Patti's After-Party: "Coastal Cowgirl" Kimberly Dawn

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Canada has produced so many great country music artists over the years, including Terri Clark, Shania Twain, Paul Brandt, Tenille Townes, Lindsay Ell and Dean Brody. There are numerous independent artists that also hail from The Great White North, one of them being "Coastal Cowgirl" Kimberly Dawn. I had the pleasure of speaking with her recently and I’m excited to share some of our conversation here.

An Alberta native, Kimberly Dawn now splits her time between Nashville and Los Angeles, hence her nickname, Coastal Cowgirl. Right off the bat I was curious how that works, so we started there. Kimberly Dawn explained, “I’m from Alberta and I grew up on a farm. My dad was a farmer and we grew sugar beet, wheat, beans and alfalfa. It was about 600 acres, so we had a big farm.” So how did a farm girl from Alberta end up dividing her time between Music City and LA? There’s a bit of a story, so I’ll give Kimberly the microphone, so to speak.

“Funny enough, from the time I was a little girl of about four, I’d watch movies and see people singing in them, and say, ‘That’s what I wanna do. I wanna sing on TV.’ I grew up singing in church and I just knew I wanted more. Where I grew up, the population in my little town was under 1,000 people. There was one high school and junior high together and there were 30 kids in my graduating class. A lot of the girls married their high school sweethearts right out of high school, but I wanted more. I knew the only way for me to try and make things happen was to leave. I always said I was gonna move to the States, and I did. I moved to Los Angeles and started doing music. I was actually doing more pop music before I jumped into country. Country was always where I wanted to be, that’s where my heart was.”

She went on, “Because I was in LA, there just weren’t a lot of producers or people out there that knew what to do with country, as I was kind of in the pop world. Then I met someone who had lived in Nashville for about eight years and we started writing together. I said to him, ‘I really love country music, it’s kind of where my heart is, I grew up on it.’ So he said, ‘Okay, let’s start writing it. I think any song can be anything you want it to be. You can make it a country song, a pop song or whatever you want it to be with the production.’ I also really wanted to see how people in Nashville wrote songs because it is really different than how everybody else does it. There’s something very magical about it. So we started writing country and then he introduced me to one person in Nashville. That was almost 10 years ago. So I started taking trips to Nashville and just splitting time between there and LA. Now we actually bought a place in Nashville, so I’m probably here about fifty percent of the time. I do two weeks in LA and two weeks in Nashville.”

She stressed that taking that leap of faith has been a blessing for her because she really feels country music is what she was meant to do. After she began releasing country songs, people would comment that she seemed more at ease with the genre. “Country feels like home to me,” she shared. She added that it was the storytelling aspect that really attracted her to writing and performing country music. Expanding on that, she said, “Even as a little girl in school I loved writing poems and stories. So for me it’s the best of both worlds because I’m getting to tell stories and then I get to share them.”

Kimberly Dawn’s stories tend to emerge from both real-life experiences and fictional creations, but there are variations. “There’s a lot of my own personal experiences in them, but I also like to tell other people’s stories. I always say, ‘You never know, there might be a song out there with your story in it,’ because I’ll hear stories, not just from people I know, it could be from a random stranger I met on an airplane or something. When I hear certain stories, it might ignite something in me to want to tell that story, or something about that story. I’m always reading books and always listening. In those moments of listening there might be something that sparks a song idea. That’s happened many times. Even someone just saying one line and I’ll think, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s a song idea!’ Then I have to write it down immediately or I’ll forget it.”

It’s not the first time I’ve heard that. I can remember a few years ago an artist telling me about a conversation overheard in a grocery store checkout line. Unbeknownst to the people having the conversation, their words helped create a song just because a songwriter happened to be standing next to them in line. I also recall hearing the enormously talented songwriter Travis Meadows once saying his song “Better Boat” was based on something he heard a couple of guys talking about in a store. One of the men uttered words something like, ‘I need to build a better boat,’ and it became a remarkable song, eventually recorded by superstar Kenny Chesney. Kimberly Dawn is correct in saying you never know when something you say will become a song.

Writing songs is a passion and a learning process for Kimberly. “I’ve learned that when you’re writing, sometimes the songs aren’t gonna be for you. A song will come about and even if it’s a good song, I don’t feel like it’s meant for me. I’m always open to pitching, but it took me a while to get to that point because you have such a personal investment when you’re writing a song. Having to learn how to let go and realize it’s not for you and it’s meant for somebody else, that’s something you figure out. You still want to get it out into the world whether it’s from you or somebody else, so you let go.”

