Candace Hastings is long steeped in songwriting. Her first came when she was in fifth grade; it had just one chord and was written on the three-quarter-size Kay guitar that her mother bought for her the Christmas after her father died. She explains that her mother couldn’t afford it, but that she also knew that music heals. Horses I Left Behind is from her latest album, Soft Place to Land, and has a strong folk feel to it, but when asked about where she fits in the americana genre, Candace challenges the notion that subcategories need to exist in americana music. As she describes it: “Americana is the sweep of the AM radio dial in a ’66 three-on-the-tree pickup, and my album, Soft Place to Land, set to be released in summer 2026, is an old-school, AM-radio road trip. Each song is a different station on the americana radio dial.”
About the song, Candace explains, “I was adopted at birth and learned as an adult that my birth mother was a tribal member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. I made many trips to the reservation in Shawnee to learn about my history and culture. But no matter how hard I worked at being “Potawatomi enough,” I still felt like an interloper. One dark, star-filled night, I was about 30 miles south of Shawnee when I suddenly had an intense feeling of finally being home. I pulled to the side of the road and wept. Later, I discovered I’d been driving parallel to the cemetery where my grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great-grandmother are buried. ‘Horses I Left Behind’ is about the gift my ancestors gave me that night.”
Speaking specifically on the topic of horses and how that relates to the featured song, Hastings adds: “At one time, I owned a place with a small hay operation and up to six horses, depending on how many hard luck cases I had taken on. But every girl who has had horses will tell you they had a heart horse. Mine was Bug–a sorrel the colour of a shiny copper penny. He’s the horse I could ride to the store, put new riders on, tell my secrets to. He was my best friend and refuge when I went through a soul-wrenching divorce. He taught me to be brave. When I moved to the city to take a new job, I boarded Bug at a local barn. On the first day on the job, the barn manager called. Bug was colicking. When I took him to the equine hospital, the veterinarians told me the impaction was so severe that surgery was not an option, but to leave him there overnight so they could stabilize and treat him. When I arrived at sunrise on the morning of July 4th, they told me he had survived the night because he wanted to say goodbye. I am grateful for those last few sacred hours we had together to say bama pi, until later. Potawatomi do not have a word for goodbye. We know we will all be reunited, if not here on Turtle Island, in the afterlife. In the song, Bug is the horse I left behind and the horse who found me again. He was sent into my life to protect me, to be by my side, and once he knew I was going to be okay, he went back to the spirit world. ”
Horses I Left Behind was written by Candace Hastings and features her on vocals & guitar backed by Glenn Fukunaga on bass guitar. It was produced by Pat Manske & Lloyd Maines, and engineered and mastered by Pat Manske at The Zone, Dripping Springs, Texas.
