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".
Only One And Only
Gillian Welch Lyrics
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Up above the clouds
Putting all the color in the sky
And twice as many tear drops
there to wash it down
Every one's another lullaby
But there's only one and only
There's a world of trouble
Trying to take its turn
I can hear it shaking underground
And half a dozen lessons
I might never learn
Not until them troubles come around
But there's only one and only
Who could go and leave me lonely
There's a mile of blacktop
Where the road begins
It takes a time or two to recognize
Growing at the roadside
Scattered by the wind
Are everybody's unsaid sad goodbyes
But there's only one and only
Who could go and leave me lonely
You're the only one and only
Why'd you go and leave me lonely
The lyrics to Gillian Welch's song "Only One And Only" convey a complex mix of emotions. The opening lyrics evoke a sense of beauty and wonder, as the singer describes the bluebirds and their colorful creations in the sky. Yet even amidst this wonder, there is a hint of sadness in the "teardrops" that "wash it down." This feeling is amplified when the lyrics shift to talk of troubles that "shak[e] underground," and lessons that have yet to be learned. The singer is aware of the difficulties of the world, and the fact that they may never truly leave.
The chorus of the song knits together these images and emotions, as the singer invokes the "one and only" who has left her lonely. While the song never explicitly states who this person is, it suggests a romantic relationship that has ended, perhaps due to the troubles and life lessons that are mentioned earlier in the lyrics. The singer is aware of the beauty and wonder of the world, but she cannot escape the pain of loss that suffuses everything she sees.
Overall, the lyrics of "Only One And Only" are powerful and emotional, exploring themes of beauty, sadness, and love. The song is a testament to the incredible storytelling ability of Gillian Welch, and it resonates with listeners on a deep and personal level.
Line by Line Meaning
There's a hundred bluebirds
There are a lot of bluebirds in the sky
Up above the clouds
The bluebirds are flying high in the sky
Putting all the color in the sky
The bluebirds add color to the sky with their presence
And twice as many tear drops
There are even more teardrops than bluebirds
there to wash it down
The teardrops seem to wash away the beauty of the bluebirds
Every one's another lullaby
The teardrops are like a lullaby, a sad song that soothes the pain
But there's only one and only
Despite the many bluebirds and teardrops, there is only one unique person
Who could go and leave me lonely
Who had the power to leave me alone and sad
There's a world of trouble
The world is full of problems and difficulties
Trying to take its turn
Problems come and go, they try to assert themselves
I can hear it shaking underground
The consequences of these problems can be felt like an earthquake
And half a dozen lessons
There are many lessons to learn from life's challenges
I might never learn
It's possible that I won't learn from these lessons
Not until them troubles come around
Only when facing problems will I realize the lessons to be learned
There's only one and only
Despite all the problems to face, there is only one unique person
Who could go and leave me lonely
Who had the power to leave me alone and sad
There's a mile of blacktop
There is a long road ahead
Where the road begins
The journey starts here
It takes a time or two to recognize
It may take a while to realize what you've got
Growing at the roadside
Along the way, things are changing
Scattered by the wind
The changes come and go, like the wind
Are everybody's unsaid sad goodbyes
The changes bring endings that nobody will speak of
But there's only one and only
Despite the long road and the changes, there is only one unique person
Who could go and leave me lonely
Who had the power to leave me alone and sad
You're the only one and only
You are the one unique person in my life
Why'd you go and leave me lonely
Why did you have to leave me and make me sad
Lyrics © Wixen Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: DAVID TODD RAWLINGS, GILLIAN HOWARD WELCH
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind