Margo Cilker to Release LITTLE WHITE CROSS Album October 9
Producer Bruce Robison, known for work with Charley Crockett and The Chicks, helmed sessions in Lockhart, Texas.
Margo Cilker is set to release her third full-length album, LITTLE WHITE CROSS, on October 9 via her own label, Fossil Records. The record follows 2023's VALLEY OF HEART'S DELIGHT, which earned Best of the Year recognition from outlets including NPR Music, Rolling Stone, Stereogum, and BrooklynVegan. For the new project, Cilker traveled to Lockhart, Texas, to record with co-producer Bruce Robison, whose credits include work with Charley Crockett, Lee Ann Womack, George Strait, and The Chicks.
'You could definitely call it a concept record. If that concept is that I got really sad and went to Texas,' she says. 'I had some material so dark I didn't think I'd show it to [Bruce]. Then I remembered this is the man who wrote 'Travelin' Soldier.''
When Cilker played Robison the saddest of her songs—upcoming single 'Molly and Me' (out Sept 10)—the pair made a conscious decision to let despair lead. They situated Cilker's originals among covers she began playing to process her own pain, some sourced from within her immediate music community (including lead single and title track 'Little White Cross' by Christy Hays). The choice embraces the longtime tradition of Texas troubadours trading tunes and the art of transforming one work into something distinct, while honoring its soul.
'Molly and Me' is written about the teenage sister of an armed suspect in a mass shooting, from the perspective of her best friend. Cilker says she was 'haunted' by the story and had to write it to 'alleviate the grip it had on me.' Her lyrics offer a nuanced and affecting portrait of human complexity: And her mom did what she could to listen / And it's true that we sincerely miss him / It's just a shame they had to die when he did / None of this will ever be undone.
'Life is nasty, brutish, and short, as they say. But if I can romanticize one tiny detail, that gets me to the next day.'
Cilker struggles to pin down the precise source of her sadness. 'Hardships that once felt rare, like gun violence, wildfires, abuse, now feel nearly constant,' she says. 'It wasn't always like this.' The grief Cilker reckons with is cumulative and collective, the stuff of profound suffering from which we're all just one degree removed, if we're lucky. 'It seems like the rate of tragedy keeps intensifying,' says Cilker. 'How do any of us cope?'
Title track 'Little White Cross' references one humble approach. Written by her friend Christy Hays, it's a song Cilker gravitated toward for its masterful blend of realism and poetry, and for its loving reminder that life is perpetually subject to unforeseen wreckage. Little white cross on the side of the road / Little fake flower and a crown of gold / They were going so fast how were they to know / They'd be a little white cross on the side of the road. Cilker's rendition feels country-classic, her vocals fluttering with the human fragility Hays' lyrics illuminate. Beyond the stark imagery of a car crash, Cilker situates the song in the grander context of repercussions—what we'll answer for as individuals, as a society, as a species.
Cilker was raised in California's Santa Clara Valley, a place once upon a time more famous for apricots than silicon. Now based in the rural Pacific Northwest with her husband, working cowboy and fellow singer-songwriter Forrest VanTuyl, her relationship to the land remains deeply rooted. Cilker's album hums with the ancestry and expanse of the American West, beckoning listeners to—at the very least—pause, witness, contemplate. 'Something I've learned living alongside ranchers is to always carry a reverence for those who came before us,' she says. 'It's that pause to remember that pushed me to make this album.'
Cilker travelled to Texas with her 'pedal steel secret weapon' Eric Heywood, and a batch of originals she hadn't even yet demoed. Robison, whose songwriting and producing credits sparkle on hits from Charley Crockett, Lee Ann Womack, George Strait and The Chicks, assembled a top tier band—Geoff Queen (Hayes Carll), Beth Chrisman (John C. Reilly), Lisa Pankratz (Dave Alvin), and Scott Davis (Band of Heathens) among others—and co-produced the album. When Cilker revealed to him the saddest of her songs, she says, 'that's when I felt the whole thing take shape.' The pair made a conscious choice to let despair lead, recording directly to tape in an all-analog setup and situating Cilker's originals among a thoughtful selection of covers; there are six on the album, songs Cilker had taken to playing as a way to process her own pain. 'When I find a song that really speaks to me, it helps me make sense of things,' says Cilker. She embraces the longtime tradition of Texas troubadours trading songs—Willie, Waylon, and The Flatlanders in particular—the art of transforming one work into something distinct, while honoring its original soul. 'Writing can be a lonely affair,' she says. 'But that exchange, that open spirit, it feels essential to art for me.'