We had to discuss her latest single, “Mason Jar Magic,” which came out this summer. As much as we went on about songwriting, Kimberly didn’t have a hand in writing that one at all. It was penned by three outstanding songwriters, Tom Douglas (Miranda Lambert’s “The House That Built Me”, Lady A’s “I Run to You”), Dan Wilson (“Closing Time” by Semisonic, “Not Ready to Make Nice” by The Dixie Chicks) and Kat Higgins (Cody Johnson’s “The Painter”, Kenny Chesney’s “Knowing You”). Kimberly stated that Tom Douglas is one of her favorite writers and Dan Wilson is also a phenomenal songwriter. She added, “I later found out that Kat Higgins is also Canadian and she’s amazing.” 

Obviously in love with the song, Kimberly voiced her feelings about it. “It’s such a beautiful song and I felt such a connection to it. I fell in love with it and wanted to record it, but we had to get permission first because you never know if someone has a hold on it. If Carrie Underwood had put it on hold, I never would have recorded it. When we found out it was available, we were told, ‘You won the song.’ I really did feel like I won the song.” I couldn’t help commenting that “Won the Song” sounds like the title of a song by itself. Who knows? Maybe it will be someday.

My first impression of “Mason Jar Magic” was that it sounded so dreamy, ethereal even. Like a dream set to music. Kimberly described it as “nostalgic.” She’s right, it is nostalgic, but with sort of a hazy, calming and dreamlike vibe. It’s very nicely done. Although the well-known producer Kent Wells (Dolly Parton, Stevie Nicks, Elton John, Willie Nelson) is who Kimberly usually works with, this time it was Eric Torres. “I think Eric did an amazing job on the song and with my vocals. I actually texted him after I got the song back and asked him what mic he used because I thought he did such a great job with my vocals.”

As for the lyrics, Kimberly has a line she’s especially fond of. It’s in the chorus and says, “And I will when they said I won’t,” and she loves it because she believes it’s an inventive way of expressing a thought that’s been used in so many songs in the past. She shared, “To be a songwriter you have to think about how many love songs or breakup songs have been written. How are you going to be different from everybody else? How will you say something that hasn’t been said before? The writers found a clever way to do that with that line.”

Although it’s just a single for now, “Mason Jar Magic” will likely become part of an album in the future. Kimberly currently has 17 songs waiting to become one full-length album or possibly be split into two. You can listen to “Mason Jar Magic” now by clicking HERE.

After a summer of frequent traveling, Kimberly Dawn is ready to start playing some live shows. She’s been invited to do a couple of upcoming festivals in Florida and she also said she always loves playing in Nashville. She admitted that as much as she enjoys playing acoustic songwriter shows, she absolutely loves doing full-band gigs. “This year I did a full-band showcase at Luke Combs’ bar Category 10. I want to do that again. It’s such a great venue and the sound is amazing. Unfortunately the sound isn’t great everywhere you play. His bar is so nice and it was so much fun. People were two-stepping and dancing and having a ball,” she exclaimed.

When Kimberly isn’t writing or performing her own music, she enjoys listening to John Mayer, Lainey Wilson and she’s really been getting into Gracie Abrams. “I love that a lot of female artists are now writing their own stuff and they’re putting out really great music. I love to support all genres.” Just when I thought we were moving on to a new topic, she popped up and enthusiastically added, “Oh! Emily Ann Roberts! She’s one of my favorite humans and I don’t even know her! I love her so much.; She just makes me so happy. I follow her on social media and she’s a breath of fresh air, everything about her. I just have to say that!” 

This was where things got so weird for me. I interviewed Kimberly on September 2nd, which was a Wednesday. The Saturday before I was with my daughter and we were talking about country music artists. In almost the exact same excitable tone, my daughter told me she was a huge fan of Emily Ann Roberts. She loved her music, but more than that, she loved her; her homespun personality, how she crochets and likes to decorate, all of it. I didn’t know she was such a fan of Emily Ann Roberts until that Saturday. Now just four days later, another person with no connection to my daughter was essentially repeating the same words. It was bizarre, but fascinating, and now I'd really like to interview with Emily Ann.

We weren’t done talking about Emily Ann Roberts yet because Kimberly exclaimed, “I had to mention Emily Ann because she’s the real deal. She’s funny and just so authentic. She’s worked really hard. I didn’t know her when she was on The Voice, but she’s sort of popping up on my feed with her house stuff and her decorating and gardening. She’s so cute and I love her singing. Oh my gosh, she’s adorable. I love supporting other female artists and she’s been working really hard and she’s doing really well. She seems like a nice, kind person.”

