Skylar Gudasz has a classic voice. From the moment you hear it, you know you’re in musical good hands – it won’t falter, and will be strong enough to carry what it promises to completion. It is a strong, distinctive voice – adjectives are imprecise things, but if pushed for some for Gudasz’s, we might wager clarion, hypnotic, smoky, smoldering. Gudasz works in country-tinged rock, but the sterling quality of her songwriting and playing make her work compelling even for genre purists and niche dwellers. This is solid, well-crafted music made to stand the test of time in a flighty, throwaway culture. Listen to Gudasz’s new single “Lean Closer to Me Now” and 2024’s LP Country – you’ll see.
Below are Gudasz's thoughtful answers to the Come Hear NC Questionnaire. She was also thoughtful enough to put together a 30 track plus playlist of North Carolina music for us/you -- give it a listen while you read!
Capsule summary-style, describe your band(s) (its members, home, history)
I live in Durham, NC. My band lineup is Casey Toll, Chessa Rich, Matt O’Connell and Nick Jaeger. All of them have powerful, incredible creative projects in their own right. Other frequent collaborators on my records are Libby Rodenbough, Jeff Crawford, Ari Picker and Kate Rhudy.
How long have you been in North Carolina, and what's your relationship with the state?
I was raised in Ashland, Virginia. My mom used to live in the Outer Banks before I was born, and we would always go there in the summers, so North Carolina represented the wild ocean to me. I came to UNC-Chapel Hill for college and fell into the music scene, and the more I travel the more I realize how singular and special North Carolina is for its history, its country and its collection of people.
What North Carolina artists do you listen to most?
I put em on a playlist.
Favorite North Carolina musical memory/moment
For my last record, I teamed up with Sandra Katharine Davidson and Cameron Laws and we made several videos at the Chicamacomico Life-Saving Station in Rodanthe, NC. The album artwork for COUNTRY ended up coming out of the collaboration with the life-saving drill team reenactors there, and it became the perfect visual representation of what is at the heart of the album: the ever-changing border being navigated between land and sea, people and nature, and our wilderness.
Has North Carolina been a good place to be a musician?
NC has been a fantastic place to be a touring musician, because of its relative affordability to big cities like NY, LA & Nashville, though now it is getting more and more expensive. There is a true DIY ethos and supportive, community mindset to the scenes in NC.
What would make it better?
Universal Basic Income. No to low threshold application for large, meaningful grants funding for individual artists – could be lottery and needs based. Affordable housing. Guaranteed paid family and medical leave provided by the state or federal government that is not tied to a W-2 job, as most musicians are gig workers and so are ineligible for such leave - which disproportionately affects women and people bearing children and caregivers, removing them from the creative work force and forcing them into other types of labor, which then removes them from creating the culture that makes North Carolina so unique. Most creative and culture workers in general are gig workers - so better benefits and protections for gig workers.
What is the musical community around you like?
My band, except our guitar player who lives in Asheville, all lives within a couple blocks of each other near Ellerbee Creek in Durham, and it’s pretty magical. There’s also an old church in Chapel Hill where several of us have music/art studios, and the sanctuary is where we have band practice sometimes. I’ve done a lot of recording at Arbor Ridge Studios with Jeff Crawford, Goth Construction with Ari Picker, Modern Recording with Chris Stamey and in Chapel Hill at Betty’s – all of which are in the woods, which feels important to the story. The triangle is so rich with incredible studios of every kind.
When did you know you want to be a musician?
I’m still not sure if it’s what I want. Music has felt like more of a calling than a conscious choice – it’s a medium I get to work in. I think I have always known I wanted to be an artist. When I was little we would write and put on plays in the woods. My brother recently found a script with a character I had written for myself named “Austin, the brave artist”.
Were your inclinations towards music encouraged?
I come from long lines of artistically, musically inclined folks who for economic and gendered reasons could not pursue art professionally. My parents treated music like another language we communicated in, which was an incredible gift. It was something everyone did, for fun, and it was always around and accessible to us. From a young age, my and my brother’s playful ideas were taken seriously and we were encouraged to make them real with whatever tools we had laying around. I’ve often felt how foolishly lucky I was to have that, and I’m always amazed at how incredible artists are who haven’t had the belief of their people in them. Because I know that without that emotional support to root system a kind of necessary delusional arrogance, I am far too sensitive of a soul to have had the stomach for this career path.
Do you have a good ear?
I learned by ear with Suzuki method on flute and mostly by ear on the piano and guitar, with some help from the early internet guitar tab sites and my brother. My flute teacher showed me how to make a chord on the piano - 1, 3, 5 and then take the 3 down a half step to make it minor – and it was all over after that.
Technique, feeling, and concept — what's the relation to you as a musician? As a listener?
Technique is amazing and fills me with awe, and concept can be expansive - but it’s feeling that is the guide at the end of the day. The emotional truth of music that is beyond words – that’s the point for me. “All my favorite singers couldn’t sing” to quote David Berman.
What would your fans be surprised you love to listen to?
Ghost podcasts.
Are there misconceptions about you and/or your music you'd like to correct?
