Checking In With… Caroline Rose

In times of crisis, it’s more important than ever to check in on your friends and loved ones. Here at XPN, we’re Checking In With our extended musical family to see how they’re holding up during the Coronavirus quarantine…and what music has kept them grounded. Today, Dan Reed chats with Caroline Rose.

Indie singer-songwriter Caroline Rose was sitting on her front porch in in Austin Texas, when she gave us a ring for Checking In. “They just locked down the city two days ago, so we’re all on lockdown for ten days,” she says. “Crazy times.” The pandemic hit Rose and her band particularly hard, since the tour behind her brand new album Superstar was the first time ever in her career that she was looking at an entirely sold out tour; a lot of stress and effort went into pre-planning, as well as the quick disassembly of those plans. “I’m not that butthurt about it,” she says. “So many people are out of work right now, my problems don’t matter, and we’re facing a much bigger tsunami of issues as a country and a world population that it’s strangely put everything into perspective for me. I’ve been feeling really humble these days.”

Below, listen to Caroline’s full Checking In chat with Dan Reed, and peruse her music picks.

Favorite Song Of All Time: “Jolene” by Dolly Parton

“There’s something about this song in that it’s so sad, yet somewhat hopeful at the same time. I can listen to it in any mood that I’m in. I really love it, the sonics of it, the way she plays guitar is kind of perfect. Everything works well together.”

Song That Raises Your Spirits: “Something On Your Mind” by Karen Dalton

“My English teacher in high school turned me on to Karen Dalton — he was hugely influential for me, he listened to really good music — but I didn’t get into it till much later. This has become one of those songs where, when all hope has been lost, I’ll sit and listen. The other day, I got in my car and drove down the street, put on this song and cried. I listened on repeat for 20 minutes and I just cried. It’s a good emotional cleanse type song, the way she sings it, and the desperation and raspiness in her voice.”

Song You’re Most Proud of Working On: “I Took A Ride” by Caroline Rose

“I wrote the first version of this song many years ago. I forgot about it, and then I found it in a hard drive or something, and was like ‘oh, I forgot about this song, it’s really good!’ But the lyrics were different, it was a totally different feel, and I was like ‘I’m just gonna work on this and make it better.’ And so I did, I changed the chords around, and it kinda reminded me of Lana Del Rey, especially the Born To Die era. And I was gonna give it to my publisher to try and give it to her to see what she thought and see if she ever wanted to do anything with it. But then I started my record and I was kind of looking for a song that took listeners on this sort of a journey. That song immediately came to mind, and I was like ‘oh, what if I reworked it again so it fit the narrative of this album?’ That’s what I wound up doing, and it’s the perfect bookend to this album. It doesn’t really tie a ribbon around the story, it leaves you very much with an open ending, which is what I wanted. I wanted to reflect the romantic storyline, or this tether to this person’s home life that they left behind and this journey they’d gone on, and I’m really happy with the way it came out, and its’s something I want to explore in future songs. How much of a journey can you take people on within the confines of one song? Can you create an experience within that four, five minute time frame?”