Author: Angaleena Presley

Angaleena Presley is a singer songwriter in the Country / Americana genre. She is also a member of the female trio Pistol Annies with Miranda Lambert and Ashley Monroe. Presley is originally from Beauty, KY but now resides in Nashville, TN. She's the single mom of a teenager and a toddler. You can find her solo albums, American Middle Class and Wrangled, on all music streaming platforms including apple music, spotify and amazon music.
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Jump

As I watched his slender fingers slide with ease up and down the neck of my cherry red 1976 Gibson 330, I understood the meaning of life. His shoulder length curls, cut short by a worn to death beanie, were a vision of teenage angst and dreams. Rockstar skinny, he had the look and movement of an age old road dog, wise beyond his makeshift bedroom stage. Notes howled their way out of my Hot Rod Fender Deluxe and passed over me like time spilled from a bottle. In a flash, I was seven and standing too close to the screen of a floor model television. Puzzled by Eddie Van Halen’s Frankenstrat, I wondered why a guitar would need all those bandaids. Inspired, I split kicked my guts out along side David Lee Roth, pretending that the multicolored striped utility carpet in the tv room was sizzling under lights and smoke. A blink and I was back, nestled in my son’s giant beanbag, watching him shred on hand-me-down gear while he practiced his solo for the guitar show at his school. He would’ve preferred Panama but Jump was a challenge that he was welcoming and wailing on.

A few days ago, I got an idea that I’m going to build the back half of my life on. While I’m not going to share said idea, I’d like to paint a picture of how I came to this revelation by deconstructing the message behind an unassuming 80’s rock song. 

Some days I get up and nothin’ gets me down. Blissful are the mornings when I wake with palpable faith in the path on which I’ve chosen to tread. It’s been paved through my belief in the value and magic of making something from nothing. As a former rural Appalachian, I come by it naturally. If money’s tight, alchemy’s necessary. 

When my mamaw’s eight young’uns were wantin’ somethin’ sweet at the end of the month, she’d peel and boil an old potato that was about to rurn’. She’d mash it up and make a dough by mixin’ it with her last little bit of powdered sugar. Then, she’d lay it out flat, spread on some commodity peanut butter, roll it up into a log and slice off a piece for each and ever’ baby. My writing is like Mamaw’s potato candy, born from necessity. Souls hunger for meaning and purpose. Some days, I know that it’s my job to meaningfully and purposefully piece together scraps of human experience with the intent to feed as many of them as I can. 

Other days I have no ability whatsoever to ro-o-oll with the punches and get to what’s real. I languish through, fully confident that no one gives a flying shit about what I’m called to write. I tell myself that I’m stupid for not marrying that boy from up on Saltwell who was fixin’ to build me a two story brick house and dig me an inground swimmin’ pool. I look at my body of work and wonder why it even exists. I look at my two babies and wonder how in the world their mama is going to keep putting food on the table with all these useless words. There are stretches of time when I devote all my energy to searching for a way out of a career that feels like walking a tightrope without a net. Having my back against the record machine for twenty some odd years hasn’t been easy. But, when the chips are down, the universe never fails to tap me on the shoulder and tell me that we need to chat. The conversation goes something like this…

Aaa-ohh, hey you!

Who said that?

Baby, how you been? 

You say you don’t know

You won’t know until you begin

My experience as someone who has ever been chained to a creative mind is likened to a dirt bike that was passed down to me from my cousin Micheal in 1989. It was a Yamahaw 125, a motorcycle that siphoned  enough sweat from dad to drown a world of sorrow. Dirt biking was my family’s weekend leisure activity. I learned how to ride when I was three. The 125 ran like a jewel once it got going, handled better than any of the bunch. But, getting it started was a real bitch. My father, a mild mannered mystic of a man who is as laid back as a field of Mountain Laurels, would cuss and kick and crank and choke and fight that hunk of metal for 30 solid minutes each and every Sunday. Some Sundays he’d win the battle and some Sundays he’d throw it the hell across the yard and tell me to jump on the back of his 250. 

