Mary Gauthier

Singer-songwriter, teacher, restaurateur, short story writer, lesbian rights campaigner and political activist, Mary Gauthier's colourful background and fearless songs have made her a significant cult star with her song 'I Drink' becoming a country classic.

Born in New Orleans she was abandoned by her mother in a women and infants asylum. She was raised by an Italian Catholic couple but ran away from home at the age of 15, turned to drugs and alcohol, was in detox at 16 and spent her 18th birthday in a Kansas City prison. She dropped out of Louisiana State University and, after attending Cambridge School of Culinary Arts, opened a Cajun restaurant in Boston. She subsequently ran the Dixie Kitchen restaurant for eleven years and when she finally released her first album in 1997, she called it 'Dixie Chicken'.

Arrested for drink driving in 1990, she gave up alcohol and, at the age of 35, decided to put the experiences of her eventful life into songs. The results made her a household name with her second album, 'Drag Queens in Limousines' informing the wider world of the arrival of a powerful singer-songwriter who not only talked the talk but had walked the walk and was in the same exclusive mould as her heroes like Townes Van Zandt, Steve Earle and Lucinda Williams.

Her vivid, descriptive songs about alternative lifestyles and downtrodden characters she'd met on the streets living on the fringe of society and her full-blooded performances made her a big live attraction in both the country and folk fields and underlined her flair for explosive narratives with the albums 'Filth & Fire' (2002), 'Mercy Now' (2005) and 'Between Daylight & Dark' (2007). Some of her personal experiences went on to be recounted in brutally honest fashion on her 2010 album 'The Foundling' which also featured Margo Timmins and Garth Hudson.

A political activist, short story writer and gay rights campaigner, her most significant release came in 2018 with the album 'Rifles & Rosary Beads' which was a result of her involvement with the Songwriting With Soldiers programme featuring eleven songs written in collaboration with army veterans recounting their often harrowing experiences.