Nancy McCallion

About Nancy McCallion

Best known as the (expired link) for the celtic/Americana band, The Mollys, Nancy McCallion performs American roots music with a twist of soul and a dram of blarney.

"Rivals Lucinda Williams and Iris Dement as one of the finest Americana songwriters..." - The Washington Post

"(Nancy McCallion's) tough-hearted tales of women struggling to strike a balance between intimacy and independence are as good as any being written today." -Bill Friskics-Warren, The Nashville

The daughter of an Irish-Scots immigrant and a Texas farm girl, McCallion grew up in Tucson, a cross-cultural border town. She heard, and was obviously influenced by, the Norteno sounds of her Southwest Side neighborhood, her older sister’s Beatles’ records, and 1970s and '80s radio rock, mixed with her dad's Irish trad and her mother's Texas old-time country. Throw in adolescent Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello and Pogues fixations and you've got the cultural stew that emerged as The Mollys' drop-jaw repertoire. McCallion, Zavala and The Mollys developed a solid following and a trail of rave reviews (including a listing in the Washington Post’s top 10 CDs of 1997) for powerful, hard-to-classify recordings and pool-of-sweat performances over 14 years. The band took a break in 2001, when McCallion stopped to have a child, and disbanded in 2003, after a last tour of Italy. She never quit writing, and resumed live performance and recording as a solo, over the last 20 years. Although often compared favorably to Lucinda Williams and other leading female writers, McCallion's sharp takes on life lived small also bring to mind Tom Wait's dark, quirky tales. Catch Nancy's track "On We Go" on Putamayo's Women of the World: Celtic along with Mary Black, Clannad, Maura O'Connell, Capercaillie and others.