Jemina Pearl, Ben Swank and their family
Michaela Anne and her family
Ryan Caudle and his family
Tristen Gaspadarek, Buddy Hughen and their family
Jerry Pentecost and his family
Tristen Gaspadarek, Buddy Hughen and their family
Jemina Pearl, Ben Swank and their family
Parenting and music are perceived as cultural opposites. Raising kids and playing music happen on opposite schedules with opposite intentions — the economics of raising a family and creating music for public consumption are at odds. It’s the stuff of Harry Chapin songs and Twisted Sister songs. The party is over once that first poopy diaper hits the bin.
The needs of the music industry are very different from the needs of a family. If pop culture is to be believed, you can’t do both — you can be Mike D and the Beastie Boys, or Mike Love and the Parents Music Resource Center. There’s no middle ground — allegedly. But for this week’s cover story, as I talked to parent-musicians from across Nashville, on a mission to figure out how we are all figuring it out, it became clear that the two ideas were more complementary than the culture would have you believe.
“I think for so long I felt like, ‘Oh, being a mom, you can’t write a punk song about being a mom,’” says Jemina Pearl, frontwoman for Be Your Own Pet, a reunited punk quartet that built its reputation on teen angst and underage shenanigans. “And then I’m like, ‘Fuck it. Yes you can.’”
Pearl, a mother of two, has just returned from touring behind BYOP’s 2023 album Mommy, a righteous repudiation of the idea that rock ’n’ roll and parental responsibilities don’t mix. Pearl’s writing is intense, personal and relatable to anyone who has ever silently seethed with rage in the school pickup line. It seems like the primary side effect of making records while raising kids is artistic evolution.
Checking in with the reunited punk phenoms in advance of of their first LP in 15 years
“There’s the sort of internal creative way that it’s changed, and then there’s the practical way,” says Ryan Caudle, singer and guitarist for The Sound & Shape. Caudle, father of one and the son of a heavy metal singer, has carved out a niche for himself in the prog-rock world after years of touring and independent releases.
“I stopped looking at things in such a ‘me’ way and sort of looked at things in a universal way,” says Caudle. “How are things affecting everything around me? Because now it’s not so much about me — it’s about this child that I’ve helped create and what’s going to be his future and what he’s got to deal with and what he’s going to see.
“And then the practical part is just having the time to do it,” he continues.
Parenting and music are both time- and resource-intensive. A gig isn’t just a gig; it’s also rehearsals and travel. A record isn’t just a record; it’s also promotion and videos and gigs (and thus more rehearsals and travel). By the same token, parenting isn’t all hugs and kisses — it’s dentist appointments and hospital visits, the pickup line, crosstown treks and after-school activities.
“Just a bunch of plates spinning and then basically trying to prioritize which plate — if I spin it, is it in line to make sense to be the thing that gets attention?” says Tristen Gaspadarek, longtime independent artist, side player and studio denizen. Her current plates include two kids, a forthcoming album and a collaborative single with Nashville indie-scene materfamilias Cortney Tidwell.
“I’m just the type of person, though, that the minute there’s space, I’ll just add another project,” says Gaspadarek. “I don’t even complain about the chaos. I also do a lot of work at night after the kids are in bed, 8 p.m. to 10 p.m., which we call the ‘golden hour.’ Most of this record that’s coming out was made in those late nights.”
Shared calendars and group texts are the foundation for pretty much any endeavor as a parent in music. Open communication and reasonable expectations factor into the formula as well. Gone are the days of all-night creative benders and unproductive band practices. Planning and routine are essential to making music when you have to do other things that aren’t music.
“Jemina’s dad toured all the time, and my dad was a long-haul truck driver,” says Pearl’s husband, drummer and Third Man Records co-founder Ben Swank. Swank, a former touring musician himself, is currently in the “plays if his friends ask him to” phase of his musical life. “So we both have this perspective of what is healthy and unhealthy for kids while a parent is away — you’re the parent at home. We both have things that are like, ‘Oh yeah, this happened.’ ‘Oh, that fucking sucked.’”
