Sturgill Simpson‘s 2019 album, Sound & Fury, came with an accessory in the form of a Netflix anime film by the same name. The film, set to the album, highlights a mysterious driver in a post-apocalyptic hellscape facing two opponents. Slated for November, Simpson and Z2 Comics are to release the film’s prequel, Sound & Fury: The Graphic Novel, exploring the driver’s beginnings.
The 144-page novel offers two different formats: a standard paperback version and a deluxe hardcover edition in a slipcase. Each is available for preorder. The project features the artwork of Rufus Dayglo, Deathburger, Rosi Kampe, Vasilis Lolos, and Takashi Okazaki.
Deathburger artwork
“Creatively this is one of the most ambitious projects we have published to date, with an incredible team behind it” says Z2 Comics publisher Josh Frankel. “The end result will not only be worth the wait, but will be one of the most complete realizations of any artist’s vision in the history of our company.”
The singer-songwriter performed a bluegrass livestream concert at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium this summer to raise money for MusiCares COVID-19 Relief, Special Forces Foundation, and the Equity Alliance. In April, Simpson said he tested positive for COVID-19 after a long struggle to find testing. Now in good health, he is working on a bluegrass album.
I first started making Rockabilly Against Racism stickers in August of 2019, shortly after hearing the news of the El Paso shooting. At the time, I just couldn’t wrap my head around it – what amount of hatred inspires someone to drive an hour away and open fire on a random assortment of unarmed strangers because of their race? It was the cold premeditatedness of the action that broke my heart. Over the previous few years, I had watched President Trump and others continue to stoke the fires of racial hatred in America. It was divide and conquer and, like many, I felt helpless. But being an artist, I understood that you must combat negative propaganda with positive propaganda.
Photo credit: Mighty Joe Castro
The idea was inspired by Joe Strummer / The Clash and, more specifically, the legendary Rock Against Racism gigs that they were a part of in the 1970s. For me, the beauty of early rock-n-roll lies in the synergy and cross-pollination of different musical styles and cultures – the twang of country music mixed with that rhythm and blues boogie, combined with the passionate fire of gospel music and the soulful harmonies of doo-wop. It’s Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis. Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry. Bo Diddley and Ritchie Valens. This music helped break down the walls of segregation in the south and paved the way for the 1960s.
Our band is based in Philadelphia, where punks once referred to the rockabilly scene as the “skinhead retirement community.” It’s 2020 and, unfortunately, that scene is still littered with images of the Confederate flag. Now I’ve heard people claim the use of that flag is about southern pride and rebellion, not racism. I don’t buy it. A real rebel doesn’t need a flag – they make their own. And that’s what the Rockabilly Against Racism sticker is for us – a new flag. We needed to set ourselves apart and let everyone know that while we celebrate the sound and style of the 1950s, we’re not living in the past. We’re taking that classic 1957 Chevy and putting a hybrid electric engine in it. Vintage sounds, not vintage values.
Photo credit: Joe Stingle
So I handed the stickers out at our shows and put the message out on social media that I’d mail a few to anyone who sent their address. Since then, I’ve distributed a few thousand all across the states as well as Europe, Australia, South America and Asia. And with every batch, I include a hand written Thank You note in an effort to personally acknowledge people and begin to build a real sense of community. People asked for a Facebook group, so we got that going as a way for bands, promoters and fans to connect and work toward making positive change. I offered the sticker design free of charge to anyone who wanted to use it – the only stipulation being that they couldn’t make a profit off of it. Everything must be given out for free or sold for cost. A group in Germany started distributing shirts and patches all over Europe and a collective of vintage vendors began sending stickers out with every order. People are printing stickers and buttons in Texas, Tennessee, Las Vegas and elsewhere. We had tentative plans to organize several Rockabilly Against Racism concerts to raise money for different organizations, but COVID-19 quickly hit the pause button on that. It will happen at some point though.
I am under no illusions that this effort is a miracle cure to fix a major systemic problem. My hope though, moving forward, is that when some young kid discovers this music, and starts going to shows, that they’ll see the Rockabilly Against Racism sticker on the band’s bass guitar or some patches on the jackets of audience members and realize that they are welcome. It’s an inclusive scene that we’re building. This isn’t meant to solve the problem – it’s a spark to inspire people to make a difference.
Listen to “Come on Angels” from the band’s debut album, released July 31.
Black Stone Cherryis set to release their seventh studio album, The Human Condition, on October 30th via Mascot Records/Mascot Label Group. The collection will be available on Red Transparent Vinyl, Limited Edition CD Boxset and Digitally.
