DEBBIE ELLIOTT, HOST:
Hayden Pedigo is a guitarist from Amarillo, Texas, and he'll be sure to let you know.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
HAYDEN PEDIGO: My name is Hayden Pedigo. I'm from Amarillo, Texas. That's how I open every single show, and I will continue to do that for the rest of my life.
(APPLAUSE)
ELLIOTT: That's Pedigo opening his live album from last year. The guitarist has a new record out. It's called "I'll Be Waving As You Drive Away."
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "SMALL TORCH")
ELLIOTT: Hayden Pedigo joins us now. Welcome.
PEDIGO: Hey, how's it going?
ELLIOTT: Good. So we heard a little bit there from your live album about paying tribute to Amarillo at every show. How can we hear Amarillo in this new album?
PEDIGO: Well, I think you can hear Amarillo in this new record with the pauses, the silence. That's always my tribute to the landscape is taking long breaks. It's the flat, endless, like, plains of Amarillo.
ELLIOTT: Up in the panhandle of Texas.
PEDIGO: Yeah, the Texas panhandle is, like, the flat, forgotten part of Texas. Texas likes to pretend that it's not there, but it very much is.
ELLIOTT: So I read that the title of this album comes from a "Little House On The Prairie" two-parter that aired back in 1978. You were approximately negative 16 years old at that time. What's the connection here?
PEDIGO: Well, I mean, negative 16 years old is a very vital age in most people's lives, I think.
ELLIOTT: (Laughter).
PEDIGO: But the title - I was homeschooled, and I joke that to graduate high school in Texas, if you're homeschooled, you legally have to watch "Little House On The Prairie." But that episode, it always has brought me to tears. It's very emotional and sweet. And it also coincided - when I finished this record, it coincided with me leaving Amarillo for the final time. So there was something really special to me having it titled "I'll Be Waving As You Drive Away" as I was leaving a lot of things behind. It was very bittersweet.
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "LONG POND LILY")
ELLIOTT: You were literally driving away.
PEDIGO: Yes, yes. And what's weird is on the cover - I'm driving away in a truck on the cover, but there's a sign also of me that is waving. And I later on realized that maybe it's this idea that I'm saying goodbye to an old version of myself that I'm leaving behind. All of my work, I uncover the meaning later.
ELLIOTT: You called this album and the two before it a Motor Trilogy. Explain that.
PEDIGO: So the Motor Trilogy idea comes from all three of the albums on the cover there is some kind of vehicle painted. And it was this idea, too, that the vehicle represents getting away from something and moving on. And this trilogy of records has kind of this underlying theme of loss, redemption, forgiveness. And I didn't mean to make a trilogy of records when I started, but by the second album, it became clear there was a story that needed to be told across three records that's all connected.
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "LONG POND LILY")
ELLIOTT: So, I really, on this record, enjoyed the song "Smoked."
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "SMOKED")
ELLIOTT: It really takes me somewhere. I'm not really sure where. It's just out of this newsroom at the moment, and it's very nice. Tell me about the inspiration for it.
PEDIGO: So that song "Smoked," I was heavily inspired by early Genesis during their very progressive rock years. And this German group called Popol Vuh. They were kind of this weird new-age ambient group in the '70s who scored the films of Werner Herzog. So it's my attempt at scoring an imaginary Herzog film.
ELLIOTT: All of your songs seem to have a feeling like they could be a movie score, right?
PEDIGO: Oh, absolutely. I think every single song I do, I'm imagining some small film. They're all little narrative movies.
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "SMOKED")
ELLIOTT: I want to ask you a little bit about your concerts. You are known for encouraging your audience to sit down. You talk with them between songs, talk about their origins. What does that do for you when you're performing, and what do you think it does for the audience?
PEDIGO: I was heavily inspired by artists like Elliott Smith. You know, when you watch old videos of Elliott Smith performing solo on an acoustic guitar in the '90s, there's an environment he cultivates, but I think it's because he's earnest and connects with the audience in a genuine way. And for me, silence is one of the best tools to connect with the audience. If you walk out on stage and wait 10, 15 seconds to talk, it changes the air in the room. And then, from there, I would notify the audience that my songs have long pauses in them. And it sets up this almost scary environment where people are anticipating silence at any moment. So they're afraid to open their beer because they're afraid the crack will break the silence. So in a weird way, it's utilizing fear against the audience to make a comforting environment.
ELLIOTT: What do you think the silent space does? What do you think happens when there's silence?
PEDIGO: With the silence - I was talking about this with someone the other day, that I realized the only time we really ever take a moment of silence is when something catastrophic or terrible has happened. And I was thinking it's kind of a shame because when people are at my shows, when we sit in silence in between notes, it's not due to something bad happening. It's a moment for all of us to feel an intense connection with each other, and it makes us reflect on things going on in our lives.
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "HERMES")
ELLIOTT: You know, in my work, sometimes I find that when you pause and are silent, somebody wants to jump into that space, right? It makes people uncomfortable.
PEDIGO: It makes people uncomfortable, but the silence also makes people be honest. And I think it cultivates a live environment with music where the audience is more honest with you and you're more honest with them. It's a trade-off. Your discomfort, the trade-off is you get an intense emotional experience.
ELLIOTT: Do you ever think of your songs as having words, even if you don't perform them?
PEDIGO: In terms of singing? No, not at all, but I do think there's words with my songs that are stories.
ELLIOTT: Tell me a story of one of the songs on this record.
PEDIGO: I mean, the title track, "I'll Be Waving As You Drive Away," that song, specifically, I think, is a story about how we are always in a constant state of leaving.
(SOUNDBITE OF HAYDEN PEDIGO'S "I'LL BE WAVING AS YOU DRIVE AWAY")
PEDIGO: What's strange is just a matter of weeks ago, I lost a very special family member, my Aunt Becky, Becky Pedigo...
ELLIOTT: I'm sorry.
PEDIGO: ...Passed away. She was a - thank you. She was a comedian and a really special person. And I got to see her for the last time, and it kind of changed the definition of this song. It was very much attached to that moment of getting some time with this relative before they passed. And now that song is very much attached to that memory. We're always in a constant state of leaving. You never have as much time as you think. And I guess now this album kind of ended up a tribute to her in some ways.
ELLIOTT: Hayden Pedigo's new album is called "I'll Be Waving As You Drive Away." Thank you so much for being with us.
PEDIGO: Thank you so much for having me. I really do appreciate it. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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