Just when you think Katy Hobgood Ray is quite the overachiever with the recent co-write of a book (Snoozer Quinn: Freestyle Jazz Guitar Pioneer), Confetti Park, a kid-friendly radio show/podcast, and a budding discography of Americana/children’s recordings, she dusts off a cache of 15 and 20-year-old songs written by her, her husband David Ray, Northwest Louisiana singer-songwriter Ted Lindsay and college bandmate Noah Slater. She enlisted The Music Shed’s Jack Miele (of The Molly Ringwalds fame) to produce these songs that deserved more than just skeleton guitar and vocals. She asked him to make this unlike anything she’d ever cut, and naturally, Miele, the visionary obliged. He surrounded her with his ‘A’ team session players, including guitarist John Fohl and drummer Doug Belote. Not confined to the control room, Miele alternated between guitar, bass, piano, percussion, and backing vocals.
Interestingly, Ray describes these songs as having a country vibe, probably based on their themes of wanderlust and broken and mending hearts. Sonically, it’s a full-on rock record sealed with a pop sheen, with layered, lush vocals, upbeat tempos, and loads of guitar and organ solos. Occasionally, remnants of ’80s New Wave creep in, such as the steadily throbbing guitar lines on the topsy-turvy “Roller Coaster.”
“Double Crosser” is where these proceedings reach their apex. Miele layered his vocalist with overdubs to create a resounding, gigantic chorus symbolizing the protagonist’s angst and the army of like-minded souls standing behind her. After the first chorus, Ray creatively detours on the bridge, citing a few lines from “The Pardoner’s Tale” from Chaucer’s Canterbury tales, revealing her beautiful voice on the upper registers.
“Tonight’s the Night” is the converse of “Double Crosser,” slower, softer, atmospheric, and impossible to eradicate from your mind once it’s invaded. It’s beautifully-written, expressing fragile hopes for reconciliation and the continuation of a relationship. Ray wrote half of these 10 songs, but regardless of the writer, the melodies are generally memorable and fit together seamlessly. If Ray wanted to be cast in a different light, she certainly accomplished that here, but not even she could estimate its radiance.