The Human Condition was completed mere days before the COVID-19 lockdown was imposed and as events progressed, it became apparent that the album the Kentucky band were completing featured lyrics that were eerily prescient.
“There was a real urgency and fear of the unknown during those sessions – it was a scary time,” recalls drummer, John Fred Young. “Every song on this album tells a story of the experiences we all go through – our happiness, our struggles, and how we have to adapt.” The album’s opening lyrics are: “People, people, your attention please, I need to tell you about a new disease” (from “Ringin’ In My Head”). The song was written 4 years ago, but powerfully captures the hysteria around the COVID-19 outbreak. On “Push Down & Turn,” BSC masterfully use space to achieve crushing swamp-metal dynamics. The stirring track talks about mental health, boldly advocating getting treatment if you’re struggling. “I suffer from manic depression and I have severe anxiety. I want to convey it’s okay to go to a doctor and talk about these issues. There is no shame or stigma there,” vocalist / guitarist Chris Robertson shares.
The Human Condition was self-produced and tracked in bassist Jon Lawhon’s recording facility, Monocle Studios. The guys went in with four songs, wrote some new ones and recorded a few beloved, unreleased favorites. For the first time, the band opted to not record basics live and instead meticulously multi tracked. Each member endured grueling sessions to ensure the collective studio mindset of achieving “epic performances.” The results are stunning; the grooves feel organic, the riffs are mountainous, the performances are urgent and the hooks shine gloriously. Sonically, The Human Condition is one of BSC’s most visceral and hooky releases. Guitarist/vocalist Ben Wells explains, “With this one, we cranked up the amps, the drums are in your face, and there are some really heavy riffs. After 19 years and 7 albums, we wanted to prove that we still kick ass. This album feels like a rebirth.”
The complete track listing features, “Ringin’ In My Head,” “Again,” “Push Down & Turn,” “When Angels Learn To Fly,” “Live This Way,” “In Love With The Pain,” “The Chain,” “Ride,” “If My Heart Had Wings,” “Don’t Bring Me Down,” “Some Stories,” “The Devil In Your Eyes,” and “Keep On Keepin’ On.”
“When I listen back to this record, I feel all these different emotions,” Lawhon says. “We started when we were teens, and life has taken its course, especially now. Through it all, your heart and your perspectives change, but one thing that hasn’t changed is our connection as friends.” Chris affirms: “This is a brotherhood. It’s been amazing to stick around with all four original members and still be inspired. Here’s to 7 more albums and another 19 years!”
ABKCO Records has announced a celebration of the 60th anniversary of “The Twist,” Chubby Checker and the legendary Cameo Parkway labels with commemorative releases September 25th. The definitive album Twist With Chubby Checker album has been remastered and will be made available for the first time on vinyl since the 1960s this September.
The date dovetails with the 60th anniversary of “The Twist” having first reached #1 on Billboard’s Hot 100 on September 24, 1960. A special 45 rpm 7” vinyl of “The Twist” with two B-sides will also be available along with the physical editions of the new, definitive Dancin’ Party: The Chubby Checker Collection (1960 – 1966) on both CD and LP. Dancin’ Party collects twenty-one tunes that includes seventeen Top 40 hits, twelve of which hit the Top 20; seven hit the Top 10 with two going to #1, including the pinnacle recording of “The Twist,” a single that two trips to the top. Pre-order here.
Twist With Chubby Checker has also been remastered for a digital release, with the single for “The Pony” available immediately to stream and as an “instant grat” track with pre-orders of Twist With Chubby Checker.
CD versions of two other newly compiled Cameo Parkway sets, You Got The Power: Cameo Parkway Northern Soul 1964 -1967 and You Can’t Sit Down: Cameo Parkway Dance Crazes 1958 – 1964 are also being made available on September 25. Pre-order here.
In summer of 1960 “The Twist” was released and first hit the Billboard chart on August 1st, sixty years ago this week. The tune raced to the #1 spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 on September 24th a matter of weeks later. Most remarkably, after the song was re-released in late 1961, it again arrived at the #1 spot on January 13, 1962, making “The Twist” the first record to occupy the #1 slot in two different run-ups, a feat unequaled to this day. The first release of the single in 1960 included “Toot” on the flip side and the 1961 version carried “Twistin’ USA” on its B-side. In recognition of that singular achievement the newly remastered version of “The Twist” EP includes both “Toot” and “Twistin’ USA.”
