A few things stand out when you listen to Sara Watkins' latest album, Sun Midnight Sun (Nonesuch): heartbreak and heartache are plentiful, her famous friends are out in full force (including Fiona Apple, Jackson Browne, and Benmont Tench), and for a fiddle virtuoso coming off 20 years as one-third of famed folk band Nickel Creek, she sure does love to let her pop star shine.
Watkins knows this new record is a departure from her 2009 eponymous solo debut. It's all part of the new reality she's been cultivating — growing up, getting outside her own mind, and challenging herself.
"The first record was establishing a home base, collecting the sources, the places I came from musically," Watkins says, speaking just before the start of a summer tour with Browne. "A lot of my past is represented on the first record. I knew that's what I was doing, establishing a base camp. Making my second record, I got to enjoy stepping away from that, and I got to enjoy collaborating with some new people, namely Blake Mills [from Dawes], who produced the record. We could explore and discover each song as we were recording it."