You could spend your whole life telling people what to think about you or you could just make work and, if you’ve done right by it, trust it to speak for itself. That’s where the most eloquent thing I have to say about anything is: in the work.
Do you view your music as self-expression? Or is it more abstract? Or both?
I think it’s me/the musicians, the muse and the energy all coming together to bring the song into this side of the world.
Is there a red thread that connects your earliest work to your most recent?
It is wild when I’ve gone back to early work and seen how themes persist: longing, the experience of femininity, hope.
Does humor have a place in your music?
The first time I ever got acupuncture I had a needle in my calf that made me laugh uncontrollably until I started sobbing. So yes.
Does spirituality?
Yes, it’s probably the whole point.
Is your music political?
Yes. That is not why I make music – but it is a part of all of it that I make. Politics are not in the initial impulse to create – that initial impulse is a spiritual or sensory riling that’s something like desire, or awe, or hunger – inherent to the human experience. But the minute an observation of the world enters into the song, or what instrument you turn to even - politics is present.
Do you care about gear?
Only insomuch as it’s a stylish touchstone of deflection above the intangible connection people are seeking from art. Guitars are like trucks. It’s a symbol of power and it’s fun to go fast and loud. They look cool. And when you’re on stage you’re engaging in theatre, so it’s a part of the set. I appreciate the attention and craft that goes into gear. Instruments have special personalities to them. But ultimately, not really. Creating sound is about what feels good and, if you’re touring, what’s easy to lug around.
Is music a job, a vocation, or hobby for you?
When I decided to make it a job, it came with a lot of negotiation - which is ongoing - about how to maintain my connection to the magic of it.
Do you care about music critics and what they write?
Music criticism is an art form and like with any art, some of it moves me. I love how music criticism can place art within a moment and frame it into the culture.
What makes good music? Bad music? What do you love in a great song, hate in a bad one, and what renders you indifferent in a blah one?
I don’t really find it interesting to meditate on other people’s art being bad. It kind of irks me honestly. Taste is so personal and so situational – I truly do not believe in good and bad music, and I actually think it’s harmful to your inner child artist to talk about it that way. Whenever I see artists calling other people’s work bad I think, careful, you can hear yourself – and wow, that artist has extra time on their hands I don’t have. They have time and energy they could be giving to making their own art, but they’re sitting here using it on pointing out what they dislike about somebody else’s work. I guess what I’m saying is, the muscles you flex to figure out how to tear something down are not the same muscles you strengthen when you stay open to the creative source. That critic voice inside you is going to cut off a lot of possibility in your own work if you’re not careful. Part of the sharpening of your work as an artist is understanding what moves you and trying to figure out why, and I’m not saying not to be discerning. You have to be honest with yourself about what you like and what you don’t. But what you don’t like at any given moment doesn’t make something bad. Perhaps whatever it is just is not for you.
What does the genesis of a song for you look like, how does it come about?
A hook, a little play of light, the tone of a train, the way some one says a word, the look between two people. A turn of phrase. A tuning fork. Triangulation. A sail.
What is the typical "workflow" for one of your songs from beginning to end?
Each song comes with its own time. Some take minutes, some take years. Some come as a joke. Some come before you know how to write them or sing them, and then you have to grow up a little, live some life, lose some love, before you can endeavor to take them on. Some you write for other people, some tell the future, some are never yours - just a frequency you tune in on. Some come in dreams. And it may be true there are no new songs, only a collective unconscious remembering. Each of these have their own flow, and I’ve never known one to come the same as any other. And also, I think they may all be one long song.
Do you theme and conceptualize projects beforehand or do you prefer spontaneous creation?
A little of both. For my last record COUNTRY, the concept became clear from the words of several fragments of songs in, and that helped call in the rest of the songs. For the record CINEMA, the theme emerged after the collection was written. When I can, I like to let the theme automatically arise from whatever you’ve been tackling subconsciously. I like to show up to the studio with the chords and lyrics finalized but open to instrumentation.
What's the relation between electronic and mechanical/acoustic instruments in your work?
Love to mix them together.
Do you need constraints to work within or long stretches of unstructured time?
Long stretches of obsessive time alone followed by scheduling studio dates to hold myself accountable to working with a producer and musicians so that I can exorcise and record the idea. I lie to myself and say I’m making a demo in order to take the pressure off.
Are lyrics important to you? How do they relate to the music you make?
Yes. And sounds are smarter than we are.
Are genre concepts meaningful to you?
Genre in the market is capitalism, how to sell your work - which is something you have to engage with if you want to make a living that way. Outside of that, claiming a genre is claiming who you want your work to be in conversation with. But also, it comes from the same word as gender, and it can be expansive. Like gender, it’s a set of ideas you can rub up against, embody or reject at any given moment.
Whose musical career serves as a model or touchstone for your work?
Lee Miller, Janelle Monae, Gillian Welch, Dolly Parton, Caroline Polachek, Rachel Kushner.
Hopes and schemes for 2025 and beyond?
I’m currently working on a new record, some theatrical and film projects related to COUNTRY, and I’ve been studying & learning Child ballads and traditional songs that mention herbal medicine.