At the 2018 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony in Cleveland, a new class was inducted, this time in recognition of their respective impact on music and culture. First among these in terms of cultural and commercial transcendence was “The Twist” by Chubby Checker. Steven Van Zandt had the honor of inducting “The Twist,” recalling the song would, “along with The Pill, Hugh Hefner’s Playboy philosophy and Helen Gurley Browns’ ‘Sex and the Single Girl,’ be credited with starting the sexual revolution.”
When Billboard celebrated the 50th anniversary of its Hot 100 singles chart in 2008, “The Twist” was declared the number one song of that half century span. That designation was bestowed on the record again in 2013 and 2015 and, yet again, when The Hot 100’s 60th year was observed. Each time, “The Twist” held on to the top spot among over 27,000 individual titles by more than 7,500 artists. “The Twist” by Chubby Checker is in the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame more than 20 years ago. In its own time, “The Twist” was recognized by the Recording Academy as the Best Rock & Roll Recording at the 1961 Grammy™ Awards.
Concurrent with the massive success of “The Twist,” Cameo Parkway became one of the industry’s most successful independent companies on par, in that era, with Motown. It accrued a vast artist roster with a strong emphasis on dance-oriented hits and its shares were even traded on the American Stock Exchange, a first for a record label. Checker’s initial follow-up, “Let’s Twist Again” was emblematic of this as were his many other dance floor and chart successes which are all collected on Dancin’ Party: The Chubby Checker Collection (1960 – 1966).
You Can’t Sit Down: Cameo Parkway Dance Crazes 1958 -1964, features well known dance repertoire by the full spectrum of Cameo Parkway stars. Among whom are The Orlons, Dovells, Dee Dee Sharp, Bobby Rydell, The Applejacks and others along with Chubby Checker. Highlights are seven Top 10 hits including The Orlons’ “Wah-Watusi,” Dee Dee Sharp’s “Mashed Potato Time,” “The Bristol Stomp” and “You Can’t Sit Down” by the Dovells, “Slow Twistin’” by Chubby Checker and Dee Dee Sharp as well as Bobby Rydell’s “Cha Cha Cha” plus sixteen more. As with the Dancin’ Party, You Can’t Sit Down includes liner notes by British music historian and author John Broven, author of Record Makers and Breakers (University of Illinois Press).
You Got The Power: Cameo Parkway Northern Soul 1964 -1967, a more specialized set, highlights the fact that numerous Cameo Parkway singles would go on to become part of the soundtrack of Britain’s Northern Soul lifestyle phenomenon. Northern Soul’s emphasis was on obscure yet danceable records, a number of which became the focus of a cult-like worship years after they were first issued. Singles by Frankie Beverly & The Butlers, Bunny Sigler, The Orlons, Evie Sands, Candy and the Kisses, Christine Cooper and Eddie Holman are highlights of the 20-track collection. The set includes liner notes by Ady Croasdell, DJ-founder of London’s 6Ts Rhythm ‘N’ Soul Club, home of Britain’s longest-running Northern Soul night.
Twist with Chubby Checker (Remastered) – vinyl and digital
Twistin’ U.S.A.
The “Ooh Poo Pah Doo” Shimmy
The “C.C. Rider” Stroll
The Strand
The Chicken
The Hucklebuck
The Twist
The Madison
“Love Is Strange” Calypso
The “Mexican Hat” Twist
The Slop
The Pony
The Twist(Remastered) 7’’ EP and digital
The Twist
Toot
Twistin’ U.S.A.
Dancin’ Party – The Chubby Checker Collection: 1960 – 1966 – CD
The Twist **
The Hucklebuck
Pony Time **
Dance The Mess Around
Let’s Twist Again **
The Fly **
Dancin’ Party
Slow Twistin’ **
Popeye The Hitchhiker **
Limbo Rock **
Let’s Limbo Some More
Twist It Up (single version)
Birdland (single version)
What Do Ya Say!
