Lera Lynn Talks More About Her True Detective Music in New Interview with Weld

By Reuben Levine | Sep 23, 2015

Lera Lynn had a major presence in True Detective season two, so it’s no so surprising that we’ve already seen several interviews with her discussing her music. She appeared, seemingly melded into the background, as a moody guitar player that frequently set the stage. In case a refresher is needed, just re-watch last Sunday’s Emmy awards.

More from HBO

From earlier interviews with Lynn we learned that she was subject to just as much secrecy as others working on the show. Much of this new interview with Weld covers details that we’ve heard before, but some of it is actually new. In turns out that she, too, saw her role as a sort of Greek Chorus:

"I walked away thinking that the role of the singer was like that of a Greek chorus, perhaps…It doesn’t seem that, in the subject matter of the lyrics, the character is necessarily foreshadowing or summarizing the story, but it’s more like an emotional or spiritual tone that I think the character set for the other characters in the show.”"

That hits the nail on the head. Lera Lynn had no speaking lines, but she was still a part of it all. Lynn also mentions Roseanne Cash, a name that hasn’t really come up before in interviews about the True Detective music. Before the season premiered we learned that Cash was somehow involved, but that was the last we heard of it. Cash wrote lyrics for “My Least Favorite Life,” and Lynn talks about creating music for them:

"“She contributed some really stunning lyrics [for that song]…T Bone and I wrote the music together in a couple of hours, maybe less, and recorded it right then. And that’s what you hear.”"

The song, like most of the others the other Lera Lynn/T. Bone Burnett songs, has a minimalist feel to it. It’s not shocking to hear that it was recorded and produced quickly. You can head over to Weld to read the entire review, which also touches on Lynn’s “relationship to darkness” that may have attracted Burnett to her in the first place.

Next: The Huffington Post on True Detective season two hate.

More from Show Snob