Long Player from Whiskeytown Alumnus, Produced by Chris Stamey, Features Guests Mary Chapin Carpenter, Greg Humphreys (Hobex), Audley Freed (Black Crowes), Mitch Easter, Thad Cockrell and Jane Scarpantoni

RALEIGH, N.C. – Caitlin Cary is putting the finishing touches on her second full-length album, titled I’m Staying Out. The album follows last year’s acclaimed While You Weren’t Looking, called “the best recording yet to surface from the remnants of Whiskeytown” by No Depression magazine. Chris Stamey once again produced. Street date is set for April 22.

In crafting the album, Cary surrounded herself with longtime accompanists Jen Gunderman (piano, organ, accordion and vocals), Dave Bartholomew (acoustic and electric guitars, vocals), Brian Dennis (guitar) and Jon Wurster (drums and percussion.) Joining them for the record on bass, guitar and harmonies this time out was special guest Don Dixon (solo recording artist and producer whose credits include R.E.M., Marshall Crenshaw, the Smithereens and Dixon’s wife, Marti Jones).

In addition, several artists made cameo appearances, including vocal harmonies by Mary Chapin Carpenter, Greg Humphreys (Hobex, Dillon Fence) and Thad Cockrell, guitar from Audley Freed (Black Crowes) and Mitch Easter (Let’s Active, producer of R.E.M.), and cello by Jane Scarpantoni (R.E.M., Beastie Boys and Nirvana.) Lee Smith (author of numerous novels, essays and short story collections, most recently the bestseller The Last Girls and numerous novels, essays and short story collections) contributed spoken word. John Plymale (Meat Puppets, Eyes Adrift, Superchunk, Squirrel Nut Zippers) engineered and did the lion’s share of the mixing.

Cary is a founding member of Whiskeytown, in which she sang, wrote and played violin alongside bandmate Ryan Adams.

Reflecting on the making of the new album, Cary offers these thoughts: “We made what I believe is a big, colorful record. There’s a purple song and for sure a red song, and yellow, and several shades of green. So I guess it’s safe to say there’s a lot of variety. There are complex stories in a lot of the songs, but not the sort that bog things down. I think a lot of energy runs throughout, so that even the sad or the poignant songs don’t dwell in melancholy, and the songs with ‘plots’ will still be good listening after the story’s been digested.”

A key progression between I’m Staying Out and its predecessor is that the new album benefits from the band’s road miles of the past year. “I think you can hear a band on this record,” she says. “It was made by the touring group and there’s give and take that comes from us knowing and reacting to one another, which allows each instrument to take its proper place and really shine. From the earliest point of listening to basic tracks, we knew we had a solid record, because there was a fullness to the music that made overdubbing seem like a luxury instead of a necessity. We certainly had fun adding shimmer and unique musical characters with harmonies, horns, strings and clarinet – but they feel like seasoning more than stock.”

Among the songs on I’m Staying Out is “Empty Rooms,” which emerged from Caitlin’s vision of what it might be like to have one’s life really fall apart. “It’s not about breaking down, but about not being able to feel enough,” she says. “It yielded a sort of driving, angry song, and that surprised me a little. I hadn’t realized that the character would insist on sounding so forceful and direct.” Another song, “Lorraine Today,” is a fictionalized version of the life of someone Caitlin knows well. “What I’m hoping,” she says, “is that it presents a clear picture without really beating home the plot – it’s more like a poem now, I think, and one which I hope will mean something a little different to each person who hears it.” And “Please Break My Heart,” co-penned with Thad Cockrell, emanated from Caitlin’s “complaint” that her life was too relatively happy to inspire a country song. Thad went home and came up with the chorus hook “please break my heart.” From there, she says, “We set out together to write the plainest, saddest country song we could muster. So the end result is this incredibly sweet-sad song about a character who would rather have the person she loves break her heart over and over again than let him go.”

Adds producer Stamey: “On this album, Caitlin has combined honesty and romance, clarity and passion, in a way that makes you feel that this is not a contradiction but the natural state of things. This is a record for true believers."

2002’s While You Weren’t Looking, received some of that year’s highest accolades. Entertainment Weekly wrote: “Trekking through love's badlands, (Caitlin’s) rangy soprano is all hard-won confidence -- the sound of an erstwhile second fiddle claiming first chair.” USA Today added: “Turns out Ryan Adams isn't the only talented alumnus of alternative-country deities Whiskeytown. The band's ex-violinist blossoms out from under Adams' prodigious shadow. Cary crafts charming and bittersweet Southern pop.” And the Tennessean: “Cary is decidedly on her way, and it’s a sign of how good Whiskeytown was that it may well have launched two noteworthy careers.”

Plans call for a U.S. tour throughout the spring and summer months with dates to be announced shortly.