Critics routinely label East Nashville-based singer-songwriter Sophie Gault an Americana artist because of the way she blends rock and roll with country music. She, however, does not see herself that way. Even though Gault begins her latest album, Unhinged, with a Buck Owens song (“Love’s Gonna Live Here”), she eschews her country identity. “I’m a rocker,” she said proudly. “I’ve played with country musicians, but I am not country.” That difference is important to her.
Gault sounds like a person you don’t want to mess with. She has a strong personality and a bit of wildness about her. While the term “country” might have many different meanings to people in other parts of the United States, in Nashville the term is laden with conservative associations. Her heroes aren’t Hank Williams, Patsy Cline, and Johnny Cash (although she does not deny their talents). Instead, she grew up wanting to be like Green Day and other pop-punk rockers of that era.
“It was their energy and attitude,” she said. “There was something mischievous about their sensibilities that reeked of cool and made me want to make my own music.” To this day she still listens to Green Day when she needs to get pumped up in the morning or before a show. She and her band will perform at the Raccoon Motel in Davenport on August 18. They are traveling across the country the old-fashioned way—in a rickety old van once owned by Gault’s parents and grandparents that is subject to periodic breakdowns.
The singer says she believes in the importance of taking risks. That’s what the title of her new album Unhinged means to her. “It means going off the book, taking a different path, doing something because it feels right rather than doing what one is supposed to do,” she said. Her self-penned songs feature protagonists that do things wrong—like doubling the bet and taking a hit in blackjack when holding a hand of 17—and somehow win big as a result. (Just to be clear, the odds of that happening in real life are almost nil.)
Going on the road to promote a record is a risk itself these days. “It’s a vicious cycle,” Gault said. “People only go out to see someone they have heard. Radio will only play you if people already know your music. It’s like when people apply for a job but get rejected because they don’t have experience. But how are you going to get experience if no one ever hires you?” Her situation is complicated by the fact that each of her three albums differs in style as she grows as an artist.
Her 2020 solo debut, Delusions of Grandeur, was a roots-rock record concerned with everyday realities in songs such as “Churches & Bars” and “Golden Rule.” Her 2024 album, Baltic Street Hotel, was a more blues-based affair with raw, confessional fare such as “Christmas in the Psych Ward” and “Fixin Things.” That album landed her a spot on Rolling Stone’s year-end best albums list. Unhinged is the sound of Gault letting go, recorded live in the studio without any digital post-production edits. The songs’ flaws and mistakes are incorporated into the general design as happy accidents.
Gault originally hails from Maryland. She first came to Nashville to see a Bonnie Raitt/Lucinda Williams show at the historic Ryman Auditorium. These women are still some of her favorite artists. In fact, Williams’s former co-producer, Gurf Morlix, sings on a haunting, acoustic cover of his song “Is There Anyone Out There” that closes her new record.
The track’s quietness serves as a contrast to the exuberant sounds that have come before. “While Green Day showed me the importance of volume, Gurf’s music-playing opened a different emotional world for me. It showed me that subtlety can be just as powerful as volume, and that sometimes what you leave out is what makes a song linger. That influence never really left me—it’s still part of how I write, arrange, and listen today.
She cites the Texas musician as her single biggest influence since she was a teenager. “I have spent hours late at night in the barn behind our house with my guitar, playing along to records and trying to figure out his parts by ear—not just the notes, but the feel of them. His sense of space and restraint really shaped how I think about music.”
What started as late-night barn practices eventually became a real-world collaboration. “I wrote him a fan letter and sent him a copy of my second album. He contacted me back and said he liked my stuff,” she said. “We have become friends and I am very pleased he sings on Unhinged, although it may be the least unhinged song on the record. That’s what makes it unhinged!”
Ending a loud, aggressive rock record with a hushed, contemplative acoustic ballad was a dicey move, but that is precisely the point. “People use the word ‘unhinged’ to describe something crazy or feral. It can mean something good or bad, depending on the circumstances,” Gault explained. “To say Janis Joplin was unhinged is a positive. To say a politician is unhinged—not naming names—is bad. I consider myself unhinged. My performances can be described as unhinged. But that does not always mean I am loud, although I usually am. Being unhinged can be the exact opposite.”
Ultimately, being unhinged just means having the courage to forge your own path.