Everything happens at the right time, in the right place, and for the right reason.

After a promising start in Eastern Washington in the late 1990s, Chad Bault decamped to Portland, where his band Train Goes Sorry’s live shows caused more than a few conversations to stop in mid-sentence. The time was ripe for a powerful combination of vulnerable folk imbued with raw power. And yet…

Everything worth striving for takes time. And maybe raw emotions need some other experiences to make them more universal. Maybe everything — experience, talent, place, reason — unfolds on its own schedule.

After returning to Yakima, Bault connected to some likeminded souls and started to get his bearings. Sort of. It took some time. Some life experiences. He moved to Seattle, got married, had a kid. Started writing music again for real.

So here we are at the No Man’s Land EP. Here’s Chad on the rest of it:

"After a couple of runs in a couple of bands that ended in heaps of heartache and mountains of debt I took a break from writing and performing. I travelled a lot over the past few years and found the experience of different scenery and cultures got me out of my own head. I fell in love with the craft of making music again. I dabbled in live shows with some friends while I got my feet back under me as a songwriter.  

Last Fall I contacted Patrick Tetreault; a producer friend of mine and asked if he would produce a few tracks for me. We set out on pre-production and realized we were heading in similar directions musically. We found a shared comfort in the lexicon of American music. The music that can be traced through artists like Jimmie Rodgers and Ledbelly; on through Cash, Waylon and Willie. I'm influenced by all kinds of music, but Texas troubadours like Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clark and Steve Earle are where I draw my inspiration. Music for the sake of the song. The storytelling. The community.

And that's what we're trying to build now. I hired Patrick's band [The Pearls] as my backing band in the studio. In the process we became a sort of family. Sharing a bill with them feels like a post-service potluck at some country church. Something that feels more than familiar to me; a farm kid that walked down a dirt road to church Sunday mornings.