Point being, my creativity isn’t the most reliable of machines. But, I know that once it’s revved up, it takes me to glorious places. Beginning is the hard part. I’ve been in a bit of a waning phase. Healing from the trauma of a toxic marriage and divorce has taken up a lot of space. My sense of direction has been a bit muttered. I’m mature in a way that’s made me question how to step forward. How do I honor the scars on this new skin without becoming them? It’s easy to wallow in the what ifs… However, the same way that my dad was determined to send a spark to a corroborator in the name of imprinting the value of feeling wild and free as a bird, I’m determined to keep the flame for my art driven first born. Watching him kill a famously hard guitar solo inspired me to take myself to the woodshed and kickstart the ever living hell out of my artistic side.

With an 80’s Roller Rink playlist roaring in the background, I laid my yoga mat down on my living room floor and exercised until I felt like I was going to die. I knew I had to bulldoze my way to that space where my thoughts smother and my spirit ascends to the plane where my soul connects with that which is bigger than me. Gasping for breath, I thought of nothing. Black, calm, still and silent, my empty mind gave way to a flicker. I began to see everything that I’ve built, I saw who I was and where I came from. As the sweat pooled in the small of my back the flame engulfed me. The engine ignited. The path lit up like the eyes of a poor kid waiting in line for a piece of potato candy. Just like that, I was shown where I’m supposed to go.

Might as well jump

(jump)

Might as well jump

Go ahead and jump

(jump)

Go ahead and jump

For me, making a career from art has required cyclical leaps of faith inspired by the simplest notes of the human experience. It’s terrifying to jump but more so to not jump and spend a life not actualized. So, here, in this silly little blog that I created because the universe told me to, I’m casting the first stone. 

I’m jumping and I’m going to land in your speakers. 

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Thoughts From My Thanksgiving Bed

I’m sitting on the edge of my bed opening a contraption that I’ve been influenced to buy. It’s a sleek handheld device with laser beam lights that are supposed to make me prettier. The dated packaging and the turning of the pages of the little booklet strike a chord and all of a sudden I’m a woman in the fifties reading the instructions to one of those shake yourself to death machines with the big belt that goes around the backside. Turns out, this thing is a miniature version. I rev it up and begin to maneuver it around my jawline in hopes that it will shake my jowls into an oblivion. Point being, I’m spending the night before Thanksgiving vibrating the hell out of my face with a laser beam, wondering why time is a dirty thief. 

Cut to the morning of Uncle Kenny’s holiday. That’s how I’ll always frame it. I hear the rustling of cousins catching up, showing off new babies and boyfriends. I smell Aunt Lola’s perfume and I feel the sting of Mamaw and Papaw’s absence. Uncle Tim says the blessing while Kenny Jr. and I stealthily sidestep our way to the beginning of the buffet. We’re ALWAYS the first in line, no matter the occasion. I pile the offerings of my McCoy family onto my plate with slight reservation as there are sixty people left to feed. Thinking ahead, I go to the dessert table and serve myself up a heaping mess of Aunt Debbie’s inexplicably delicious cracker salad. Some poor soul will wind up scraping residue and crumbs of it from the bottom of a pyrex and it’s not going to be me. I nestle myself between my sister and my cousin Mandy and I sink my teeth into the wonder that is Uncle Kenny’s famous, butter injected turkey. I’m overwhelmed with gratitude. I’m safe. I’m home. 

Redirect to what’s actually going on this morning. I’m still in bed. I’m listening to the clicking of keys as I write this post through tears that welled up during the above walk down memory lane. My kids are with their dads and Uncle Kenny is breaking bread with our heavenly father. We haven’t gathered on his day since his passing.

When I was in my twenties, I spent a Thanksgiving behind the counter of the little gas station at the mouth of the holler, selling scratch offs and two liters. I can’t say that I’ve ever spent one by myself. But, don’t pop the top on the pity party champagne just yet. This is a predicament of my own making. I chose, with intention, to abdicate myself from putting on makeup and preparing a side dish. A selection of those ‘friends who would step in front of a train for me” from my last post cordially invited me to their homes. I respectfully declined.