The process of writing her own songs, on the other hand, can be intense, veering almost supernatural. 'I often feel haunted by stories, kept up at night by a kind of external pressure to tell them,' says Cilker. 'I'll write a song just to alleviate the grip it has on me.' Album standout 'Molly and Me' emerged from that very kind of unconscious urgency. Written about the teenage sister of an armed suspect in a mass shooting, from the perspective of her best friend, it's an artful and affecting display of human complexity. And her mom did what she could to listen / And it's true that we sincerely miss him / It's just a shame they had to die when he did / None of this will ever be undone. Cilker withholds no nuance in conveying the unthinkable, allowing human suffering its due specificity. 'Just because something horrible happens time and time again, that doesn't make it any less horrible.' The final line—Is this all we're made of?—echoes on. It's a recurring question across Cilker's new album, mystified and infuriated. An earnest inquisition and a wail of desperation.
In conversation, Cilker embodies a kind of cowboy humility, a down-to-earth humor edging on self-effacing. It's inviting, lovable, and in notable contrast to the esteem bestowed upon her by major tastemakers since her debut album 'Pohorylle,' released in 2021. Rolling Stone proclaimed, 'Cilker shows that she is as interested in reinvigorating Southern country-folk storytelling tropes as she is in exposing their flaws.' Pitchfork praised a 'country artist who pushes against conventions of the genre that don't fit her perspective.' And the list of Cilker supporters only grew with the release of 2023's 'Valley of Heart's Delight.' NPR noted, 'Cilker's sound is classic cowboy country, but her sensibility is totally now.' Bandcamp deemed her 'the future Lucinda Williams of the West.' Lists of the year's best music from Uncut, No Depression, Paste, Stereogum, and several more bore her name. None of it appears to have gone to Cilker's head. In fact, her commitment to making music free from industry measurements has only intensified.
Cilker recently launched Fossil Records with friend and fellow musician Avery Hellman, a label motivated by artist solidarity above all. 'Right now, it's all in the family,' says Cilker. 'People we love, driven by a shared devotion to songwriting.'
'You don't know what people have lived through, what another person is carrying with them,' she says. 'Every time I've written something about hardship, or gone to a place people don't want to go, there has been someone who tells me they needed it.' Like venom spun into antidote, or ashes feeding the earth, Cilker's sadness arrives as its own part of nature's cycle. Pain consumed to soothe.
Margo Cilker On Tour
October 8 - Higher Ground - South Burlington, VT*
October 9 - Iron Horse Music Hall - Northampton, MA*
October 10 - One Longfellow Square - Portland, ME*
October 12 - Baby's All Right - Brooklyn, NY*
October 13 - MilkBoy - Philadelphia, PA*
October 14 - DC9 - Washington, DC*
October 16 - The Hangar - Troy, NY*
October 17 - Cafe 939 - Boston, MA*
October 28 - Polaris Hall - Portland, OR+
October 29 - Tractor Tavern - Seattle, WA+
November 7 - Globe Hall - Denver, CO^
November 8 - The Marigold Room - Santa Fe, NM^
November 10 - Hotel Congress - Tucson, AZ^
November 12 - Dune Room - Indio, CA^
November 13 - The Roxy Theatre - West Hollywood, CA^
November 14 - The Chapel - San Francisco, CA^
November 15 - Felton Music Hall - Felton, CA^
*co-headline tour with Lilly Hiatt
+headlining album release shows
^supporting The Cactus Blossoms
The album's lead single and title track, LITTLE WHITE CROSS, is a cover written by Christy Hays, while the upcoming single MOLLY AND ME, due out September 10, was written from the perspective of the best friend of the teenage sister of an armed suspect in a mass shooting. Cilker has described the song as one she felt compelled to write to process the story's grip on her.
Photo Credit: Jon Moore
Photo Credit: Jon Moore
