Nine years ago, Margo Price sold her car and pawned her wedding ring to finance her debut album, Midwest Farmer’s Daughter. When she moved to Nashville in 2003, with husband Jeremy Ivey, the couple tried to adapt to a less risky approach to making money from her work.
Trying to imitate the glossy style of mainstream country, they wrote some songs to please a producer. “We created pen names because we didn’t want anyone to know it was us,” Price admits.
“Sylvia Slim and Sam Pickens – Slim-Pickens! We wrote a couple songs, and I felt gross doing it. The producer didn’t like it; neither did we. So it was, ‘All right, now I’m just going to write for myself.’”
Four albums into a successful career that's included collaborations with Bonnie Raitt, Mike Campbell and Willie Nelson, Price has collaborated with Gibson Guitars on a signature model J-45 acoustic.
While the new signature guitar is a tribute to you and and your artistry, it could also inspire your young female fans to take up the guitar.
“Absolutely. I was inspired by Gibson guitars when I was younger. And I love the story behind the company – all the women who worked in the factory during World War Two, building guitars.
“There’s a wonderful book called Kalamazoo Gals that gets into the history. They tried to cover up that women were making the guitars, because they thought people would be less likely to buy them.
“But women would have been more likely to pick up an instrument had they known. That’s why it was really important for me to get my name on a signature model.”
What features did you want to keep and change from your old Gibson?
“We made the body slightly smaller. The neck isn’t quite as slim as my '65, but it still feels so playable. Robbie Johns at Gibson was really instrumental in putting this guitar together. We ultimately decided on that Heritage Cherry finish and mahogany.”
What is it about Gibsons that suits you as a player?
“Seeing Bob Dylan with a J-45. Seeing Lucinda Williams, John Lennon and so many of my heroes who played Gibsons, and wrote beautiful songs inspired by the guitar itself. Everything you really need is right there.
“I have a large collection of guitars – but the songwriting, the storytelling, and the folk singers that I saw with Gibsons in their hands, that just clicked for me.”
What are your latest discoveries about guitar playing?
“I strum a lot. I do a lot of cowboy chords. I also play drums, so I do a lot really syncopated, rhythmic, percussive strumming. You can see that in the worn-down spot on my old J-45.
“Lately I’ve been trying to focus more on my fingerpicking, adding some licks here and there. You never stop learning new stuff – otherwise, you might as well just hang it up.
What have you learned from collaborating with Mike Campbell of the Heartbreakers?
“Watching him work in the studio on my album Strays was incredible. He doesn’t overthink a lot of things he plays. It’s really visceral – from the gut. I’m always trying to to learn from the way he and Tom Petty wrote together, dissecting what’s going behind that simple genius.
“What makes their songs so listenable? So much of that is the melodic licks that Mike put between Tom’s vocal. He’s got such great instincts.”
You’re friends with Willie Nelson. Have you ever gotten to play his famous guitar, Trigger?
“Yes, I have! It’s just one of the most beautiful, living, breathing pieces of art. There’s this stoic frailty to it; it’s got all of these braces, his red, white and blue guitar strap, and all the grime that has just aged into the wood.
“I’ve seen Willie play more than any other artist. It just gets better and better, richer and more thoughtful. In the first second you’re like, ‘That’s Willie!’ Nobody else was playing those kind of Django Reinhardt style leads in country. It’s so uniquely him.”
You have a Martin acoustic signed by Willie, Dolly, Kristofferson and other greats. What’s the story behind that guitar?
“It was kind of sitting around in my house. I wasn’t really playing it much. I started thinking, ‘I’ve been around so many of my heroes but I never asked them to sign anything.’ I was inspired by Rodney Crowell, who has this incredible guitar – he's let everybody sign it and etch things into it.
“I thought, ‘What a beautiful way to tell the story about shows you’ve played!’ So I've got Willie, Dolly, Loretta, Keith Richards, Paul Simon, Beck on there.”
Aside from the Gibson guitars, are there other pieces of gear you treasure?
“Fender been so good to me; they made me this beautiful custom Telecaster that has my name inlaid on the neck. I played it on Jimmy Fallon and it was in the Country Music Hall of Fame for a while.
“D’Addario Strings have been great too, and I'll give a shout out the LR Baggs pickup that we have in in the signature model guitar – it sounds really great plugged in.”
- For more info on the Margo Price J-45, head to Gibson.com.
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