Seven months after Gulf Coast singer-songwriter Molly Thomas suffered serious injuries in a car wreck, she and her band The Rare Birds have taken wing again.

Thursday evening the band made its first appearance since last summer at the Book Cellar, within Fairhope’s Page & Palette bookstore. The size of the overflow crowd and the warmth of its love for Thomas made amply clear that this was a special occasion.

“I’m not quite back to 100% but I’m getting very close,” Thomas said at one point, apologizing for using a stool rather than standing. “I can’t thank you enough for all of the support that everybody has given. Prayers [being] the most important, I feel like, it’s what got me through it all. Financially, bless all of y’all for helping out. My husband and I have been able to pay the bills, thank goodness.”

Thomas, a native of coastal Mississippi, has considerable history in the Mobile area. Her vocals and fiddle work were essential to the sound of Slow Moses, a prominent group on the Mobile scene in the ‘90s. She later spent some time in Nashville before making Fairhope her home; her solo releases over the years have included 2005′s “Shoot the Sky,” 2011′s “Make Everything Bright” and “Honey’s Fury” in 2019.

By 2015 she had found the musical allies who form The Rare Birds: Guitarist Rick Hirsch, drummer John Milham and bassist John Keuler.

The 2023 wreck left her facing the prospect of being unable to work or perform for months. A GoFundMe drive was immediately set up, with a goal of $30,000. Supporters ended up contributing nearly $41,000.

So Thursday’s show at the Book Cellar was many things: A homecoming, a payback, a reunion. An occasion for triumph and pride, humility and thankfulness.

It was also a reminder than Molly Thomas is something special. The third song in, she called a new original tune that The Rare Birds had never played out or even rehearsed as a group. She had every reason to play it safe on this night, sticking to songs the band knew like the back of its hand. But Molly Thomas does not play it safe.

“I cause myself a lot of anxiety, being that way,” she said afterward. “And a lot of conversations with myself after the fact, going, ‘Did, I really just do that? I can’t believe we did that.’”

She’s a believer in “honing the craft of a song and rehearsing it and getting it done really well before you play it,” she said, and that normally is the way the Rare Birds go about their business. But this was a special occasion. In part it was about picking up threads of life and art that had been torn apart by the wreck.

Thomas said the song, “Even the Strong Need Somebody Sometimes,” has roots going back five years or more. She was recovering from a divorce, she said, and friends kept praising her for how strong she was being. She didn’t necessarily agree.

“I would have conversations with myself on my front porch and go, ‘What are they talking about? Like, I need somebody to put my shoulder on. I wish I had somebody here with me that I could lean on.’ Because, you know, life is heavy.”

It made her think that she had a duty to others. “Like maybe that was my calling, in a way, to show strength for other women or other people who were having a hard time.”

She and writing partner Ken Rose were working on the song and other material for a planned new album. But life kept changing, even before the pause forced by the wreck. “Life is so interesting because you can divide it up into segments of time, you know, pre-COVID, post-COVID,” she said. “So I have, you know, pre-divorce, post-divorce, pre-accident, post-accident.”

(Note: Thomas has since remarried, to Gary Brady, who she describes as “a rock throughout my recovery.” He’s a fellow artist whose paintings can be found at Sophiella Gallery in downtown Mobile.)

She’d started the song in 2017 or 2018, she said, but put it away. More recently she and Rose had worked at completing it and had even made a rough demo before the wreck. She and Hirsch and Keuler played it at a low-key Biloxi show in January, and she and Rose and Keuler played it earlier this month at The Frog Pond, a Baldwin County venue. But Thursday was the first time The Rare Birds had played it.

“John Milham had never heard the song until like the day before,” she said. “So it wasn’t too foreign for everybody but foreign enough to probably not have put it on the set list.”

But it’s a song about resilience, and the moment was about resilience, so in it went. And let’s be clear, part of the reason The Rare Birds are named The Rare Birds is because of the musical depth they bring to the table, and their willingness and ability to follow a leader who’s uncompromising about her art.

A few songs after that, the group hit its stride, following Thomas’ tender “Everything’s Gonna be Alright” with a swampy cover of the Buddy Miller-Julie Miller tune “Gasoline and Matches.” As Milham and Keuler laid down a sinuous, bluesy groove, Hirsch – a founding guitarist for Wet Willie, sideman to the likes of Gregg Allman and Joan Armatrading – poured out a wild wah-wah solo far beyond anything you’d have expected could fit into a coffeehouse gig, and Thomas filled in with some equally unconventional fiddle work.

“We’ve had a lot of fun playing that song,” she said. “I’ve never been able to quite hone in the fiddle part on that song, but I think with a few more tries, we’ll get it.”

For Thomas and The Rare Birds to make their return to public view at the Book Cellar was no accident. Thomas has worked there as a bartender and was instrumental in developing the venue’s music series. She’s taken the stage with other groups and performed there with The Rare Birds. It’s a home venue.

Thursday night, she got a warm welcome back home. Added to the support she’s felt over the last seven months, it was humbling.

“There’s been just a lot of support from the people of this town,” she said. “It’s been amazing and they all reached in their pockets to help the GoFundMe and, Gary and I, I don’t know what we would have done had that not happened. I can’t even define the meaning of it all, it’s just otherworldly, how I feel. The presence of people last night, and their enthusiasm and support, I just can’t put it into words.”

Thomas said that her goals are to get back to performing full-time, and hopefully to release that long-brewing new album by the end of the year.

The last few months have changed her, she said.

“Quite honestly, through all of this, one thing I learned is to embrace my gifts,” she said. “I’ve never done that, I don’t think, quite as deeply.”

This is a somewhat shocking thing to hear. But pursuing a career in original music brings a lot of challenges, and Thomas said she’s struggled with doubts.

“I’ve had a lot of time on the couch thinking and like reflecting about life,” she said. “And so all of the lessons that I’ve learned, one of them is that I’ve built a stronger connection with myself and my talent. I know I’m not all that, but I’m just saying that I do have the gift that I have been given.

“I’ve always tried to put my candle out, like, not shine on myself, because I haven’t really liked that kind of attention,” she said. “Not that I like it now because obviously I’m having a hard time even putting this into words. But I guess what I’m trying to say is one of the lessons I’ve learned is to accept myself and my talents on a different level than I have before.”

“I can hear my grandmother say, long ago when I was small, ‘You’ve been given a gift and it’s your responsibility to use your gifts and to share your gifts with others,’” she said. “And I’ve always heard that in her voice, saying that, but I’ve never really accepted it until now, I guess.”

“I guess there’s always been that love-hate relationship with music because it’s something that I had to do,” Thomas said. “It’s really the only thing I know how to do, that and make pottery. So there’s always conversations swirling around in my head about, ‘What am I doing? What else can I do? Maybe I could be somebody’s bookkeeper or, you know, something else.’”

She’s been grounded, but it’s time to fly.

“Now I know this is what I’m meant to do,” she said.

For updates on Molly Thomas’ performance schedule, visit www.facebook.com/mollyewingthomas.