Rural singer-songwriter Margo Cilker's pandemic hustle is paying off

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/12/ [login to see] /rural-singer-songwriter-margo-cilkers-pandemic-hustle-is-paying-off
Margo Cilker's songs bring listeners to the West's more forgotten places: from the 99 freeway through California farm country south to Tehachapi Pass to the north and Jordan Valley, Ore.

"Took a room at the old Basque hotel, it was like a kind of prayer when her eyelids fell," go the lyrics from That River, the first track on her first full length LP Pohorylle.

The lack of live gigs over the past two years was especially tough on up-and-coming musicians from smaller cities and towns like Cilker. But in the end it may have leveled the playing field some.

"I was one of the lucky ones to come out of the pandemic with more of an opportunity in the industry," Cilker says.

Originally from the suburban Bay Area in California, Cilker has spent most of her burgeoning career based in the rural Northwest from remote eastern Oregon to eastern Washington, where her husband works as a ranch hand.

During the lockdowns, Cilker did odd jobs around the ranch and sometimes played live for the cowboys and the veterinarians. And she wrote, a lot. Everyone was remote and virtual and her rural life figured heavily into her music. It appears to have given her career an early boost.