The Runaway Strings formed on Halloween in 2023, when a spontaneous front-porch banjo session introduced husband-and-wife pair Peter Harrison and Jiah to the trio’s third member, Lionel. For a country band based in Ararat, Victoria, it’s hard to imagine a more American origin story.
That borrowed Americana sits at the center of “Baby When It’s Gone, It’s Gone.” Harrison spent his life wanting to visit the country that produced Muddy Waters, Hank Williams, Woody Guthrie and Johnny Cash, and about a year ago he came to feel that the America of those records had disappeared. He compares it to “watching a friend go off the rails,” and he hoped the song would sound out of date by the time it came out. The moment hasn’t passed.
The band sets aside the jokes of debut single “Big Gold Watch” for something more tender while keeping its usual mix of guitar, ukulele, banjo and harmonica. Harrison produced the track himself at Greenhills Sound in Blackwood, with Bobby Bravington mixing and engineering. That small acoustic lineup suits an elegy, since it’s built from the same tools as the music Harrison fell for in the first place.
Warmth carries the song. The band treats the loss the way you’d treat a friend in trouble, with sadness and a little wit, and the result is a farewell with the porch light still on. The America Harrison loved survives in exactly the kind of front-porch session that started this band.
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