Songfacts®:

• Madeleine Peyroux's ninth album, Let's Walk, was in many ways a long time coming. After her 2018 album Anthem, Peyroux found herself facing the strange quiet of the pandemic, when the idea of gathering, let alone recording, felt like a distant memory. But the global shutdown had an unexpected upside. With time on her hands and nowhere to go, she hunkered down with her longtime collaborator, Jon Herington (who also plays with Steely Dan). Together, they reflected on the strange, seismic moment they were living through and wrote, rewrote, and then wrote some more - what Peyroux calls "a shadow of reckoning."
  
  Enter producer Elliott Scheiner (Fleetwood Mac and Eagles) who, after hearing the early material, laid down one rule: "No covers." He was convinced the time was ripe to highlight Peyroux's own lyrics, which often cut deep into the issues of the day meshed with Herington's skill for weaving melodies and arrangements.
• "Let's Walk" came to Peyroux in a dream. She'd been part of the Black Lives Matter marches in New York City, and the experience struck a chord deep within her. "I think I was subconsciously seeking to pay homage to that experience," she told UK newspaper The Sun.
  
  "One morning, I woke with these words, their rhythm, the chanting form, and its call and response, in mind," she continued. "I sent them, with a two-note reference melody and no chords to Jon Herrington."
  
  Two days later, she received a demo back, fully fleshed out with seven-part harmonies, chords, the whole works. And yes, she wept.
• The end result is an upbeat song that feels like a call to action. It's about the collective power of people moving together for a cause, a "voluntarily unified action in support of a humanitarian ideology," as Peyroux puts it.
• Herington added a gospel touch, layering in organ, a steady beat, and some uplifting harmonies from a trio of powerhouse vocalists: Catherine Russell (David Bowie, Steely Dan), along with Cindy Mizelle (Bruce Springsteen) and Keith Fluitt (Patti LaBelle, Michael Jackson). These gospel-style call-and-response moments contribute to the song's energetic and mobilizing feel, supporting Peyroux's vision of a global march for civil rights.