MADDY KIRGO

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“It’s a pretty simple story,” Maddy Kirgo says. “This album was meant to bring me joy and I hope that, when people listen to it, they feel good.” It’s been seven years since Kirgo dropped an album when she released Another Love Song independently on Bandcamp in 2017. “That was something I recorded because I was busking at the time and I wanted a record that matched what I was doing on the street,” she says. Around the same time, Kirgo was trying to start a honky tonk band and wrote “Trading Partners” as an exercise in crafting a classic- sounding country song. But what started as practice has become a centerpiece of Kirgo’s new album—and Gar Hole Records debut—Shadow on My Light, a 10-song wonderment that stretches the elasticity of country music into the realms of indie pop through a tapestry of sentimentality, grief, and circuit-breaker songwriting.

Kirgo made Shadow on My Light with Video Age’s Nick Corson and Duncan Troast. They’d known each other through the regional intimacy of the New Orleans music scene, but had never made music together. “Cut to 2021, just as lockdown was ending, and I was finally ready to record some songs,” Kirgo says. “I didn’t know who I would do it with, but my fiance at the time was like, ‘Why don’t you ask Duncan?’” It was Troast who thought Corson should be a part of it and, together, the trio bounced around living rooms in the city making the album. “We took it slow, because we all work day jobs,” Kirgo continues. While she was teaching preschool at the time, Corson was working in a crystal shop and Troast was in the service industry. Whenever there was free time, they’d hole up in someone’s house and “figure out one more sound.” There was no timestamp or finite expectations, just a year of writing, recording, experimenting, and “taking in all the sounds that would end up influencing” Kirgo.

As a result of this patient process, Shadow on My Light contains vast sonic landscapes with meticulously constructed arrangements and sounds sourced from across the trio’s range of influences. The record begins in earnest with “Spare,” which arrives like a sultry dream-pop ballad fresh out of the indie sphere. It’s an undeniable opener and, given Kirgo’s musical upbringing on the streets of the French Quarter, a sugar-sweet curveball of vocal runs and tasty bass scales. “Crush,” likewise, culls hypnotic sensibilities that echo Corson and Troast’s influence with a continuum of tones and textures that ring the bell of pop and alt-rock distortion ever so briefly. “Nick and Dunan intuitively understood what it was that I was looking for, they have their own musical languages that they bring in and sprinkle throughout,” Kirgo says. The record slowly descends into country territory, taking itself apart piece by piece. “Try Harder” brandishes a towering arrangement, one packed with pedal steel, angelic acoustic plucking, bluesy, riffing electric guitar, and soulful drumming (courtesy of Video Age’s Ray Micarelli, who tracked all of the percussion in studio). “I’ve been trying hard to try harder,” Kirgo gospelizes over and over, as a brief string arrangement glows behind her. “Stranger Over Me” slows the tempo down into a sprawling bar waltz that is quixotic and vibrant.

There’s a lot of emotional measures set aglow all throughout Shadow on My Light. About half of the record was written and recorded before Hurricane Ida hit New Orleans in August 2021, which forced Kirgo to evacuate to Pensacola. It was there where she learned that a dear friend, Gabryelle Allnutt, had passed away while also fleeing the same storm. “When I returned to New Orleans after the storm, songwriting was my primary tool for grieving that loss,” Kirgo says, “and that brought on songs like ‘Spare’ and ‘Midnight Flight’ and countless other songs that will go on my next record. I like to credit Gabryelle with helping me complete the project.”

Kirgo’s latest marks an exciting entry into the Gar Hole catalog, as it sees the label’s stable expand beyond its country, folk and Americana bonafides and venture into pop territory for the first time. “The type of music that I like to listen to is often bringing together multiple genres,” she says. “But if there’s one thing about me, it’s that I love pop music.” Shadow on My Light is warmed by its own catchiness, pulling elements not immune to chart spikes and skyscraping streaming numbers into a framework greatly informed by DIY, communal togetherness and affectionate, historical preservation. It’s what makes songs like “Cowboy in a Flame” and “Beautiful Babe” such earworms; they’re timeless, distinctive, and lived-in—with Kirgo’s time- worn croon planted firmly at the album’s center.

Thus, Shadow on My Light is colossal in scope, a synthesis of Kirgo’s years collecting influences from her surroundings in New Orleans: going to countless country dance nights, combing the streets for a few spare ears, and soaking in the city’s boundless musical legacy of pop, soul, and folk. And though the record’s creation may be inextricably tied to the sunken city’s vast, often-undefinable music scene, Maddy’s voice rings true, destined for fresh woods and pastures new. “I’m so glad I met you,” Kirgo pronounces on “Spare.” By Shadow on My Light’s end, you’ll be glad you met her, too.