Nashville based indie folk singer/songwriter Ellie Turner has taken a long and winding road to the release of her debut LP, "When The Trouble’s All Done" due for release in March of 2023, produced by Jack Schneider. Along with news of the LP, Turner also shared the LP's lead single, “One More Day,” along with an accompanying video.
“One More Day” acts as a superb introduction to her upcoming LP and to Ellie Turner herself. Opening with some folk harmonica before settling into an acoustic groove, the track’s effortless strolling tempo lends a reflective undertone. The song is tinged with both peace and melancholy all at once, and showcases Turner’s pillowy vocals and honeyed melodies grounded by Schneider’s low harmony. Together, Schneider and Turner offer a perfect marriage of nostalgia and sorrow, with the lyrics depicting the pair as two estranged lovers thinking over the times they had together.
Turner has explained about the song, “This first track on the album was actually the last song to be written. We had already tracked eight songs during our first recording session at Sound Emporium in November of 2020. If I remember correctly, we ended up using 5 of the takes we had tracked that day on the album. Our next session was scheduled for early February. Four of the remaining tracks would come from that second session, but leading up to that day, I knew we still needed one more song to complete the album. And not just to make it a nice even 10-song record (though I admit I do I love that). No, more importantly, I knew that the story was not yet finished. The ‘final page,’ if you will, had not yet been written."
Also released ahead of her upcoming album "When the Trouble’s All Done', was the single "I Love You' Song’" that sounds almost naïve, being refreshingly raw and honest. Ellie wrote this song a few weeks into the initial pandemic shutdown. Ellie Turner has stated, "Every day I would wake up, eat breakfast, put on my tennis shoes and just start walking for hours at a time… After weeks of this, I remember hitting a breaking point of sorts. I was simply tired of being sad and I was bound and determined to write a happy love song if it was the last thing I did on this earth. So, I set out walking as I always did and line by line, this kitschy little tune fell out. I remember smiling the whole time as I walked. And months later, in the studio, when we were getting ready to play this song, I remember Jack looking at me and saying, ‘Remember to smile when you sing!’”
"When The Trouble’s All Done", uses stripped-down production and a commitment to capturing a singular performance to deliver unique moments, seemingly severed from day-to-day life. Turner has explained this “imperfection” was entirely intentional. “The album was performed and recorded live-to-tape at Sound Emporium Studios in Nashville,” she says. “This was a very conscious decision made by myself and my producer, Jack Schneider. We would play the song live until we felt like the most honest version of the song had been performed and captured. The imperfections and unexpected little moments of each performance are where the magic of the record lives. I wanted it to feel as if I was in someone’s living room and was handed a guitar to play." While “Folk Music” has come to mean so many things over the past decades, Turner’s approach is both refreshing and vintage, evoking early Bob Dylan, and a tradition of bygone years, embracing beautiful imperfection.
Originally from Dallas, Texas, Turner discovered old-time music through a fiddle jam during her time at University in Arkansas and quickly became enamored. “I was too afraid to actually participate at that point, I would just sit and observe in complete wonder. It filled me up like nothing else ever had. I couldn’t get enough… I think that was probably when I first started to understand the power folk music had to stop time.” After a few years working as an analyst for Southwest Airlines, she finally mustered up the courage to leave her corporate gig for something more creative, although she still didn’t pursue music. It would take one more year and a brief stint at the interior design company The Citizenry before she finally gained the confidence to say yes to the thing she truly loved.
As Ellie has described, “I was at breakfast with my Dad on a Saturday morning when I made the decision to quit my job, sell my house, and move to Nashville. It was July of 2018, I was 26 years old, and I felt so behind.”
After several years in the corporate world, she found the courage to quit her job and move to Nashville to pursue own music.
Through every element of her album’s creation, Turner has taken care to retain a specific presentation of her songs. Most of the tracks feature just acoustic guitars, upright bass, and vocals. “The album was performed and recorded live-to-tape at Sound Emporium Studios in Nashville, TN,” she says. “This was a very conscious decision made by myself and my producer, .”
"When The Trouble’s All Done" reflects that same meditative pace, offering a warm and winding tour through Turner’s world. Ellie took great pains to find the truest and most vulnerable version of each performance, blemishes and all and it results in a disarmingly simple approach, one that captures an easy charm innate to Turner’s songwriting.
In an era when it is possible to edit every note of a record into some semblance of perfection, Ellie Turner’s music reminds us where folk music comes from, the homes and souls of regular people singing unedited songs for one another on quiet evenings. Eliie Turner's music brings out the honest core that runs within the best folk music. Give a listen to Ellie Turner's releases of her singles, the "I Love You' Song’" and “One More Day” and don't miss the release of her debut album in March, "When The Trouble’s All Done"