In the Way of Wonder

In the Way of Wonder

MUSICIAN, ARTIST, AND MOTHER JULIE ODELL IS MAKING SOMETHING NEW

Story by Lauren Heffker • Photo by Olivia Perillo

When I finally got in touch with Julie Odell to ask about her upcoming album, she was phoning from the kitchen of her sister’s family farm in Indiana corn country, in the midst of a flower harvest. She was telling me how the day before, she had accompanied her sister, Jessica, to an Amish produce auction, where they purchased three hundred and fifty pounds of tomatoes that would then be brokered off to different vegetable vendors by the time Odell returned home to New Orleans. Before her Midwest sojourn, the Odells had spent most of July off in the woods, soaking up the last weeks of summer in the green and blue foothills surrounding the Chattooga River, hiking, swimming, sunflower field frolicking, and whitewater rafting.

For Odell, every day seems to be an opportunity to put herself in the way of wonder, whether it’s finger painting rainbow collages with her five-year-old wild child, Lilou, sewing up a storm ahead of any occasion worthy of a costume, or planning her thirty-second birthday party as a live show at a Franklinton farm after a year without an in-person performance, just for the sake of making some noise together again.

The singer-songwriter has spent the better part of the past decade embedded in the New Orleans music scene, a fixture at local venues like Banks Street Bar, Gasa Gasa, The Music Box, One Eyed Jack’s, and Carnaval Lounge. Making a living as an artist runs in her blood.

Though she’s originally from Ruston ( ... and Covington, and Lafayette, too), Odell and her siblings were often on the road with their parents, who made their livelihoods as ceramic artists, traveling around the country to arts and craft festivals. Growing up this way, surrounded by roving artsy types who spent their days creating with only their hands and imagination, she never could foresee a fluorescent light future, tethered to a desk.

Today, the musician’s life is one infused with whimsy and color thanks to a patchwork of side projects—Odell is one half of The Jelly Sisters, where she performs with Tiffany “Teddy” Lamson (also known as the vocalist of Lafayette-born indie-pop band GIVERS) and one third of Mosquito Eater, an experimental act with Jonathan Arceneaux and Anthony Cuccia, also known by his stage name The Night Janitor. Offstage, Odell is a mixed-media maker inspired by the swamps of her scattered South Louisiana upbringing. She often creates eye-catching posters for upcoming shows and occasionally updates her Etsy shop, Crystal Pony Co., with handmade tapestries, earrings, pottery, and prints, along with her online merch brand, Pink Pollen. Then there’s The Pepper Lantern, the “rainbow cuisine” supper clubstyle popup Odell has run with Vanessa Degrassi since 2014—the pair started the event as a “backyard speakeasy,” cooking a creative, seasonal vegan menu and hosting live music at their Seventh Ward home.

After years spent gaining a foothold in the industry, opening for headliners or sharing marquees, packing up gear and playing house shows, and dealing with a few shady and sexist club owners, Odell said she is now moving into the next phase of her career. All the relationships with other musicians she’s cultivated in the process have given her a network of support and an established niche in the who-knows-who of NOLA music. This close-knit community is important, because it contributed to what Odell recalls as a major turning point for her—her 2018 Solstice performance at the Marigny Opera House. Backed by a “tiny orchestra” of music-making friends and others who had volunteered to help with running sound tech, recording the show, and constructing the set—which Odell had designed with arches and bridges in mind—the end result was pure magic.

“The whole arch symbol was such a perfect representation of that night for me because I did feel a little bit like I crossed over into another realm in the community, and within myself, just learning of different boundaries that I could push personally but also collaboratively,” she said. “I was always so afraid to collaborate because it’s hard for me to not do great in front of people, so this was something that I was totally terrified to do. But it was almost like entering into motherhood. I was like I have to keep doing things that totally freak me out, and because they’re things that I dream of all the time, and I don’t want to live my life and be like, ‘I cannot believe I didn’t do the thing because I was too afraid.’ And it all came together so beautifully.”