Jerry Pentecost and his family
A healthy attitude about the ups and downs of musical life is essential to making it work. Across all of the interviews for this article, it became clear that making peace with one’s pre-kid musical life is essential for making the post-kid musical life work. Recognizing that what works as a mom or dad is not the same as what works for a freewheeling 20-something is essential.
“When the girls were 6 months old, I was so sleep-deprived then, but I was still DJing on Broadway until 2 in the morning and then coming home,” drummer and father of twins Jerry Pentecost tells the Scene from Minneapolis. He’s preparing for a weekend run with alt-rock legends Soul Asylum before returning for a Sunday DJ gig at Skinny Dennis in East Nashville. “But yeah, let’s just say I don’t do very many gigs that require me to be home past 11 or midnight anymore. I just can’t hang.”
‘There are two versions of Broadway: the one that white people get to experience and the one that people of color experience.’
When we speak with Michaela Anne, the folk singer, mom of two and co-host of The Other 22 Hours podcast is about to leave for her first weekend of shows as a family with a 3-month-old. She recognizes and appreciates how child-rearing has changed the way she works.
“Logistically, [parenting has] changed my creative practice, because I do not have the time that I had, and I don’t have the brain capacity that I had,” explains Michaela Anne. “So I have longer periods of time between writing, and I’ve come to be comfortable with that and be confident that it comes back. Everything is much more scheduled. And when I work, we gotta get down to work.
“So recording is much more done in pockets,” she continues. “It’s an adjustment because you have so much less time, but you can be really productive. And maybe more productive than when you were just fucking off all the time having fun.”
But tight timelines and other distractions aren’t the only things these parents are coming up against: The music industry’s baked-in misogyny is often ready to end careers at the first sign of a fertilized egg. Unsurprisingly, an industry overpopulated with unimaginative man-babies can’t fathom the idea of balancing motherhood and music.
Stories of parent-musicians being dropped by booking agents, ignored by labels and pushed aside by publishers are plentiful. These moves are often based on sexist presumptions about agency, ability and availability, which is especially bothersome because anyone who has maintained a steady career as a working musician has already proven they are creative enough to survive in a tumultuous industry.
Why not let these folks come up with creative solutions that fit their situations? The entire industry has changed in the past 25 years — why are people still hanging onto Eisenhower-era ideas about parenting and music-making? Is there an alternative to letting disinterested dudes steer the ship?
“I knew this was possible because I toured with Leyla McCalla when she had a 3-month-old baby,” Michaela Anne explains. “And Leyla told me that the only reason she knew it was possible and had the confidence was because she toured with Rhiannon Giddens. … That network is so incredibly vital that I wouldn’t have been able to do what I’ve done without it. And I know not everybody has that easily accessible, which is why I think I’m passionate about sharing more publicly.”
Michaela Anne and her family
Making a network of parent-musicians more visible and more viable is the goal of Brittney King Brock, music executive and founder of Moms in Music, an Atlanta-based organization that holds events in Nashville and online. Founded in 2023 after Brock’s online searches turned up scant information for musician moms, Moms in Music has seen steady membership growth. Moms from across the country and around the globe connect, sharing stories, resources and support.
Brock, who got her start fresh out of college as a day-to-day manager for R&B superstar Usher, has had a front-row seat for the struggle of parents trying to push through barriers of an uncaring industry. But she also sees incremental progress and changing attitudes across the industry. She’s advocating for changes in the music business that reflect how parent-musicians may need more from the industry than your average van-dwelling young adult.
“A lot of venues — they’re old, [and] they are not conducive to mothers that may need a breastfeeding room,” Brock explains. “No space, right? Or they kind of give you a back closet that has mops and brooms in it. I think the industry as a whole needs a refresh. You don’t have to go overboard, but just [need] mindfulness. If it’s someone that’s a part of the crew that needs to breastfeed — whether it’s the artist or it’s the drummer — just having the mindfulness around it. I think those small things can make the artist just feel like they’re more supported.”
Support comes in all sorts of forms, especially when you aren’t on the tour-bus-and-a-nanny level of financial success. More than anything else, it takes flexible partners, understanding grandparents and sympathetic friends. The old adage that it takes a village to raise a child is no more true anywhere than in the music world. Professional child care is expensive and not exactly available at rock o’clock. Babysitting buddies are a finite resource, and family members have lives beyond caring for someone else’s kid. It all takes an enormous amount of coordination and cooperation.
