Although she was a fixture on the early 60s NYC folk scene that launched the careers of Bob Dylan, Fred Neil and countless others, Karen Dalton never achieved the household name-status that she perhaps deserved. This fact wasn't entirely the fault of an indifferent listening public—Dalton appeared to be almost wholly disinterested in really pursuing a career in music. She only recorded two albums in her lifetime, and quit performing altogether in the 70s. Plagued by substance abuse issues, she died destitute in New York City in the early 90s. But thanks to the proselytizing of several high profile fans, including Nick Cave and Dylan (who called her "my favorite singer" in his 2005 memoir Chronicles), Dalton's scant recorded output became much-sought-after grails for serious record collectors. Her 1969 debut, It's So Hard To Tell Who's Going to Love You The Best, was reissued on CD a few years back, but her masterpiece, 1971's In My Own Time remained frustratingly out of print, fetching absurdly high prices on eBay and elsewhere. Fortunately, thanks to the efforts of Seattle-based label Light In The Attic, a CD version of In My Own Time was released late last year.

Turns out it was worth the wait. In My Own Time is a country-soul gem that more than lives up to its "lost classic" legend. Produced by former Dylan sideman Harvey Brooks, the album can stand with other Woodstock (the town, not the festival)-centric works like Van Morrison's Tupelo Honey, The Band's Music From Big Pink and Bobby Charles' self titled release. In My Own Time is an eclectic batch of songs, swinging from the deep Appalachian drones of "Katie Cruel" and "Same Old Man" to the soulful swing of the Motown classic "How Sweet It is." What ties it all together is Dalton's beguiling voice, a beautifully cracked burr that dances around the songs' beats and melodies in unexpected and delightful ways. She's often compared to Billie Holiday in this respect, but Dalton was, more than anything else, a completely individual singer. No one else sounds like this.

We spoke to Light In The Attic's Matt Sullivan about the long and arduous process of getting In My Own Time out of the hands of record collector scum and into the public's ear.

First off, can you tell me a little a bit about how you came to discover Karen Dalton's music?

The mid-90s reissue of Karen's first album introduced me to her voice, but for years I'd hear about her incredibly rare second album. I'd hear about it, but couldn't find a copy to hear. Eventually I luckily stumbled upon an old beat up copy on eBay for a couple bucks after the record was incorrectly listed by the seller, making me feel a bit guilty. But I couldn't resist. On a completely different discovery tip, Chris Estey, our in-house publicist first heard Karen in the '90s on the Australian compilation entitled Original Seeds, which collected favorite songs from Nick Cave. The comp included Karen's eerie take on "Katie Cruel." Chris spent years trying to find the In My Own Time LP (with "Katie Cruel") and never did until his first day on the job, as he walked into our office and heard the LP on the stereo. He was a bit stunned to know that we would soon be re-releasing the album.

Why hadn't In My Own Time been reissued before this? Was it challenging for Light In The Attic to secure the rights to the recording?

Michael Lang, the famed Woodstock promoter and the owner of Just Sunshine Records, who released the original album in 1971, was busy focusing on concert promotion, so his old master archive continued to collect dust. He was a big fan of Karen's music but simply hadn't gone back and started licensing out his back catalog. This was a major obstacle for us. Four long years went by of calling, faxing, e-mailing, pleading and begging Michael to license Light In The Attic the album. During this time, he had been approached by countless labels trying to do the same, such as Sub Pop (after Chris Takino of Up Records turned the staff onto the album). However each one disappeared as Michael was unresponsive.

The guiding light though was Nicholas Hill, the producer of the reissue of Karen's first album and friend of Michael's. Lang had given Nicholas permission to pick a label for the reissue of In My Own Time. Nicholas was a major fan of Karen, giving copies of the original LP to folks like Lucinda Williams and Nick Cave. Like Michael though, Nicholas was a great guy but it took an endless amount of pleading. He was a bit sour towards the music business. We ended up flying out to New York and visiting Michael as well as Nicholas. Another few months went by and Michael ended up finally saying yes. He respected our enthusiasm along with the label's back catalog, and knew that we would put great detail into reissuing the album. I'm still stunned that it actually worked out after all those years.

