Rufus Wainwright on 'Folkocracy,' His 'Blatant' Grammy

By Todd Gilchrist

editor

Twenty-five years have passed since the release of Rufus Wainwright's self-titled debut album, a rhapsodic collection of 12 songs celebrating his open homosexuality and given suitably cabaret-inspired flair by producer Jon Brion. In addition to commemorating the occasion with an expanded, remastered, digital-only re-release featuring ten extra songs from its three-year, 56-song recording process, Wainwright will on June 2 also premiere "Folkocracy," an anthology of covers produced by Mitchell Froom. It's a full-circle moment for the singer-songwriter after decades of sidelining his family's pedigreed genre: though he's collaborated many times with his folk-singer father Loudon Wainwright III, late mother Kate McGarrigle and aunt Anna McGarrigle, the album marks the first official folk/ Americana recordings of his career.

Ahead of his June 2 performance at Walt Disney Hall in Los Angeles, Wainwright spoke to Variety to discuss the serendipity of "Folkocracy" arriving within just weeks of the May 19 anniversary of "Rufus Wainwright." In addition to detailing his careerlong (until now) aversion to folk music and the multifaceted but "blatantly honest" reason he decided to lean into his family's legacy, Wainwright looked back at the impact (on both him and the world) of creating such a slow-cooker of a debut, and reflected on his ongoing negotiation between original material and adaptations or covers as a conduit for his creativity.

"Folkocracy" arrives within weeks of the 25th anniversary of your debut album. Was that a coincidence or strategic?

I had no sense that either it would be the 25th anniversary of my first album or my 50th birthday, which is coming up in July, that this folk album would emerge. But of course, when you step back and look at the pattern, it does make sense symbolically, for sure.

Do you see a clear line between that record and this one?

Not necessarily. I see my albums in a lot of ways as a departure from folk. I’ve always had folk music as a baseline, because it's what I was brought up with. But I never felt particularly comfortable in that world, mainly because of my sexuality. I think if I had been a lesbian, it would’ve been a lot easier, because there's a real tradition of lesbians in folk music. But as a gay man growing up in the ’70s and ’80s, it was tricky with the folk world, which is incredibly heterosexual. So this album is actually the first time I’ve really turned around and just focused on that genre, where most of the time I’m running away from it a bit.

Throughout your career, you’ve vacillated between original material and adaptations or covers. How do they present different challenges for you?

They’re such different animals. I’m a three-headed monster, one being a composer who writes operas and I’m composing a requiem and so forth, so I’m more in the classical genre or the musical theater world. Then I have my work as a singer-songwriter, which is just about writing songs about my life and "the Wainright experience." And then thirdly, I’m a singer who interprets all sorts of material and they’re very unique and they all kind of ignore each other and compete.

Your debut, I understand, was culled from 56 songs to 12 tracks. How many of those that didn't make the cut originally go on to show up on later albums?

A lot of them made it onto other albums. There's still some though that I haven't had a chance to really dig into. It took three years to make that record. So it was a heavy lift, and Jon Brion and I worked tirelessly to produce it and so forth. And I was incredibly demanding and incredibly judicious and critical in terms of wanting to put out a good record — to the point where Jon Brion didn't talk to me anymore. So I put a lot of effort into that record.

I interviewed him last year and he was very complimentary of you.

That was a little bit under the belt for me, but let's just say we put it all in that record.

He is quoted as saying, you were very committed to very complex arrangements on those songs. Is that something that is just a natural instinct?

At the time, it was early on in my love affair was with opera, which has remained. But at that point I was really intoxicated by Richard Strauss and Wagner and Janáček and these great operatic composers who kind of threw everything at the wall to see what stuck. And so I think I was in that mindset. But if anything, with my last few records, especially working with Mitchell Froom, I’ve been able to step back somewhat and be a little less over the top about things, which is appropriate for now. I think it was cool though, that when I started out, I went all guns blazing.

From the beginnings of your career, you were incorporating a lot of really highly literate influences. How much of your creativity takes the form of trying to emulate influential or inspirational art?

