Gillian Welch & David Rawlings Contrast Contentment With Life’s Ticking Clock on Woodland

In perhaps the album’s most haunting moment, Rawlings looks down at the boots of (presumably) Clark and opines, “Jesus Christ, that’s some mighty big ones to try to fill / Never can and never will,” sounding audibly gobsmacked—and maybe even slightly horrified. Rawlings and Welch have written so many great odes to meaningful connection—the kind of kindred spark that can kindle between like-minded individuals and serve as a reminder of what really matters in life. “Hashtag” explores the inevitable flipside of that; the heaviness of grief and the gnawing hole left by someone’s irreplaceable absence.

Despite the gravity of the subject matter which Woodland concerns itself with, it would be wrong to describe the album as a downbeat listen. Warm, tough, tender and resilient all at once, the album is illuminated by memories of old while still finely attuned to present reality. Recollections of long road trips, old dreams and familiar faces add warmth to the album. As do surprising flashes of dry humor—on the opener “Empty Trainload of Sky,” Welch looks up at the clouds and sings, “Was it spirit? Was it solid? / Did I ditch that class in college?”

In March 2020, tornadoes ripped through Nashville, necessitating extensive repairs to Welch and Rawlings’s Woodland Studio. The duo managed to salvage all of their music during the storm, and it may have even provided inspiration for what would become Woodland, the album—a record finely attuned to the threat of destruction. “The Day The Mississippi Died,” a string-led lament that recalls folk traditionals, foretells both the death of a person and the eventually drying up of the Mississippi river. Once again, Welch and Rawlings use humor to elevate what could be unbearably heavy in another’s hands (“The subject’s entertaining but the rhymes are pretty rough”).

Still, despite such flashes of humor, there’s no doubting the gravity of what Gillian Welch and David Rawlings sing about across Woodland. For this reason, the album’s lovely, unlikely closer feels particularly subversive. “Dry your eyes, don’t you cry, ain’t gonna rain no more,” declares Welch on “Howdy Howdy,” as if trying to gain composure after a particularly emotional episode. Over a plucky banjo, Rawlings and Welch intertwine their voices to deliver an ode to eternal love: “You and me are always gonna be howdy howdy / You and me, always walk that lonesome valley.” Sometimes, staring down the apocalypse doesn’t have to result in despair—instead, it can just make you profoundly thankful for everything you’ve had and everything you have yet to lose.