Caitlin Cary & Thad Cockrell Plan Duet Album, "Begonias", Due on Yep Roc on June 14

Caitlin Cary is known for her work with Whiskeytown and Tres Chicas as well as two notable solo albums. Thad Cockrell is the singer/songwriter who "put the hurt back into country." Together, they penned "Please Break My Heart" for Cary's most recent solo effort, the acclaimed I'm Staying Out.

On June 14, they will issue a duet album titled Begonias (Yep Roc Records), which will expand on their storied chemistry as a singing and songwriting team. The album was recorded in Nashville and produced by Brad Jones (Josh Rouse, Jill Sobule, Butterfly Boucher).

"We'd actually planned to make this album a long time ago," says Cockrell. "It was sometime between Caitlin's first EP Waltzie and her album While You Weren't Looking. We'd write together on Sunday afternoons. It was merely a matter of fitting in with each other's schedules."

According to Cary, the album has one footprint in the duo's songwriting past and another in the present. "Half the material is older and very familiar," she says. "The other half was written in three weeks in the studio, so half the songs are old friends, and the other half are pure spontaneous combustion."

Getting out of Raleigh provided not only a needed change of scenery for the two, but a different method of recording. The guitarist on the CD, Pat Buchanan, had just come from sessions for the new Kenny Chesney record, and he, along with pedal steel virtuoso Pete Finney, were thrilled to be cutting "real country songs in real time." The entire cast was excited about recording the album live. "My favorite records were made this way but it's been a long time since I've gotten to record this way," siad Finney.

Cockrell, in fact, took the opportunity to relocate to Nashville just prior to the sessions, bringing him closer to the music of his inspiration.

Begonias has several standout tracks, but the one that is bound to cause the most instantaneous recognition is "Please Break My Heart." Says Cary, "It was thrilling to play it so differently than on my solo record. On my record, it was very simple. Here, as a duet, it's the way that Ray Charles and Betty Carter might have recorded it: plainly spoken, but with a lot of stylistic details that come straight out of the early '60s." The album title comes from the lyrics to "Conversations About a Friend," a story song told from different points of view. Another track of note is "Two Different Things," which was actually written during a pilot for a public radio program in which host Cockrell composes a song in the course of a conversation with a guest artist. In this case, the guest artist was Cary. Begonias also includes two covers: "Warm & Tender Love," originally sung by Percy Sledge, and "Waiting on June," which was written with the duo in mind by their friend Skip Matheny, of Roman Candle).

Those who attended SXSW in Austin during March 2005 were treated to four shows by the duo of Cary and Cockrell. The two will tour the U.S. during the summer months.