Is it weird to admit that I cried when I wrote this song?….
I was in a meeting with my Anti-Racism book club. We were going through the book “Me and White Supremacy.” This is a book I believe should be mandatory reading for every white person. It’s powerful. Every chapter has a topic relating to racism like “White Silence,” “White Saviorism'' and many more. At the end of each chapter there are questions that we would all answer separately but were committed to answering honestly and vulnerably and sharing when we would meet. As we would read, our eyes would be open to many aspects of what Black, Indigenous and People of Color go through on a daily basis but that we don’t even realize because we walk through the world with white privilege. Exposing the racism within us and digging it out, is a crucial part in working towards a more equitable society. Anyway, in one of the meetings when we were sharing about ways we thought or acted in racist ways, my dear friend (and incredible musician) Kat Jones said something to the affect of,
“Sharing these things with you is like, that phrase they say in yoga- ‘The light in me greets the light in you’ but the opposite ‘The Darkness in me greets the Darkness in You.’”
“Whoa!” I said, “I need to write a song about that!”
And so I did.
I believe the path towards growth leads us through the valley. I believe in the power of processing through grief, I believe in the importance of catharsis and expressing all emotions in a healthy way, and I believe if we were to all have safe accepting spaces where we could be vulnerable with one another and share the dark sides of ourselves with the LOADS of self-love, self-acceptance, empathy and compassion, our lives and the world would be so much better for it.
We live in a society where we are bombarded with images and narratives of people presenting themselves in their “perfect” selves. But you know the feeling when someone puts down their guard for a minute and shares the “non-perfect” side of themselves: we breathe a sigh of relief and think, “oh, thank God I’m not the only one who struggles with that.”
That’s the power of vulnerability- it helps us not to feel alone AND helps us to accept the non-perfect, and sometimes dark sides of ourselves to work through it and become better versions of ourselves. And that’s what the meaning of the chorus of the song is:
“The Darkness in me greets the Darkness in you.”
It’s like the line from one of my favorite songs written by Jeff Tweedy and sung by Mavis Staples “You're not alone”. She sings,
“You’re not alone, I’m here with you, and I’m lonely too.”
Why did I cry when I wrote this song? Because I hit on on a message I feel most passionate about and that is that I want you to know: you’re not alone in your sorrows, and you are valuable and you are worthy of love.
This is the title track for this album that has many songs that if I’m being honest, I feel very vulnerable for me to share, but in the end, I truly believe that vulnerability will be the light of connection and acceptance that shines through.
Want to hear the original demo version of this song? Click here.
Wanna hear the whole record before it’s released? Click here to grab a Test Pressing Bundle!
About the Record
Sally Grayson has emerged from behind the Black Swift disguise with a new record of mystical desert rock. Jangling guitars, pedal steel, and heat-shimmering reverb all conjure the epic distances of the American southwest and the kind of loss and longing that only the desert highways can fix. “The Darkness In Me” presents a passionate appeal to all those who have gone through the heartbreak, have shared their darkness within and are yet still on that highway looking for love and connection in the further hills of the near future. A western gothic romance filled with haunted highways, long sunsets, mysterious strangers and the impossible longing and grief that propels the ride across the starry night, the album asks the question many of us have been asking: how can so much suffering and so much love exist side by side? How can we move forwards into the hope of a new dawn in the midst of so much systemic prejudice and pain? What’s around the next bend and over the next hill?
An American living in Germany, Sally felt the calling of the vast open spaces of the American southwest and traveled to Tucson AZ to record the songs at Dust and Stone Recording Studios where Gabriel Sullivan (XIXA, Giant Sand) produced and performed. The record was made with the help of a variety of session musicians: Winston Watson (Bob Dylan, Warren Zevon, Alice Cooper), Thøger Tetens Lund (Mark Lanegan, Howe Gelb), Ryan Alfred (Nick Lowe, Calexico) Nick Dehmlow (Lucille Furs), Conner Gallaher (Calexico), Brian Lopez (XIXA, Calexico), Kat Jones, Anna Illenberger (Kitz), Ralv Milberg (producer of Die Nerven, Human Abfall), and Ben Nisbet (Tucson Symphony Orchestra)
While the record is evocative of mythical visions of the west in the land of her youth, Sally has found that it is a German word that helps to explain her songs best: Sehnsucht: Sehnen- to pine, to long for, to ache for something; Sucht- to be addicted. The need for longing, and the longing to be needed, it’s a desire suggesting that the journey across the mystical desert plain is far more profound than any destination.
