“The Desert Wind Rang the Bell”: Dave Christen on ‘I’m Yours Tonight’ and the Day Music Became a Wedding

Well, we got delayed in Dallas getting to Terlingua on our trip. It’s nine hours from Dallas. I’ve been going there and playing for years, and it actually goes way back, as I have hiked the Big Bend area many times over many years. I had to cancel a Thursday show at Long Draw Pizza because of the delay, so we ended up in the Boathouse watching an open mic with Rory Hancock—and his dad was there, Butch Hancock of The Flatlanders with Joe Ely and Jimmie Dale Gilmore.

I did not book a show for Friday, the day of the recording session, so that any overruns in the session would not create the problem of having to run off and do a gig. We did have a show Saturday night at DB’s Rustic BBQ. I did tell Butch that night I was going to cut his song “If You Were a Bluebird,” which I did cut during Terlingua Sessions II a year later.

That Thursday night, I sprung it on her. She had not brought clothes or prepared in any way for it, but said, “Are you really asking me to get married?” I said yes. We knew Scott was ordained and had talked about doing it in Terlingua, but actually doing it all of a sudden became reality. I had rounded up all locals for the recording session. Moses Martinez was doing harmonica on the sessions, and his wife, Skye, loaned her a homemade duster coat. She got married in her flip-flops and her hand-decorated hat. Greg Hammer, the owner of the Boathouse, was the only witness besides the session musicians and Bill Palmer. Of course, the Terlingua local on spoons, Dan Pruitt, did spoons on a couple of songs and was the best man. Bill Palmer walked her down the aisle.

Okay, well, my usual method of recording is to record a scratch with a click, with vocals and guitar. Then come back and redo the guitar, focusing just on that, then come back and redo a vocal track to cue everything else and have those isolated. Then, many times, redo the vocal after all parts are in.

This day, we started with “One Last Day in Tennessee” that way, but decided very quickly that all those extra takes might not be necessary when the initial scratch track was so good that it stood perfect. We were going to be able to mix a nice blend of vocal and guitar with the mics in the room. The acoustics and the vibe and my voice and mood just set the tone for the whole session.

So we tracked “One Last Day in Tennessee” down and moved on to “I’m Yours Tonight.” It ran in one take, as did “Terlingua Moon” and “Don Pedro.” On some of the session, there were retakes on some partial parts, but mostly on bass and dobro to fix some flaws—and done so professionally and quickly, it was amazing. The harmonica was all one take, and spoons as well, adding those on top.

Yes, we did realize it was an issue that day, as the church is very small, and the wind noise itself and the doors blowing open were all concerns in the recordings. In fact, it was the second time it happened that day, and actually, it happened even more prominently on the “Don Pedro” song. While the spirit of Texas was sanctioning our love and the love song—and sending Texas wind to ring the bell in our honor on “I’m Yours Tonight” in approval—it really rang in acknowledgement of its El Alma de Tejas, the soul of Texas, Don Pedro. I had a shrine set up with a picture and candles to honor the Texas legend.

Well, I do consider it my masterpiece to date. And then “When the Train Leaves the Last Station” comes in right after, also recorded in the ghost-town church one year after the first sessions. It features Bill Palmer on guitar. But back to “I’m Yours Tonight”: I had been divorced for more than 20 years and had not even lived with a woman for that period. “I’m Yours Tonight” was, in my mind, my way of celebrating our union and finding the soulmate. It was inspired by trying to rewrite your heroes, which they say to do. So its inspirational musical-form catalyst came from Dylan’s “Feel My Love,” but, as all my songs do, it took on a beautiful life of its own.

Scott lives in Terlingua, out in the Terlingua Ranch area, and has a pretty good-sized piece of the West—many acres. He is an amazing guy: songwriter, singer, guitar player and bass player. His water-capture system from tin roofs processes tens of thousands of gallons of water. He did all the purification equipment himself. He has a full-blown studio at the ranch he calls Crazy Rock.

Now, he is not just a bass player; he is a master on bass. “I’m Yours Tonight,” in particular—I came back to Dallas and played it on headphones to John, my bass player who plays the local live shows in Dallas. John asked me, “Are you going to put bass on it?” I said, “There is bass on it.” The bass was so clean and perfect and precise, he thought it was the guitar producing the bass sound.

Now, not only that, the spaghetti-Western lead on “Don Pedro” is Scott. Watching him grab the low E key and tweak it way down out of tune, play some more, and then grab it again and tweak it back up into tune was one of the most amazing guitar leads I’ve ever witnessed. He has had us out to the ranch to stay during the world-renowned chili cookoff in Terlingua and is just a super guy and monumental friend now.

Well, it turned out that Bill kind of has an in with Bill Ivey, who, well, owns the ghost town. We didn’t have to pay to use it; we just had to be sure we had it spoken for on that date. Whenever we record, we always have some tourist types come around and come in and listen while we work. The setting is very inspiring, and the acoustics are amazing. I had been in the church over the years and was glad to hear it would be the location when we came to have Bill record.

Bill is extremely professional and top-notch—the kind of engineer you want, who knows exactly what and where you need to pick up if you redo a bar or section. He is also a very talented writer and musician. On Terlingua Sessions II, Scott was stuck on what he would do on guitar for “When the Train Leaves the Last Station.” It could be that he sensed Bill was really connecting with it, so Bill ended up doing the last guitar track on it, and man, it is just epic. He has recorded many times in the room and knows exactly how to work it.

Don Pedro was a healer who came over from Mexico in the late 1800s. I came across the history and was fascinated with his story. I struggled for probably about a year with chord progressions and looking for co-writers before the song finally came together. I feel like it’s kind of my “Hurricane.” You know, Bob Dylan visited Rubin Carter in prison to get the story for his song.

Now, I have read not only about Don Pedro, but also the curanderos, their history and other Texas ones like Teresa out in El Paso. I also have visited the Don Pedro shrine in Falfurrias that is still there today. Actually, you can go there and still today see people leave notes asking for his help and blessing in things. He would literally have 100s of people come and camp at his adobe hut to get his healing advice. The feds tried to take him down for practicing medicine without a license, but he never charged anyone—only took donations—and even fed the large groups of people who came, growing food in the area. Then he cured the sheriff’s wife of blindness, and things changed. He also would travel around to people to heal.

I ended up writing the piece myself, but with the help of my producer and DFW music partner, Don Maracle—an accomplished musician, producer and engineer—I was able to take the piece that was written in the fifth mode of the harmonic minor scale that gave it Latin flavor. He needed to shore up the chords and some of the movements to stay true to the mode. So I do call him a co-writer on that one.

Well, you know, nowadays anybody and their brother and drum machine in their bedroom can think they are an artist. And some are, but not all are; most are just dabblers, and that’s okay. Music is healing. The streaming industry gets over a hundred thousand new songs a day and, thus, a huge group of people who can be taken advantage of.

And so, this has created a whole army of some guy and their brother who put up a website and act like they are a magazine or they are the media, to troll those people for money. Real media looks for news and funds their magazines from sponsors and ads—not asking artists to pay for articles. That is fake and not journalism.

As an independent artist, you reach out to a lot of people if you are doing it on any kind of level. So the fakers come back at you, thinking you’re a novice and would be glad to have anybody say anything about you—and you’re naive enough to pay for it. Technology and the social-media world create all kinds of new potholes to navigate.

Well, the Dave Christen team is hitting the music harder and busier than I ever have. I took a break years ago, thinking I needed to step away. Now I see it as just lost time. Music is a lifetime thing. I keep writing the best thing I ever have, and keep topping myself. That is all I can do and will continue to do. I tell people my retirement plan is… drop dead.