vast understatement. And let me tell ya, that’s a lonely road.
But then you discover this body of work, from someone who is now within arm’s reach, and it’s suddenly as though the trail had been blazed. Sure, the foliage was quickly regrowing, but your job was no longer to find the path, it was simply to maintain it as you carried forward, in hopes to eventually catch up.
And sure this all sounds poetic and maybe even overwrought. But the truth is, I’m a damn fortunate fella that all these years later I had the opportunity to dig a well with the master. (And NOT ONCE did he ever make me feel like anything but his equal.)
He, myself, Anana & Irakli spent countless hours locked away in the studio practicing magic and summoning sonic spells. The result is something we are all so incredibly proud of, I’d dare even say intimidated by.
That will of course be shared with you all when the time is right.
In the interim, I’m left to reflect, as we all are, on the small moments spent with David. The conversations around the kitchen table or in the living room, which would more often than not drift off the rails of the task at hand and into the absurd, often to the point of contagious hysterics.
That’s something I’m really gonna miss. His laugh. He’d be sitting quietly as we all bantered on, so quiet we weren’t sure he was even listening, and then out of nowhere he’d chime in with a quip that would make us all fall out, him included.
The funny thing about losing someone is there’s this pressure we put on ourselves to remember specifics, and that pressure creates a mental bottleneck. We get frustrated and even fearsome that we’re not gonna remember that person’s words.
But just when you’re not expecting it, something they once said will flash across your mind and resonate like an echo from a mountaintop. It’s a bit like the writing process itself.
His laugh, though. That one will echo indefinitely. It’s sound carried weight. A lifetime of grappling with life’s big unsolvables, of wisdom-molding hardship, of lost love and renewed romance, all churned up and emitted into a sound that nearly rendered the suffering comical.
That was the gift of David Olney. He could move us to tears as quickly as he could to laughter, often in the same breath. This town won’t ever be the same since you departed, just as it’s never been the same since you arrived.
Thanks for the dance, David.
David Olney at WireBird Productions working on his new record.
David Olney with Anana Kaye working on his newest record at Wirebird productions with Brett Ryan Stewart.