Welch and Rawlings have collaborated on seven critically acclaimed albums, five released under her name, and two released under the name Dave Rawlings Machine. Her 1996 debut, Revival, and the 2001 release Time (The Revelator), received nominations for the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Folk Album. Her 2003 album, Soul Journey, introduced electric guitar, drums, and a more upbeat sound to their body of work. After a gap of eight years, she released a fifth studio album, The Harrow & The Harvest, in 2011, which was also nominated for a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album.
Welch was an associate producer and performed on two songs of the soundtrack of the Coen brothers 2000 film O Brother, Where Art Thou?, a platinum album that won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 2002. She also appeared in the film attempting to buy a Soggy Bottom Boys record. Welch, while not one of the principal actors, did sing and provide additional lyrics to the Sirens song "Didn't Leave Nobody but the Baby." In 2018 she and Rawlings wrote the song "When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings" for the Coens' The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, for which they received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Original Song. Welch has collaborated and recorded with Alison Krauss, Ryan Adams, Jay Farrar, Emmylou Harris, the Decemberists, Sam Phillips, Conor Oberst, Ani DiFranco, and Robyn Hitchcock.
Gillian Howard Welch was born on October 2, 1967 in New York City, and was adopted by Mitzie Welch (née Marilyn Cottle) and Ken Welch, comedy and music entertainers. Her biological mother was a freshman in college, and her father was a musician visiting New York City. Welch has speculated that her biological father could have been one of her favorite musicians, and she later discovered from her adoptive parents that he was a drummer. Alec Wilkinson of The New Yorker stated that "from an address they had been given, it appeared that her mother ... may have grown up in the mountains of North Carolina". When Welch was three, her adoptive parents moved to Los Angeles to write music for The Carol Burnett Show. They also appeared on The Tonight Show.
As a child, Welch was introduced to the music of American folk singers Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, and the Carter Family. She performed folk songs with her peers at the Westland Elementary School in Los Angeles. Welch later attended Crossroads School, a high school in Santa Monica, California. While in high school, a local television program featured her as a student who "excelled at everything she did."
Welch and Rawlings incorporate elements of early twentieth century music such as old time, classic country, gospel and traditional bluegrass with modern elements of rhythm and blues, rock 'n' roll, jazz, and punk rock. The New Yorker's Alec Wilkinson maintained their musical style is "not easily classified—it is at once innovative and obliquely reminiscent of past rural forms".
The instrumentation on their songs is usually a simple arrangement, with Welch and Rawlings accompanying their own vocals with acoustic guitars, banjos, or a mandolin. Welch plays rhythm guitar with a 1956 Gibson J-50 (or banjo), while Rawlings plays lead on a 1935 Epiphone Olympic Guitar.The New Yorker's Wilkinson described Rawlings as a "strikingly inventive guitarist" who plays solos that are "daring melodic leaps". A review in No Depression by Andy Moore observed that Rawlings "squeezes, strokes, chokes and does just about everything but blow into" his guitar.
Many songs performed by Welch and Rawlings contain dark themes about social outcasts struggling against such elements as poverty, drug addiction, death, a disconnection from their family, and an unresponsive God. Despite Welch being the lead singer, several of these characters are male. Welch has commented, "To be commercial, everybody wants happy love songs. People would flat-out ask me, 'Don't you have any happy love songs?' Well, as a matter of fact, I don't. I've got songs about orphans and morphine addicts." To reflect these themes, Welch and Rawlings often employ a slow pace to their songs. Their tempo is compared to a "slow heartbeat", and Cowperthwait of Rolling Stone observed that their songs "can lull you into near-hypnosis and then make your jaw drop with one final revelation".
My First Lover
Gillian Welch Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
My first lover
He was tall and breezy with his long hair down
But he gets a little hazy when I think of him now
My first lover
My first lover
He was always talking trying to bring me down
But I was not waiting for a white wedding gown
From my first lover
I do not remember any going wrong
Just a record playing that old Steve Miller song
Quicksilver girl
Quicksilver girl
At a surfer party with the whiskey porin
And the bottle rolling I was on the floor
With my first lover
My first lover
I do not remember any fights or fits
Just shakey morning after calling it quits
With my first lover
Quicksilver girl
Quicksilver girl
Quicksilver girl, and she's free
The song "My First Lover" by Gillian Welch is a reflection on a past relationship with a tall and breezy man with long hair. The singer acknowledges that her memories of him are now hazy, but the song does not indicate why this is or what happened between them. The man in question seemed to always be talking and bringing the singer down, but she was not interested in a traditional white wedding gown. Rather, she is seems to be more interested in living her own life and being free. However, the singer also asserts that she cannot recall any fights or issues with her first lover -- her relationship with him seemed to end on an unremarkable note.
The verse referencing Steve Miller's "Quicksilver Girl" refers to a specific moment in the relationship between the singer and her first lover. This verse suggests that they met at a surfer party, drank whiskey, and danced on the floor. The verse concludes that there were no fights or fits, just a shaky morning after where they called it quits. The ending of the song reiterates the idea of being free, specifically referencing the "quicksilver girl" mentioned earlier in the song.
Line by Line Meaning
My first lover
Reflecting on the singer's first romantic relationship.
My first lover
Repeating the phrase from the previous line for emphasis.
He was tall and breezy with his long hair down
Describing the appearance of the singer's former partner.
But he gets a little hazy when I think of him now
Acknowledging the artist's fading memories of the relationship.
He was always talking trying to bring me down
Recalling the negative behavior of the artist's former partner.
But I was not waiting for a white wedding gown
Asserting the singer's lack of interest in traditional forms of commitment.
From my first lover
Repeating the phrase from the previous line for emphasis.
I do not remember any going wrong
Noting the absence of any significant problems in the relationship.
Just a record playing that old Steve Miller song
Recalling a specific moment from the relationship involving music.
Quicksilver girl
Referencing a character from a song who symbolizes freedom and independence.
Quicksilver girl
Repeating the phrase from the previous line for emphasis.
At a surfer party with the whiskey pourin
Describing a specific event where the artist and their partner were present.
And the bottle rolling I was on the floor
Recounting a moment of intoxication or loss of control at the event.
With my first lover
Repeating the phrase from the beginning of the song for emphasis.
I do not remember any fights or fits
Recalling the absence of major conflicts in the relationship.
Just shakey morning after calling it quits
Describing the aftermath of the relationship's end.
Quicksilver girl
Repeating the phrase from earlier in the song for emphasis.
Quicksilver girl
Repeating the phrase from the previous line for emphasis.
Quicksilver girl, and she's free
Repeating the reference to the Quicksilver girl as a symbol of freedom and independence.
Lyrics © Wixen Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: DAVID TODD RAWLINGS, GILLIAN HOWARD WELCH
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind