About That Song: Annie Enneking of Annie and the Bang Bang
About That Song #17
In our special series, singer-songwriter Sarah Morris interviews artists about the songs that shaped them.
Hi! I’m Sarah Morris. I’m wildly in love with songs and the people who write them. There have been a few songs in my life that have been total gamechangers—songs that made me want to be a songwriter and songs I’ve written that made me feel like I am a songwriter. About That Song is a space where I can learn more about those pivotal songs in other writers’ lives.
In the 17th edition of our special series, I connected with Annie Enneking of Minneapolis rock ’n’ roll outfit Annie and the Bang Bang to ask her about formative songs in her and her band’s musical journey.
Annie and the Bang Bang. Photo credit: Tom Smouse.
Sarah: Hi Annie!! Oh, it’s so lovely to get to talk to you. Congrats on your upcoming album release, RADIO BABY! Your double album release, no less! I am such a fan of your singing, your writing, and your person-ing. I’m wondering if you’d be willing to talk a little about the songwriting piece of your story in advance of your big celebration at Icehouse on October 22! Do you remember the song that you heard that made you want to be a songwriter? Tell us about that song.
Annie: It’s a tossup between Rickie Lee Jones’s “Skeletons” and Joni Mitchell’s “Rainy Night House.” Rickie Lee’s story is a delicately delivered, high-stakes, compact jewel of a short story. We know within the first verse that we are with a young, hopeful couple driving to a hospital because the girl is about to have a baby. From there we’re just a few lines away from their car getting pulled over, and the cops shooting the soon-to-be father when he pulls out his wallet and they assume it’s a gun (all too familiar, that story….).
The honesty and raw emotion of this story inspired the baby writer in me, but the part that got me was the line at the end: “Some kids like watching Saturday cartoons / Some girls listen to records all day in their rooms.” It’s part of a longer line that leads to an image of a young boy in a tree (the son of the young man killed), but the intimacy of those simple observations gets me every time. Out of the complexity of this sad and violent story (big action) we come back to regular life (small action). I still cry almost every time I hear it. I loved the powerful effect that a good song had on me. It made me feel connected to the larger world, that I was part of the human drama.
As for “Rainy Night House,” it has this wonderful mix of sacred and profane concrete imagery, and holds such mystery: “It was a rainy night / You took a taxi to your mother’s home / She went to Florida and left you / With your father’s gun alone / Upon her small white bed / I fell into a dream / You sat up all the night and watched me / To see who in the world I might be.” We have a taxi, we have a rainy night, we have a mother, we have a small white bed, we have a…gun? It taught me that you don’t have to answer all the questions your stories might present.
Joni also uses vocal delivery in clever ways. She cuts her lover down with the line “You called me beautiful / You called your mother” by first extending the vowels in the middle of the word “beauuuutiful,” making it ethereal, and then juxtaposing that with the staccato throwaway line “You called your mother.” And in the middle of the song she inserts this grand vignette of musical expression by creating a brief choir singing “ahhhhh” after saying “I am from the Sunday school / I sing soprano in the upstairs choir.” She’s sculptural in her approach. Or painterly might be a better word, as we know she is actually a painter. When I heard Joni in my teens, I felt like she was giving me the keys to the kingdom of experience. Like, I learned from her what my life might be like.
Sarah: OH YES! I’m not familiar with either song, but oh, I’m thrilled to go and get to listen to them now! I love how you’ve described both songs as being able to hold these big contrasts—sacred/profane, ordinary/extraordinary. Both of these artists also (to me) make their performance feel like a part of the writing. That gets me with any and all Joni music. I’m curious, Annie—once you began writing, did you feel like a writer immediately? It took me a few years of writing before I believed it—was there a song that gave you that “a-HA! I AM a songwriter!” moment? Tell us about that song.
Annie: I did not feel like a writer immediately. I started to feel like one after writing the song “Fast and Good Looking.” There’s far more metaphor in that than I use now, but I felt a real balance in my ability to tell a non-linear story over a set of chords I was proud to play, and to have it all lead to a chorus that said volumes. I think I started to hit my stride in my late 30s/early 40s, even though I’ve been writing in earnest since my 20s. I have a lot of songs now that I really like and feel centered by. I can sing them and get settled into my body, and know that by telling the particular stories I have to tell in the particular way that I tell them, that I’m another human in the flow of humanity, trying make sense of the world by observing it and feeling things about it—making art out of external and internal experience.
Annie and the Bang Bang. Photo credit: Eric Melzer Photography.
Sarah: Your idea of songs that you “feel centered by” absolutely resonates with me. Somewhere in the middle of all the pandemic livestreams, a version of that concept became the metric for me on how to choose what to sing: what feels good in the body today. Likely that was always something I could’ve paid attention to, but the abundance of “singing to myself and also kinda to other people” time stripped away so much of the external. I’m grateful for that knowledge now. One of the most striking parts of watching you sing (or actually, just being in your presence) is observing this sense of groundedness, which, I think, puts the audience at beautiful ease.
You’re a songwriter, and also a bandleader. I’ve heard you speak to how the Bang Bang feature prominently in your process of bringing a song to life—was there a song that kickstarted this relationship? A first song that you shared with them where you realized that writing in this context would be different in some way?
Annie: There was a song called “Shake the Shaker” (off the album LOVELAND) that got some reworking on our first tour to Colorado—an experience that gave us a taste of what it was like to live together for a few days and to create during that time. But I prefer this story, which felt more magical:
I’d gone on a few writing retreats and loved the flow I would get into and how productive I was. The band started to daydream about doing one of those together, but it took a little while to figure out where we could go. We wanted to be away from everything, in a place all to ourselves, where noise wouldn’t be an issue. In November of 2018, I asked my mom if we could have a weekend-long band slumber party at her house in Rogers, MN. She couldn’t have been happier to oblige! She’s been a huge supporter of my artistic endeavors and adventures.
We loaded our gear into her basement—which had a huge picture window—and got right to work. We’d gone grocery shopping for beer and food supplies, and we made a big stew in a crockpot that made the house smell good while we were working. We ate when we were hungry, slept when we were tired, and stood out on her patio when we needed fresh air, on the cusp of winter. On the second night, John started noodling around on a riff he sometimes quietly worked, and then Mike started playing drums, and Kari joined in on her bass.
At one point John looked out the big picture window and said, “The snow is blowing sideways.” That line stuck with me, and a melody came that night. I went for a walk the next day and most of the words came. We named it “Crow River Drive” in honor of my mom, and after the street she lived on. The chorus of the song is “come on girls and boys, let’s make some noise,” cause that’s what we were doing. That was the first song that we all wrote together, by which I mean, it was the first song that did not originate from me.
Sarah: YES! That is a magical story! And such a sweet example of the way your band cares for one another, for the process. Also, a house is always in better shape when there is a stew going! One last question: Your current single, “let me down”—the lyrics have this delicious physicality and leanness to them—I’m a big fan! What can you tell us about that song? How’d it come into being?
Annie: Yay!! I’m so glad you asked this question and that your takeaway is its leanness and physicality. I wanted to write something smart and cool. That song comes from me overhearing Kari say to John (jokingly), “Oh, first you let me down and then you make me wait” as they were carrying an amplifier up the stairs while loading out for a gig. The line stuck with me and made me itchy to write something using economical language to explore musical equipment as metaphor for relationship.
The chorus is advice I was given on how to coil instrument cables: “over under, over under…” “You never let it hang out anymore” is the tying up of cable so the ends don’t stick out. “You put me back down so you can pick up the other pretty thing” is about guitars, etc. but it all sounds like the narrator is fed up with her lover’s behavior and is over it. John’s super lean guitar riff came out of a band retreat that wasn’t adding up to much. We all came back from lunch a little disheartened that nothing was catching fire. He sort of fell into that three chord riff and we all yelled “KEEP PLAYING THAT!”
Sarah: The over-under of instrument cables! Perfect. I love that you spun these two completely could-be-mundane moments into a song that hits as the story of an almost-maybe-tormented love. Bravo! Thank you for sharing that with us. I can’t wait to hear the rest of the album!
Get tickets to the RADIO BABY ALBUM RELEASE (with Turn Turn Turn) at Icehouse on Sunday, October 22. Doors open at 4pm and the music starts at 5pm.
Listen to “let me down”
Credits for RADIO BABY
All compositions are a collaboration of Annie and the Bang Bang: Annie Enneking writes lyrics, melodies, sings, and plays guitar. Mike Kittel plays drums, percussion and sings backup. Kari Tweiten plays bass and piano. John Riedlinger plays guitar, and most of these songs come from riffs he generated. RADIO BABY was produced by Tom Herbers and the band. It was recorded and mixed by Tom Herbers at Creation Audio, and mastered by Bruce Templeton at Microphonic Mastering. The album art and cover was designed by Jacob Stoltz; photo on the back cover by Eric Melzer Photography.
AUTHOR: SARAH MORRIS
Sarah Morris. Photo credit: Tom Smouse.
Sarah Morris is a superfan of songs and the people who write them, and a believer that certain songs can change your life. A singer-songwriter / mama / bread maker / coffee drinker who recently released her fifth album of original material, she’s been known to joyfully sing with people in her Big Green Bathroom.
