Lucy Woodward sings melodies like a cat toying with a mouse. She is in full control and relishes the power. The artist taunts, teases, and pushes her virtuoso prowess in captivating directions with every sultry breath. The result is bold and passionate music that connects as an emotion — you don’t just listen; you feel.

Stories From The Dust (officially available on April 5, 2024) is Lucy’s 7th studio album. Oddly enough, while the songs are not necessarily all about her, the artist states it is her most personal album to date. That is because the stories are told through her eyes. This allows Lucy to express herself in a way she’s never been able to do before. According to Woodward, the album features songs about “fiercely independent and unconventional women.” Some of the women were family members, while others were strangers she merely “observed from afar.” But all have impactful and inspiring personalities that infuse the album with a robust storytelling flair.

How Stories From The Dust came to be

In 2020, Lucy lost nearly one hundred gigs. She wondered how long the pandemic would go on and what she was going to do with her life if it continued. Like many of us, her downtime inspired a period of introspection. 

“I don’t wanna blame everything on COVID,” she began, “because people hit places in their life and they are like, ‘I need to make changes,’ or, ‘I need to be better.’ We all hit these walls, COVID or not.” Years before the pandemic, for instance, Lucy took a job singing backup vocals for Rod Stewart because she just wanted to do something different.

As society emerged from isolation, Lucy realized she wanted to explore new ways to express herself. Her first step was contacting David Garza, a multi-talented artist whom Woodward has known for over 20 years. Though the two were like fabled ships passing in the night at Atlantic Records — with David’s time ending at the label as Lucy’s was just beginning — they hit it off and became good friends. When Lucy offered to share some lyrical ideas she’d been working on, David’s response was, “Great, come out to LA and let’s make a record.” 

“He had a really cool way of opening up what my little thoughts were,” Lucy recalled. It wasn’t like the beginning of her career when her label was pairing her up with “professional” writers to write hit songs. “It’s very different writing with a friend.”

Initially, Lucy was hesitant. Over her career, she had written many breakup songs and recorded some incredible covers that brought a fresh new life to familiar tunes. However, she didn’t feel comfortable (or confident) writing about other people. Ultimately, David convinced Lucy that she was the perfect artist to bring these unique tales to life in song.

“It was liberating,” she expressed. “It wasn’t me, but the stories were told through my eyes, which made it a different kind of personal.”

“Clenched Fists”

The idea of telling other women’s stories wasn’t new to Lucy. It was just something she’d never attempted. The artist revealed that she previously had an idea for a song with a working title of Loud Women. “It was going to be about the people in my family,” she laughed. “There are political activists, environmental activists, and educators. Why aren’t I loud like them? Or am I?”

Though she has a loud voice when singing, Lucy tends to internalize her thoughts, like her brother, who is a visual artist. When working with David Garza, however, she realized that putting herself in the shoes of others was a whole new level of songwriting. “I could be whoever I wanted to be.”

For example, the opening verse of the feisty “Clenched Fists” is Lucy pretending to be her great grandmother. She considered what it was like as an eight-year-old moving to this country from Eastern Europe.

Stepped into a world with two clenched fists
They can’t pronounce my name cause the vowels don’t fit
I dropped a syllable just to make it sit pretty
I’m going to speak a language that they understand
I know I got to try to find a way to blend in
Silence is the devil in this household, family
Mama said, “I won’t raise you quietly”

“I’ve seen all these photos and heard the stories my whole life. If anybody, I’m the one to tell this story.”

“City Girls”

“City Girls,” on the other hand, is about Lucy. Interestingly, she didn’t come up with the idea. One day when she arrived at the downtown LA coffee shop where they met every morning to discuss song ideas, she found David talking and singing to himself. She sat down and he said he had an anthem for her. “‘It’s about you growing up in New York City,’ he said. ‘You’re passing the torch to these girls in the next generation and you’re going to tell them what you learned.’ It was so amazing. I wouldn’t have come up with that idea myself.”

Lucy and David left the coffee shop and went to a nearby parking structure. David brought his guitar, and the two started singing at the top of their lungs to get a feel for what it would sound like in an amphitheater. After finding the soul of the song, Lucy went off to write several more verses, which were eventually trimmed down to three. They recorded the track with Amy Wood on drums, Tim Lefebvre on bass, and J’Anna Jacoby Harrold on strings. Gaby Moreno and Holly Palmer, two of her closest friends and recording artists in their own right, sang backup vocals as the Dust Girl Choir.

The result is a driving track that thunders with an infectious, body-moving groove. Lucy saunters through the rhythms with intoxicating vocal bravado, making “City Girls” a standout track on the album.

“Rocketeer”

In sharp contrast to “City Girls” is “Rocketeer.” Lucy wrote the gentle song from the point of view of someone leaving her. It was, however, also infused with the knowledge of what it is like to be the person who is leaving.

“I actually pictured myself standing in the doorway with someone as they were leaving, and I was really releasing,” Lucy recalled. “I was like, ‘You need to go and be yourself and find yourself.’ I had just come out of a huge relationship, so I was really processing the hell out of that situation.”

The tender track is a beautiful lullaby that can help anyone who needs to let go. The sparse arrangement showcases Lucy’s breathy vocals, revealing a poignant yet uplifting artistry that radiates warmth and love.

Advice for the younger generation

Besides writing, recording, and performing, Lucy also offers master classes in conservatories throughout Europe and America. She told Entertaining Options that one thing her students always want to know is where they should put their focus.

“There’s branding, marketing, TikTok, the viral world, and the discipline of the music,” she pointed out. “But they have to decide which is important because they are the only ones who know what they want and what their goals are. For instance, some people just want to be famous, and I can’t help them with that. You have to figure out what that means to you and why you want it. And fame is fleeting, so I’m not gonna be part of that conversation. But if you want to know how to strengthen your art, how to focus your discipline, or how to make your music the most authentic it can be, then we can have a conversation.”

Lucy has noticed that in some cases, the younger generation doesn’t have the same skillset as students did before the pandemic. Whether they were in high school or a conservatory, the pandemic hit and it took away the social and collaborative aspect of music, which to Lucy, is the most important part. Hanging out, jamming, and talking about music with peers is not something that is natural to the younger generation of musicians. However, they are much more independent. These aspiring artists can write, record, perform, and promote all on their own. So there are some benefits that came from losing the social aspect of creating music.

Lucy’s advice is to prepare. Build up material for a solid one-hour set. “Don’t be so anxious that you put yourself out there before you’re ready. You need songs to fill in a set. Do you have that ready to go? There’s such a hunger to succeed, but you have to prepare for that for your live show. Of course there are many things you won’t be ready for so you ultimately have to just dive in and do it.”

Recap

Lucy Woodward’s latest album is called Stories From The Dust. It is officially available on April 5, but you can get it right now at BandCamp or on Lucy’s website. In May, she will start releasing songs from her next project Lucy Woodward & The Rocketeers, which will come out on Snarky Puppy, bandleader Michael League’s GroundUP Music label. It will be Lucy’s first jazz orchestra album, and she promises it will not be a traditional offering. Instead, she describes it as “wild and crazy.” 

Lucy Woodward
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