Loddy Lo
Hooka Tooka
Hey, Bobba Needle
Lazy Elsie Molly
(At The) Discotheque
You Just Don’t Know (What You Do To Me)
Hey You! Little Boo-Ga-Loo
**DENOTE CHARTS IN TOP TEN
You Can’t Sit Down: Cameo Parkway Dance Crazes 1958-1964 – CD
The Twist – Chubby Checker
The Wah-Watusi – The Orlons
Bristol Stomp – The Dovells
Mashed Potato Time – Dee Dee Sharp
You Can’t Sit Down – The Dovells
The Third House (In From The Right) – Bobby Rydell
Do The Bird – Dee Dee Sharp
Slow Twistin’ – Chubby Checker w/Dee Dee Sharp
Shimmy Shimmy – The Orlons
The 81 – Candy And The Kisses
(Everybody Do) The Swim, Pt 1- The Marlins
The Popeye Waddle – Don Covay
Do The New Continental – The Dovells
Baby, Do The Froog – Dardenelles
Rocka-Conga – The Applejacks
The Hucklebuck- Chubby Checker
The Mash – Tom Young & The Hippies
Mexican Hat Rock – The Applejacks
The Cha-Cha-Cha – Bobby Rydell
When You Dance – The Turbans
Everybody South Street – The Taffys
Twistin’ U.S.A. – Chubby Checker
You Got The Power: Cameo Parkway Northern Soul 1964-1967 – CD
You Got The Power – The Four Exceptions
Because Of My Heart – Frankie Beverly & The Butlers
(Whoa, Whoa) I Love Him So – Nikki Blu
Girl Don’t Make Me Wait – Bunny Sigler
It’s Rough Out There – Jerry Jackson
Envy (In My Eyes) – The Orlons
Picture Me Gone – Evie Sands
Country Girl – Vickie Baines
Night Owl – Bobby Paris
Village Of Tears – Ben Zine
You Just Don’t Know (What You Do To Me) – Chubby Checker
Mini Diaz and Gov’t Mule bassist Jorgen Carlsson met at The Grove School of Music in 1991. Jorgen was enrolled in the bass program while Mini worked there as a supervisor for the students in the recording engineering program. They hit it off so well, they became life partners. Mini writes, sings, plays guitar, ukulele and has occasionally been playing the role of a co-producer and recording engineer. Jorgen produces as well as writes, engineers, and plays various instruments. In the turn of the millennium, two records were conceived when they began to release their independent albums in the hopes of getting a publishing deal for the studio band they affectionately call “Little Days”. In 2008, Jorgen joined Gov’t Mule, but in between a busy touring schedule these last several years, they have found time to rekindle Little Days and continue working on new song ideas.
We spoke to Jorgen last year just before the release of their album Pop & Tacos. Today they release the more Americana flavored single, “Touch Me.”
Some call it fate but Jorgen and Mini call it luck. Back in 2016 Little Days’ recording studio, Rogers Boat, had a break in. Among the loot were hard drives containing works in progress. At the time, Jorgen was busy touring with Gov’t Mule so they thought the opportunity to re-record wouldn’t happen anytime soon and were saddened about the fact that the magic was lost. Fast forward to COVID19 lockdown. With extra time on their hands a deep “spring cleaning” ensued and back up drives of their work were discovered giving Jorgen and Mini a second chance to finish what they started. Vocal and bass tracks were redone and now “Touch Me” is ready to be introduced to the world and is the first single of a series Little Days lovingly call The Lost File Sessions.
The circle remains unbroken at the Grand Ole Opry as it approaches its 95th year. Still trucking through a global pandemic, Opry members and special guests have helped to reach its largest audiences to date. Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell, and Vince Gill — whose history runs through five decades –reunited to perform a concert for Grand Ole Opry’s Saturday night broadcast live on Circle TV this past weekend.
Harris recorded Crowell’s “Bluebird Wine” on her 1975 album, Pieces of the Sky. Later, Crowell played guitar and sang for three years in Emmylou Harris’s Hot Band. Crowell left the band in 1977 to embark on his own solo career, putting together the Cherry Bombs. Harris also contributed backing vocals on Crowell’s iconic Ain’t Living Long Like This album.
As for Gill, he left Pure Prairie League to join Crowell’s Cherry Bombs, later to join Harris’s band for a few albums: The Ballad of Sally Rose, Thirteen, and Angel Band — Thirteen being an album Crowell was also involved with. He continues to work with Gill and Harris to this day.
Watch the entire hourlong broadcast below.
This week’s Opry Live guests will be Dom Flemons, Old Crow Medicine Show, Billy Strings, and Molly Tuttle.
Tom Petty’s Wildflowers album (1994) is commonly hailed as his solo masterpiece, but you may not know that half of those recordings actually ended up on the cutting room floor. Which is why the Petty estate is prepping the release of an expanded version of Wildflowers soon. Details to be announced.
Following the 8-track demo version of “You Don’t Know How It Feels,” which served as a teaser for the imminent project, is another unearthed demo called “There Goes Angela (Dream Away).” You can take the fun quiz on the Tom Petty page and unlock the song, or you can listen below.