Though the transition from wife to ex-wife has delivered proper throes of solitary loathing, I’m typically, abnormally comfortable being alone. I’m a pro at losing myself to frozen pizza and a good documentary. When the house is still and quiet, the ideas that I collect in the hustle and bustle of my day to day ease themselves into fruition. My guitar gets played and self indulgent songs get written. I don’t suffer from fear of missing out. In fact, I err more on the FOGO side of things, fear of “going’ out. I love a warm bath with a side of staying in my pajamas all day. 

This Thanksgiving, I’m thankful that the path I’m on never ceases to provide experience, growth and truth. I’m grateful for a moment of respite from small talk and responsibility. Excited about the incoming Bob Evans Holiday Celebration Platter that I ordered from Doordash, I reel in the convenience of living in Music City. I revel in the fact that after I gorge myself on processed bounty, I’ll go downstairs to fulfill some t-shirt orders from fans who appreciate my life’s work. I’ll do the dishes and pack my bag for Vegas. 

U-turn to my space odyssey 2022 glowing, gyrating face sculptor. It’s a fad that has come and will eventually go, a relic that will die slow in a bathroom junk drawer. In the interim, I’ll gladly draw false hope from new fangled things. I’ll find ways to deaden the blow of middle aged beginnings. This won’t be the last holiday that I’ll spend in isolation and I’m ok with that. I’m confident that I’ll rock them out, fine and dandy like Dolly Parton during a hard candy Christmas. Pain has a higher purpose. I’ll wake up tomorrow, stronger and more settled in my freshly laser beamed skin. I’ll be closer to letting bygones be bygones and farther from the fear of starting over. 

I’d like to invite you to use the comment section to share the ups and downs that graced you this Thanksgiving. No matter your story, your story matters. Tell it to me.

Don’t cry for me Argentina, I’m at peace and I’m mere moments away from a hot date with Bob Evans. Happy Happy Turkey Day to each and every one of you beautiful, beautiful creatures.  

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She’s In Love With the Boy

It was the summer of 1994. I was sporting a half up half down curly perm hairdo held in place by a fluffy mauve scrunchy. Sitting in the passenger seat of my cousin Mandy’s maroon Mustang LX, I excavated a few quarters from a striped tube sock that housed the money we’d scavenged for our first parentless road trip. In need of gas, cigs and chocolate milk, we pulled into a Texaco station where I handed two pounds of change to a clerk while ignoring her raised brow. We were headed to Nashville, TN. I was seventeen and I felt as free as the donated bologna, ham, pickles, mayo, mustard and American cheese that sat chilling in the cooler in the backseat. 

Though the adventure was worthy of a novella, there’s one piece that I’d like to put under a microscope for the purpose of this post. The term “full circle moment” gets thrown around a lot in Nashville. When you decide to follow a dream, you do so without a map. There are only varying sets of point A and point B that can be examined and connected upon the realization that various parts of the dream have come true. A while back, I had a jarring full circle moment in my living room while watching my three year old daughter dance and lip sync to the 90’s Trisha Yearwood classic, “She’s in Love with the Boy”. Point A? Seventeen year old, road tripping Angaleena, sitting in the Bluebird Cafe, listening in awe to Jon Ims sing a song that he wrote called, “She’s in Love with the Boy”. 

The song was a breakout hit for Yearwood in 1991. I can’t count the number of times that I belted it into my my hairbrush, well, by that time I was singing into my turquoise hair pick, pretending to be Trisha nonetheless. “She’s in Love with the Boy” is a song about a girl, Katie, who is head over heels in love with hometown good ole’ boy, Tommy. A hillbilly version of star-crossed love, the romance does not have the stamp of approval from Katie’s father, wherein lies the conflict. Of course, it all works out in the end as the listener is lead to believe that Katie and Tommy will inevitably live happily ever after. As a pubescent coal miner’s daughter in a town with one red light, I believed that it was only a matter of time before I would find my Tommy.