“Patience, communication and accountability,” says Pentecost. “Those, to me, are the three keys to everything. If it’s not working, be patient, communicate. … I’m trying to take care of myself. I’m trying to take care of my family. I’m trying to make a living to take care of my family. I am trying to keep my mind healthy, so that way I can be mentally available for them.”
“I definitely have to compartmentalize, especially with a kid the age that my son is,” says The Sound & Shape’s Caudle. “He’s a contrarian by nature, and he is 12 — so he’s about to be a teenager, which means he’s in that rebellious stage. He doesn’t love the fact that I leave. But the first show he ever saw us at, actually, was a sold-out show at the Brooklyn Bowl here [opening for art-rock legends King’s X]. And so that was the first time he ever saw me onstage, [playing] to 1,200 people. … He was just like, ‘OK, Dad, I get this.’
Ryan Caudle and his family
“[The last tour ended] with a sold-out show at the Whiskey, and [The Sound & Shape] got to meet some really cool L.A. people and have fun backstage and all this stuff,” he continues. “And then I get home and my son is like, ‘Thank God you are home.’ I think he hugged me for four minutes when I got home. So yeah, it’s two totally different things, but they’re great in their own ways.”
Maybe that’s the secret to how all this works, despite the world being stacked so that it doesn’t: The joy outweighs the hassle. While every musician we talked to has a different approach to putting the puzzle together, the end result is always beautiful. While Chappell Roan, a 27-year-old pop star, recently said every parent she knows is miserable, the reality is that there are many parent-musicians finding more personal joy and artistic success in their creative lives post-kids.
Before Van Etten’s show at Brooklyn Bowl, we talk to the stellar songsmith about her band The Attachment Theory
Case in point: The new album by onetime Murfreesboro resident Sharon Van Etten is both maternal and mind-blowing. Or the recently passed Mac Gayden, a Nashville OG who played on some of the most important albums in the history of recorded music, but turned down fame and fortune to raise his family. The man wrote “Everlasting Love” and played on Blonde on Blonde, but he was more proud of the music he made with his wife and children than anything else.
“When you get to play music now, and you have a rehearsal, and you have the babysitter, and you take care of it and you’ve carved out your time, you’re like, ‘This is for me, this is fun,’” says Gaspadarek. “So it’s just healthier — there’s just not as much burnout.”
“Embrace the new version of you, fully embrace it,” says Brock of Moms in Music. “Because I went through a process of really grieving the old me.”
Pearl of Be Your Own Pet notes: “I think there’s so much pressure on parents, but women specifically, to be like, ‘You had a kid and now it’s straight back [to work].’ Same exact output, your body looks the same, everything’s the same. And it’s like, that’s the reality. And to have that expectation is fucking ludicrous. So yeah, just give yourself a minute and you’re going to be OK.”
Tristen Gaspadarek, Buddy Hughen and their family
For people who built their careers in creative fields as young people — with few responsibilities beyond their craft — it can be difficult to reconcile current aspirations with the artistic persona audiences expect. But trusting that your audience has grown with you can help mitigate the pressure to capture lightning in a bottle again. And that’s where you can find liberation, the confidence that comes with giving the middle finger to a system and culture pitted against you and your family.
Nashville’s OG rock scene gathered for a nostalgic, emotional evening out at The Blue Room
While this is only a small sample of parents making music in Nashville, and only a small number of the stories you can hear on the topic, it’s easy to see that all the hard work is worth it. Making music is always an uphill battle, but to share that battle with the people you love, to hear your kids sing your songs, or see them from the stage makes all the group texts and FaceTime calls worth it. Yes, those long drives between shows may be lonelier, and late nights might be more exhausting than they used to be, but the rewards for all that work are richer and more joyful when you don’t have to choose between your art and your family.
“You’re still a rock ’n’ roller,” says Pearl. “No part of you is not there. But just give yourself some time and you’re going to get through this phase. You’re going to find what you want to say again. You’re going to find your voice, and it’s going to be OK.”
Tristen Gaspadarek, Buddy Hughen and their family
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