I’ve always been imitating people that I adore. And I actually feel that in a strange way, because I was so influenced by so many people and was always had my ear out to latch onto something, therefore made it sound like me. It was amalgamation of so many disparate musical movements, whether it was Kurt Weill who I’m singing now, or opera or my folk roots or what was going on at the time with Sonic Youth and Nirvana. I never discriminated between musical influences and that therefore, I think gave me my own proper sound because I was creating this Frankenstein of music.

Dreamworks was a famously anachronistic label when it came to promoting its artists. How much was that a virtue in letting you develop naturally, and how much of it was a vice?

There's an argument that I was probably the last artist who's still around today, who had this old school rollout with their record company. Having worked with Lenny Waronker and Mo Ostin, there are very few people after me who can boast that space and that attention and that trust, really, that eventually something would come even if it was on like the third record. So I was very lucky to have had that. There was a price to pay as well. And when I say that, I mean literal price because it costs a lot of money for me to just sit around and compose. And I course wasn't aware that in the end of the day I had to pay for it myself in a lot of ways, in terms of recouping and stuff. So I just narrowly didn't go to the bank. But that's okay — it was worth it.

You talked about your comfort level within the folk world, but at the time people immediately credited you for your openness with your sexuality and your music. Did that acknowledgement bolster your confidence, or maybe apply some degree of pressure going forward?

There were really two elements that sparked that fact. One was that I’m just a bad liar in general. I always have been. I’m not good at hiding the truth, so it just sort of comes out regardless. But the other one I think more profound in a way, and that we often forget about now, is that was during really smack in the middle of the AIDS crisis. And I just had such a fear of being hidden about my sexuality and then getting AIDS and having to hide it like Rock Hudson or Liberace and it being this sort of double shame. So in a lot of ways it was like, "Look, I just want to get my sexuality out there, have them deal with it, and then if I get sick, I’ll just deal with that as that and not have to do deal with my sexuality as well." It was actually quite pragmatic.

Did you encounter opposition, whether it was through the support of the labels that you worked for or just in your creative community?

There was a lot of pushback. Nothing direct in the sense like nobody would say, "Oh, we’re not hiring because you’re gay." I definitely saw certain slots that went to others on certain music TV shows. Certain agents would say, "Well, couldn't you just pretend that he is bisexual?" That was often said. But I think especially when I went to the whole Judy Garland thing [his "Rufus Does Judy at Carnegie Hall" album], then they were like, "Oh boy, we’ve lost him."

To talk more specifically about "Folkocracy," there's obviously a palpable affection for these traditional songwriting structures. How did you conceive the unifying principle around this record?

I’m going to be blatantly honest about this because I think it's kind of a funny story. What happened is that my last album with Mitchell, "Unfollow the Rules," was nominated for a Grammy and the category was best traditional American pop vocal, some odd category that I’ve actually been nominated in once before when I did the Judy record. It seems to be an area where they put albums that they can't quite categorize because there is no singer-songwriter category. Sadly I didn't win, but I watched the show and I noticed that there were all these other categories of country, folk, Americana roots, all this acoustic-type music. And a little light went off in my head and I said, "I know how to do this. This is part of my upbringing. Why don't I just try this way to get a Grammy?" And my husband manages me, and then I also told Mitchell, and it was a bit similar to the Judy Garland project where once I mentioned it, suddenly all these other sparks were ignited and we had a little fire. And then next thing you know, the house is burning down in a nice way. Yes, I would love to win a Grammy, of course, but now it's fallen in with the fact that I’m hitting 50, it's the 25th anniversary of my first record. And also a lot of my parents’ generation, my dad's still with us, but others have left. That we’re sort of at the closing of this era of the folk world and the classic folk world that I grew up with, I felt it necessary to celebrate that as well.

You’ve worked with most of the people on this album before. Was there anyone where you were just kicking yourself about either finally getting to collaborate with them or collaborate in a new way?

Certainly Chaka Khan. I’ve known her for a few years, but I’d never worked with her. So that was super exciting and completely heavenly. I’d always made the joke with her like, "Oh, Rufus and Chaka Khan back together again." And this was it actually happening. So that was fun.

There was no instinct to do "Tell Me Something Good" or something like that?