“Stand up Lynn…” he insisted. Lynn, Ims’s real life college girlfriend aka inspiration for Katie, bashfully stood up as a round of applause erupted. Up to the very second that I stepped my foot over the threshold of the Bluebird Cafe, I thought that the person who sang the song also wrote the song. I’d only heard of the Bluebird because of the movie, The Thing Called Love starring the late River Phoenix who portrayed an up and coming singer-songwriter. A couple of my favorite country artists, KT Oslin and Pam Tillis, made cameo appearances. 

Having learned a few chords on my dad’s old guitar around the same time that The Thing Called Love was released, I became obsessed. However, I hadn’t quite put two and two together as to how the business of songwriting worked. As Ims played through the song, a hush came over my body. My limbs went numb and I could feel my heart beating like a hammer on my chest. I thought to myself, “Who is this yahoo and where in the hell is Trisha Yearwood? Did this dude really write this song? How can this be? People can write songs for other people to sing?” Then, a sudden calm eased its way up my spine and something that us hill people call a knowing created a vacuum in my brain. That was the exact moment when I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that I would grow up to be a songwriter. 

Up until the moment that the gavel fell on my second divorce, I believed in the kind of love that Katie and Tommy have. I believed in making out in the last row of the drive-in and make due Dairy Queen proposals. Part of me filed for divorce as a Hail Mary effort to erect a grand gesture movie moment where my husband would show up in a limousine with a dozen red roses and a clean bill of health from a team of therapists and psychiatrists. The other part of me, the voice of reason, filed because I knew I had, to no avail, given him every chance on God’s green earth to show his chivalrous side. Still, there was a spark of hope that he’d climb over the table in the courtroom and publicly denounce our parting of ways. He didn’t and as the ink on the papers dried, my faith in wholesome love and partnership flatlined and perished. 

As I sat on my couch watching her perform, a tornado of memories touched down around my little girl’s feet, twisting and scattering debris as she twirled. I saw a teenage dreamer, hopeful and rising into the unknown without fear or hesitation. I saw an accomplished, head strong woman singing Housewife’s Prayer to Loretta Lynn from the stage of the Grand Ole Opry, and I saw a 40 something, twice divorced, single mom, singer-songwriter, laying on a bone cold bathroom floor, wailing like an injured animal. I saw my Kentucky born and raised mom and dad, my aunts and uncles, my mamaws and papaws who all married young and have gone to ground beside one another as I suspect Katie and Tommy would’ve done. I saw true love and abuse and homesickness and joy and pain and true grit. I saw the mud and muck of my mistakes and misgivings. I saw an innocent child, my baby, giggling, shining, lighting up the room and buying into what Katie and Tommy were selling and it pissed me the hell off. 

Mother bearing against the spread of happy ending, horse shit, fairytale propaganda over the airwaves of my living room, I suggested that we listen to a different song. She declined and  requested to repeat the song at least six consecutive times until she had memorized the lyrics. Now, the song is on its fifth week in the number one spot on my toddler’s chart. She particularly loves the full circle moment in the song where Katie’s mom says, “My daddy said you wasn’t worth a lick. When it came to brains you got the short end of the stick. Well he was wrong and honey you are too, cause Katie looks at Tommy like I still look at you” I can literally feel her little heart welling up to the beat of her sassy hip shake up as if to say, “See!! I told you love would win.”… 

But the thing is, my baby doesn’t know that her chance to experience the etherial idea of her mom and dad enjoying a moment of clarity regarding the disapproval of her rebellious beaux, has been robbed from her. My baby daughter will never know the peace produced by a post nightmare crawl into bed between two committed and connected biological parents. Her dreams will be dreamed through the veil of divorce and discord. Maybe I wasn’t angry at the thought of her precious ears being polluted by a silly, unattainable love story. Maybe I became jealous when reminded of the fact that some, including her, do still have the chance to find and keep Katie and Tommy brand love.  