These days, it seems like every reissue is packed with alternate versions/mixes, demos and outtakes. But for In My Own Time, you've just reissued the album as it was originally released. What was your reasoning behind this approach?

There's actually a number of alternate mixes from the album sessions, which are available on iTunes and will soon be available as a bonus disc inside the In My Own Time CD/LP release. Including a bonus disc was our original wish but we weren't able to afford that in the beginning stages.

All of us here in the office spent months arguing back and forth about possibly including these tracks on the CD reissue. Would these bonus tracks take away from the brilliance of the original record or strengthen the release? As always, we over-analyzed the issue because we take things very seriously .we simply didn't want to do it for financial gain. The original sequence of the record, the way producer Harvey Brooks had intended it for Karen, meant far too much to us to muck it up. In our eyes, it was the perfect album and a major honor to be re-releasing the LP. So we sided with the former and left the tracks off the CD. Fortunately now, the record has done well and we can afford to include a bonus disc inside the release.

Is In My Own Time Karen Dalton's final recorded work? Is there anything left over that she recorded after the album?

As far as I know, In My Own Time was her final recorded work.

As usual, the packaging you guys have put together for this reissue is beautiful. How important a role does the packaging play for you? What effect are you going for with In My Own Time's look?

Thank you. Packaging is a major part of our vision as a company. For us, the packaging must reflect and respect what's heard in the grooves. It's just as important as the sound and the promotion. We'll spend eight months trying to track down one single photo and will push back an entire release schedule until things come together. It is truly insane, but seeing the record properly presented is so important. For most of these albums, it's taken thirty or forty years to get to this point, so what's another year or two to do it right? Yep, we're probably completely mad and I couldn't argue with you if you accused us of that.

For the packaging of In My Own Time, we wanted something with an organic and timeless quality. The matte style of the digipak and the foil stamp helped bring this out.

It's amazing to me how many great, obscure recordings like In My Own Time are constantly being dug up and reissued by intrepid labels like Light In the Attic. Do you foresee a time when the well will have run dry? Or in 20 years, will we be seeing reissues of the Greatest MySpace Bands of the 00's!

Greatest Myspace Bands of the 00's! It's infinite, the amount of music out there. In every scene there's always dozens of bands who don't make it and who should have.

What's up next for Light In the Attic? Any projects you're particularly excited about? Any "dream reissues" you guys would like to release?

Later this year, we'll be re-releasing the first two albums from seventies funk-punk goddess Betty Davis (ex-wife of Miles Davis). Like Karen, this one's been going on for far too long but we're just about to get it into the hands of her adoring fans, and hook so many possible new ones up with her brilliant work. Betty crafted some wicked albums in the early to mid-70s with Sly Stone's rhythm section, writing all of her own material and self-producing everything after her first album. She was a serious visionary with a D.I.Y. approach, turning down both a Motown songwriter's deal and Clapton as her producer.

Betty introduced Miles to Hendrix, and her influence on him would soon spawn Bitches Brew; she wrote the demo that would get the Commodores their Motown deal; and was eventually urged by Marc Bolan (T-Rex) to stop writing for others and become a recording artist.

Her story is mind-boggling and still mostly untold. In the late '70s, Betty would have a nervous breakdown, completely losing all touch with her music. These days folks like Talib Kweli, Ice Cube, and Method Man are found rhyming over her tracks. She's sadly broke and living in the Pittsburgh ghetto. Thankfully though, she's fully supportive of the project, which marks the first time which Betty will be receiving proper royalties for her music on CD. The liner notes include only her second interview in over 25 years, written by Oliver Wang (best known for his excellent Soul-Sides.com audioblog).

--Photo Courtesy of Dan Hankin

By Tyler Wilcox.
February 14, 2007