No. I know my place. So that was fun. I’ve worked with Brandi [Carlile] a couple of times. That's always a thrill. John Legend was great. I’d never sung with him before. And that was really beautiful, what we were able to do together. I don't want this to come off this strange, but it's great to sing with people of color. And then there was also Nicole Scherzinger, who's part Hawaiian, because part of the folk music is also about people's roots and where they come from. And so also to maybe get into more of the gospel side of things, especially with the Chaka Khan, was just such a wonderful journey for me to go on. So it was nice to get to the soul of people in general.

They aren't on the album, but you introduced Sam Smith to Sharon Stone and they worked together on his "Saturday Night Live" performance. Were you surprised to see her performing with him?

I loved the idea of Sam singing to Sharon. She is such an icon and strong, inspiring, smart and warm hearted woman. I have written a song about Sharon and she gave me one of her paintings which is in our house in Montauk. So we definitely appreciate each other artistically and are in each other's lives.

Your interpretation of "Hush Little Baby" is considerably more ominous and theatrical than a lullaby. Is there a challenge or responsibility in observing the history of these songs as you’re reinterpreting them?

The one that I was probably the most challenged by was "Down in the Willow Garden" just because it's so blatantly masochistic and murderous and it's sung from the perspective of the perpetrator. So I really wanted to sing that with a woman. So Brandy [Carlisle] did that with me, and that one I was conscious of. The other one that I spent a lot of time really focusing on and having a philosophical relationship with was the Hawaiian song, "Kaulana Nā Pua," which I sing in the native language. At first I was maybe just going to toss it off a bit by listening to the old recording and kind trying to match it or whatever, but then I quickly realized that if you’re going to sing in a native language that's totally non-European, you really need to do a little work. And so I ended up getting a lot of coaching and on the day that I recorded it, it was one of the most difficult sessions I’d ever been in. And subsequently one of the sessions that I’m the most proud of that I’ve ever done.

We live in an era now where performing songs that are not from the tradition from which we come is more controversial than it once was. Were there any personal or larger cultural minefields that you had to be careful to circumnavigate as you were choosing what the songs were going to be?

That was one, as I said, that we realized that I had to be really mindful of. And then we actually played it for some native Hawaiians afterwards and we got their seal of approval and so forth. But then there's also just the fact that a great song is a great song, and there's something about folk tradition, which is about communicating one's culture to another. Folk music used to be like the television — it used to be how information was disseminated. And what makes us humanity but these different folk cultures intersecting and then forming new ones. So I think on one hand you have to be mindful, but also you have to be brave as well.

"Kaulana Nā Pua" is also one of many songs on this album that has a political subtext. How much, if at all, did you intend this to be a political album?

We have that with that song and also with my own song "Going to a Town," and also with "Arthur McBride" as well, is to continue the political tradition of being an activist in folk music, which certainly from my parents’ generation was totally the norm. And which today is so lacking, I find it stupefying how disengaged politically artists are today with what's going on. We need to get out there and just start doing all that we can to save our democracy and fight for human rights and so forth. That was a very important thread that I wanted to bring into this album.

How much of a thrill or a challenge is there for you in taking these potentially less commercially familiar forms like opera and translating them to an audience who may not know or even recognize them when you deliver your final version?

I’m finding it so valuable for me personally on a spiritual level at the moment. There's all of this talk of AI and "computers are going to take over the universe" and all this stuff, we’re not going to need songwriters anymore. And really my only answer to that is look at these amazing works of art that we’ve inherited already. These great songs, these great novels, these great plays. Let's just try and master those first and then worry about what the robots will do. Because as an artistic culture, humanity is pretty incredible. And they lack in other departments certainly, but I think as creative beings, I have great faith in what we do. And it's always been about going into the past and studying what came before and just building on that. So I think it's the way to go, frankly, when faced with the robot apocalypse.

How much does an album like this either charge you up or give you a little bit of a relief for another record of purely original compositions?

Well, we’ll see. I have to tour the record. I’m really looking forward to going out with my sister Lucy and also my friend Petra Haden and the band. The tour is not incredibly grueling. I didn't want to go out there and, whatever, slog it. I wanted it to be fun and magical the whole time. So it's not going to be tremendously long, but we’ll see. I’m excited to just keep to it fun. But do I want to go to studio and make an album of all my new songs? I’m not sure yet. I’m a pretty busy guy.