I really thought I could have it all. I thought I could geographically abandon Beauty, Kentucky yet carry the traditions and ideologies deep in me like seeds that I would plant in big city soil. Sadly, I don’t have a green thumb. I have slender fingers good for playing guitar and a knowing that takes the wheel when I get close to cashing in my chips and settling for a simpler life. Townes Van Zandt said, “You have to blow off your family. You have to blow off comfort. You have to blow off money… You have to blow off your ego. You have to blow off everything except your guitar.” As a deep thinking artist who’s no stranger to the dark side of dreaming, I unequivocally relate. As a woman who unexpectedly got pregnant with my first born by a handsome midwestern singer who reminded me of Townes Van Zandt and River Phoenix, I constantly buck against the balance between mothering and music making. 

In a way, I do have it all. I have unconditional, magical, authentic love in my relationships with my children. I’ve made a name for myself in the music industry, written hit songs, met a lot of my heroes, including Trisha Yearwood. I have friends who would step in front of a train for me. I have long weekends in Kentucky with my Katie and Tommy esque parents who throw rocks in the creek with my kids and teach them how to sew and ride four-wheelers. I have full circle moments where I realize that parts of my dream have come true. In fact, I had another one while writing this post. I remembered that the name of the leading lady in the The Thing Called Love is Miranda Presley. Twenty nine years after the release of a movie that altered the course of my life, Angaleena PRESLEY is a Pistol Annie with MIRANDA Lambert and Ashley Monroe. 

All that said, my desire to ever again be “in love with the boy” remains lifeless on a Davidson County courthouse floor. I’m more damaged by this marriage and divorce than I’ve ever been by anything else in my life. Normally, I’d work it all out in songwriting rooms on Music Row. That’s what I did after my first divorce. But, that relationship was a whirlwind, art fueled romance that burned itself at both ends until the raging fire became a spark in a baby boy’s eyes. There’s no bad blood between us. We understood that we weren’t meant to be together but instead were meant to, together, raise a part Kansan, part Kentuckian guitar playing, music loving Nashvillian. We peacefully continue to do so. We’re supportive, respectful and kind to one another. He’s proud of the fact that I picked up my guitar and churned the pain of our separation into bread and butter for our boy’s table. He’s humble in that way and he appreciates a good song when he hears one. Even when he’s the ramblin’ main character. 

There’s a difference between fire and poison. Fire keeps you warm. It’s dangerous but when met with caution, it’s comforting and life giving. Poison just makes you sick. Poison seeps into the cracks of things, undetected. It festers. It kills things softly. My second marriage was toxic and I’ve yet to find an effective cleanse. At times I feel like my internal organs have been replaced by a bunch of rusted, misshapen cogs and gears that don’t know how to grind my body into action. It’s like there’s a residue on everything, a sludge that my boots can’t navigate through. 

I’m here because I need to detox from the chemicals that are making me hate Tommy and Katie’s guts. I’m here because I’m scared. I’m here because I’m lonely. I’m here because the urgency to turn this trauma into art is overriding my lackluster admin skills. I can’t book the co-writes fast enough. I’m here because my lullabies were Appalachian murder ballads sung by strong hill women who didn’t take no shit from no man yet somehow managed to hold on to a man with the stickiness of those high lonesome melodies that continue to glue my wayward soul to my small town heart. I’m here to talk about music and misery and motherhood and making due. I don’t know why. I just know that this is what I’m supposed to do next. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about dream chasing, it’s that sometimes, during the scariest parts, you have to let go of the bar and throw your hands up in the air trusting that your higher power’s grand design will not only keep you on the rails but also deliver you to your purpose.

In the words of Jon Ims, “What’s meant to be will always find a way.” That’s something I’ll never stop believing. It’s what forces me to drag myself through the darkest of days. I’d scream it from the roof of the old RCA building, the same way Miranda Presley screamed, “I’m here Music City and I ain’t never leavin”. For now, I’m going to keep my nose to the grindstone, and my hands hard at work, writing and sharing the words that will hopefully turn all this bull hockey into something as useful and inspiring as my daughter’s current favorite song.