Easier than articulating Odell’s fluid sound is translating its visceral, visible effect on the listener; a space where she makes a powerful exchange of catharsis possible, both for herself and the audience. From delicate and folksy exuberance to expressions of grief and deep tragedy, listening to her songs is a bit like wandering around in the dark to an unknown destination, but Odell has the map. It’s transfixing, really—the type of unexpected force that stops you in your tracks. It’s the type of soulful performance that asks stillness of an audience. To say Odell’s talent is a sort of superpower wouldn’t be a far cry from the truth; she has been known to bring people to tears at her shows—a capability reserved only for truly great art.

“I feel like what I have going on internally, most of the time, is really, really intense, and I have a hard time communicating in general,” Odell said. “So I think the reason all of my songs end up being so emotional is because it’s just like all of my internal thunderstorms have been gathered in a song, and a lot of my songs do have a lot of sorrow and sadness in them, but I always try to remember to add in some kind of hopeful element. I want to let people feel understood, because when you’re in your darkest moment it’s really hard to remember that it will pass.”

Her raw candor and transparency is likely what elicits her audience’s strong reactions, especially when hearing her play for the first time. These can range from curiosity to bewilderment, as described by Katie Sikora, concert photographer and executive director of The Sexism Project, which first exhibited at Preservation Hall in 2018. Odell was slated to perform at the exhibition’s opening reception in a lineup curated by fellow local musician Alexis Marceaux. In a 2019 Q&A with Odell, Sikora described overhearing an attendee comment in awe, “What did I just watch?” following Odell’s set.

Odell is proud to provide a space where people can feel without constraint or judgment, she said. Most of the time, it’s the lyrics that come to her first, especially while listening to classical piano music. “Since I was a kid, it’s just something that’s always helped me open up some portal in my brain that lets things flow. And it usually happens around 3 am; I wake up from a dream, and go on to write the music.” Since she often writes from what she knows, Odell loves to incorporate imagery and detail into her lyricism, jumping on the guitar or piano to match the words with melody. “I do want people to be able to kind of see the light coming in, and the water flowing,” Odell said. “I want people to be able to have pictures in their heads when they hear my song, but also be able to relate to them on multiple levels.”

In early 2020, Odell signed with Frenchkiss Records, an independent record label based in New York City. Her first single and accompanying music video—shot against a dreamy Lake Martin sunrise—is slated for release in early 2022, and eventually, a full-length album will follow. It will also be Odell’s first recorded work with her backing band, a trio of talented locals who have played with the songstress since 2017: Jonathan Arceneaux on drums, Kenny Murphy on bass, and Chad Viator on guitar. According to Odell, the track is different from anything she’s done previously; “It’s a high energy, fastpaced emotional rollercoaster,” she said. The following record will be her first studio release in a decade, and though she’s no longer an emerging artist in the sense of experience and craft, it’s a step in a new direction for Odell. The work mirrors her transformation from an idyllic twenty-something to finding her footing in her thirties, now as a mother. But like any significant change, it’s scary, too, and comes with its own wave of trepidation, particularly about touring and having to leave her daughter for extended periods of time.

“Signing to a label kind of feels like jumping off a cliff in some ways, but also I have faith that it’s going to put me in a better position,” she said. “All of these years that I have played in the South and hustled and grinded so hard, it’s gotten me places and it’s opened up opportunities for me, but there’s only so far you can get with the type of music that I play. It’s just a necessary step if I want to keep doing this, because I can’t imagine doing that hustle and grind anymore. I’m glad I did it, because it taught me so much and I met so many great people that are a network I’ll never lose. So it created the foundation for my career, but now there are bricks being laid.”

The forthcoming record, written over the course of ten years, covers a broad and important swath of her life, Odell said. “In that time, I got married in my early twenties, then divorced. And then I moved all over the country and worked on some farms, and I lost some people, and made so many mistakes, and it took me a really long time to learn from all of them. And then right as I started to figure it out, I got pregnant and had the most crazy birth in a blizzard.”

While sharing the inherent beauty and fragility of her life in each and every song can sound emotionally taxing, Odell said that she finds the meaning of her music tends to shape-shift for her over time, allowing her to view old verses and versions of herself with new eyes. You could say it’s the gift that keeps on giving. “That’s what I love so much about music, it can always be healing in one way or another, whether it’s letting you feel your sadness, or helping you to forget something, or helping you to remember something in a different light.”

Follow Julie Odell’s journey on social media via @juliekodell on Instagram.