Des Moines songwriter Patresa Hartman nearly let her new album slip quietly into the world without fanfare. Instead, she celebrated Wolf in a Lady Suit with a triumphant release show at xBk Live earlier last month — and she’s glad she did.
She gathered up a crew of veteran Des Moines-area musicians and, with one exception, played every song on the new record at xBk Live. There with her was a crowd of roughly 100 friends and supporters. Hartman said she’s “proud" of how the songs stood up in the live setting and how smoothly her band performed them.
The thing is, she nearly didn’t go through with it.
The songs that became Wolf in a Lady Suit sat for years virtually abandoned, interrupted by the pandemic. Hartman said she nearly quit songwriting altogether at the time, all but convinced the anxiety she battles during live performances wasn’t worth it. Even after she decided to finish the album, which was a decision spurred on by her 50th birthday and the discovery that she still had things she needed to get off her chest as an artist, she considered forgoing any kind of release show.
Steph Graham, the album’s bassist, convinced her otherwise.
“I told [Steph] I’m not doing a release party, but she said we have to because she wanted me to play the songs live,” Hartman said during an interview, continuing, “I have since thanked her.”
Wolf in a Lady Suit features 10 original soul-folk tracks, some of which Hartman began recording in 2019 at Midday Studios in Des Moines. Hartman decided to finish the album at Golden Bear Studios, adding in three newly written songs. In addition to her keys and vocals, Russ Tomlinson and Renee Potts play percussion, Amanda Drish plays violin, Graham plays double bass, Tommy Doggett provides saxophone and Jenny Kohls adds electric guitar.
“The Bride” kicks off the release with an exploration of gender double standards and societal expectations placed on women. Hartman’s rebellious streak lurks behind every lyric, hinting at a desire to tear up the rulebook and toss it to the wind. Hartman said she decided to make “The Bride” track one because its rebelliousness ties much of the album together.
Hartman said the song came from a dream she had, during which she was on a date but couldn’t manage to keep her dress clean no matter how hard she tried.
“And to me it was a lesson that I and a lot of women grew up with, which was stay clean and pure, pristine,” she said. “And if you are not those things then you will not be respected or loved or wanted. We see that play out in the emphasis we put on a white wedding dress.”
“Willing Accomplice,” the fifth track, is another highlight. In it, Hartman takes an unflinching look at a failed relationship, and recognizes her own hand in its demise. In her voice, the listener can hear an artist facing up to a hard truth and extracting painful lessons. Instrumentally, the song is carried by softly plucked acoustic guitar and melodic violin. The song is so raw and vulnerable that it was the one track Hartman didn’t play at the album release show.
“I once was a willing accomplice / Will I just be a willing accomplice again?” Hartman half-sighs at the end of the song.
“For that song, it’s a rejection of this idea of being a victim when things go sour in a relationship. Oftentimes … you can see how you set yourself up for it,” she said. “That was me acknowledging that, and then being afraid that if I don’t fix that am I setting myself up for that again?”
Hartman’s vocal delivery shines on every track. She delivers her lyrics with a soulful, mature approach that carries an emotional weight all its own. She said she doesn’t do anything in particular to prepare to track her vocals. Rather, she tries to let the song do the work for her.
“I guess if I’ve written a song that’s honest, then it’s just gonna come out,” Hartman said. “Less than a handful of times I’ve written songs that didn’t really mean anything to me. Those songs never stick. They never feel right, and they go away as quickly as they come. If I write a song that means something and feels honest and expresses something I need to express, then the vocal delivery takes care of itself.”
‘Wolf in a Lady Suit’ is Hartman’s third full-length album and is available to stream on major music platforms and on CD via her Bandcamp page.
