Bloomington-based singer-songwriter Cody Diekhoff, known as Chicago Farmer, was in Colorado Springs promoting a new album when the pandemic hit. He and his band, the Fieldnotes, packed up and went home.
Diekhoff said he wasn't terribly eager to make another record after that.
Six years later, Homeaid is here, dropping March 6 on vinyl, CD and streaming platforms. The band returns to the Castle Theater to promote the album on March 28.
A double entendre, the title of the album points to the long arc of Chicago Farmer’s journey as a folk singer who has stayed relatively DIY the whole time.
“Back in 2013 I got a manager and started working with booking agents,” Diekhoff said. “Other than that, it’s been all grassroots, organic—yeah, homemade, exactly.”
Homeaid, in fact, is the first album he’s produced by a label, LoHi Records, and the first to feature his touring band, the Fieldnotes. Based in Greensboro, North Carolina, for a decade, LoHi’s mostly roots rock and Americana roster also includes Erik Duetsch, Them Coulee Boys, The High Hawks and Vince Herman.
“These songs are my life, my thing, my therapy—it’s hard to just give them to someone else,” Diekhoff said. “But I decided I’ve been doing it my own way for so long, it’s time to try something new.”
Half Hazard Press in Bloomington collaborated on the cover and liner art, plus a new line of merch.
'It's still about the songs'
Diekhoff said Homeaid feels like an inflection point.
“It’s definitely building and definitely growing,” he said. “I do love that, and the best part about it is, even though the team has grown, it’s still really about the songs.”
About those songs: Homemaid teeters in and out of Diekhoff’s comfort zone—both sonically and in the writing, which tends toward small oddities and mundane moments.
That is still very much present in songs like Tina Hart’s Mustang and Mattress.
“I lived on South Center Street in Bloomington, and I lived next to this rental house. For some reason the people who lived there often left abruptly,” he said. “I’m not sure why, but they would leave their stuff in the yard without taking it with them.
“So, I started staring at their mattresses for several weeks as I would have my coffee and play my guitar on my front porch. Then I started noticing mattresses everywhere else. They were on top of minivans and in the back of pickup trucks and under viaducts in Chicago. …As a songwriter, you have to pay attention to these things, but also I didn’t want a mattress song in my repertoire.”
There is, indeed, a mattress song in the repertoire—and it’s among peoples’ favorites.
Mattress stands in stark contrast to songs like Peshtigo and Battle Cry, which contribute to an overall angstier, pricklier, more rock-heavy sound in Homeaid.
“I think it is a dark time and that’s kind of what Homeaid is,” Diekhoff said. “I think we all need a little relief and assistance from all of this.”
Peshtigo in particular references the deadliest wildfire in recorded history, estimated to have killed between 1,500 and 2,000 people in the upper Midwest.
“The angst thing is definitely there,” he said.
The band recorded Homeaid at Pachyderm studios in Cannon Falls, Minnesota, the same place Nirvana recorded its 1993 album In Utero.
“When I was singing Peshtigo I was letting loose a little bit more—letting that scream out a little bit more. That’s kind of like therapy, really,” Diekhoff said. “I think a folk singer’s job is to sing about everything that’s happening in the world and at home. I’m still that at the core, but now we’ve got a little grit behind it."
Diekhoff said he’d been going through the motions, playing the same songs, the same way, night after night.
“That’s the last thing you want to do as an artist,” he said. “It’s tough for me to admit, but I’m happy to admit I wouldn’t allow that for too long. It’s time to move on and try new things.”
Chicago Farmer isn’t the only one shaking things up lately.
“It all starts right here locally,” said Diekhoff. “I just went and saw Dan Hubbard and he had a horn section on his show, and I thought that was so cool. Edward David Anderson’s always picking up a new instrument.”
“I think you always try to expand and try something new. And if you don’t, what’s the point?”
Chicago Farmer and the Fieldnotes' Homeaid is out now through LoHi Records. The band plays at the Castle Theatre on March 28. Tickets are $25 at thecastletheatre.com.