I commented that maybe someday she could write with Emily Ann Roberts, to which she replied, “I’d love that. Maybe we could write a hit.” 

Every job has good points and not-so-good points. Kimberly Dawn detailed what she loves about having a music career. “Well, I love to sit and write. I’m newer at the guitar because piano is my first instrument, but I’ve really been putting a lot of time and energy into guitar. I take lessons every week. So it’s even more fun for me with the creative process because now I understand the chords and different strumming patterns. Just the whole process of creating a song before you put it out into the world is fun for me.”

On the flipside, what is she not much of a fan of?  “I would say my least favorite part, and I hate to say this, but it’s the social media and having to do all of that.” The good news is Kimberly isn’t the only one living on the “social-media-stresses-me-out” island, I’ve heard so many artists say the same thing. If you’re a casual user of social media, it’s nothing to doom scroll all day or post something here and there, but if you’re an artist and your career depends on staying on top of multiple social platforms, yes, it’s incredibly taxing. “It takes up so much time,” she confessed. “Listen though, I’m grateful for it, don’t get me wrong, it’s just that I’m a creative person and I want to create. I guess I’m just gonna have to look at social media as creating content when I’m on there, but it does take a lot of time. Sometimes I just don’t have the energy and I just don’t wanna do it, but I know that I have to, it’s just my least favorite part. I do Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok, so it’s not focused on one thing and that takes so much time.”

It’s inevitable that new social media platforms will be introduced all the time and that might force some artists to be more selective on which sites they choose to participate in. This is especially true for independent artists that really do all of their own social media. Some people hire others to handle their socials, but Kimberly Dawn is hesitant about doing that. She explained, “Even if you wanted to hire someone, I don’t always feel like they’d be able to get your message across. Not that they can’t, but I feel like sometimes you still have to be hands-on.” 

A box of random question cards was waiting for me to pick one out and ask her whatever it said. I picked one out and it said, “If you could be anywhere in the world for New Year’s Eve this year, where would you most want to be?” A few seconds of silence passed and finally she responded, “That’s a hard question. There are so many places I’d want to be. At the end of the day, I’d just want to be somewhere where I’m with my family, wherever in the world that would be. I’d just like to be together somewhere, maybe home with the family.” I couldn't agree more, I'd love to do the same.

We are Center Stage Magazine, so at what time in Kimberly Dawn’s life did she feel like she was “center stage?” I wasn’t expecting the answer she gave me, but it was timely and I loved hearing it. She began, “You know what? I’m gonna share this. It was when I met Dolly Parton. Dolly has this magical way of when she’s speaking to you, you feel like you’re her best friend. She didn’t know me, we’d just met. I just felt like I got a little bit of that magic she has, just that moment we had together. I remember feeling like, ‘Wow. This is it, this is the coolest moment ever.’ That really felt ‘center stage’ because it was such a moment for me. I was in the studio with Kent Wells and Dolly was coming in that morning to record. Kent told me, ‘Dolly’s coming in and I want you to come in and meet her.’ She knew I was coming so it wasn’t like we were surprising her with people. She came in like pure sunshine and she was as kind as could be, just lovely and full of energy. It was early, like 9:00 in the morning and she had more energy than most people do at that hour. She had full makeup, hair done and was looking fabulous as always. She was just so sweet.”

I transcribed her words exactly as she said them to me. She moved back and forth from present to past tense, which was interesting to me, as Dolly Parton sadly passed away August 25th, shortly before our interview. It occurred to me that it was probably very natural to speak of Dolly in the present tense because she’ll always be so alive in our hearts and minds. Imagine making that much of an impact on so many people that you’ll likely always be thought of as still here. That’s a life brilliantly lived. 

I asked her if she felt fortunate to have had that opportunity, now that Dolly is gone. Humbly, she replied, “I do. It’s one of those moments where you actually pinch yourself. I feel very honored and grateful that I got to meet her and spend a little time with her. We connected and we knew some of the same people. We were talking about some of the people we knew. She was just talking to me like I was her best friend. She was so cool.”

That concluded our conversation, but what better way to wrap it up than on a Dolly Parton note? Like I said, her answer was so unexpected, but it sprinkled a little joy into my day. I guess that would be the "Dolly Effect" and everyone could use some of that.

Keep current with Kimberly Dawn on her website and social media sites. If you comment or send her a message, let her know Center Stage Magazine sent you. We’d appreciate it!