On December 26th, 2018, Emily Cross received an excited email from a friend: Brian Eno was talking about her band on BBC radio. “At first I didn’t think it was real,” she admits. But then she heard a recording: Eno was praising “Black Willow” from Loma‘s self-titled debut, a song whose minimal groove and hypnotic refrain seem as much farewell as a manifesto: I make my bed beside the road / I carry a diamond blade / I will not serve you. He said he’d had it on repeat.
At the time, a second Loma album seemed unlikely. The band began as a serendipitous collaboration between Cross, the multi-talented musician and recording engineer Dan Duszynski, and Shearwater frontman Jonathan Meiburg, who wanted to play a supporting role after years at the microphone. They’d capped a grueling tour with a standout performance on a packed beach at Sub Pop’s SPF 30 festival, in which Cross leapt into the crowd, and then into the sea, while the band carried on from the stage—an emotional peak that also felt like a natural ending. “It was the biggest audience we’d ever had,” she says. “We thought, why not stop here?”
Following the tour, Cross went to rural Mexico to work on visual art and a solo record, while Meiburg began a new Shearwater effort. But after a few months apart (and Eno’s encouraging words), the trio changed their minds and reconvened at Duszynski’s home in rural Texas, where they began to develop songs that would become Don’t Shy Away.
Loma writes by consensus, and though Cross is always the singer, she, Duszynski and Meiburg often trade instruments. Meiburg compares their process to using a ouija board, and says the songs revealed themselves slowly, over many months. “Each of us is a very strong flavor,” he says, “but in Loma, nobody wears the crown, so we have to trust each other—and we end up in places none of us would have gone on our own. I think we all wanted to experience that again.” The album that emerged is gently spectacular—a vivid work whose light touch belies its timely themes of solitude, impermanence, and finding light in deep darkness. Stuck / beneath / a rock, Cross begins, as if noticing her predicament for the first time. Then she adds: I begin to see / the beauty in it.
Listen to the single, “Ocotillo,” from forthcoming Don’t Shy Away.
Today, education non-profit Mighty Writers continue their weekly series with jazz pianist Marcus Roberts. This marks the second installment of a new benefit video series called Mighty SONG Writers to raise money for the Philadelphia-based literacy program, put together in partnership with media outletLiterary Hub. Last week, Amanda Shires and Jason Isbell debuted the show.
Each week, noteworthy musicians of various genres will play songs and also answer questions about literature — making for a unique video format. The Mighty SONG Writers series will continue with a new video every Wednesday, aiming to raise money to support Mighty Writers, whose mission is to teach low-income and minority kids to think clearly and write with clarity. The organization offers free programs for students from elementary through high school at nine centers in diverse neighborhoods around Philadelphia and New Jersey, including several bilingual locations for Spanish-speaking students.
Marcus Roberts is a Grammy nominated jazz pianist, bandleader, arranger, and composer. He has recorded over 20 albums as a solo artist and bandleader, has been profiled by CBS’ 60 Minutes, and holds an honorary Doctor of Music degree from the Juilliard school. Blind since the age of five, Roberts is also a recipient of the Helen Keller Award for Personal Achievement. He has written over 150 original compositions, including commissioned works for Chamber Music America, Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and Seiji Ozawa‘s Saito Kinen Orchestra.
Watch Mighty SONG Writers’ second video, in which Marcus Roberts plays several pieces and talks about how, when he was a child, his mother made sure that his blindness wouldn’t prevent him from learning to read and write.
Singer/songwriter Wily Bo Walker’s textured voice is distinctive. You recognize the rasp immediately, sounding like a version of Tom Waits raised and trained by Howlin’ Wolf. But as recognizable as his voice is, it’s not the defining characteristic of his music.
You know Walker because of how he weaves character-driven lyrics and blues-rooted music into songs that take off into unexpected places. On Ain’t No Man a Good Man, Walker once again collaborates with horn-player/arranger Danny Flam, creating horn-drenched rock tunes that evoke multiple musical eras.
Walker’s music is constantly evolving, yet he manages to maintain an essence, so that you never feel like you’re listening to a completely different band, even as his sound shifts. Walker’s songs are journeys where he allows the listener to tag along. And no global pandemic is going to slow him down.
Steven Ovadia:
How are you so prolific?
Wily Bo Walker:
I’m lucky that I’ve got quite a wide network of people and also lucky that I’m independent so I can do what I want to do. So I’ve got different kinds of things going on. One of the things that coronavirus has actually allowed me to do is to finish off a lot of sessions that I had started over the past three or four years, which I wouldn’t have had the time to finish in the studio had I been out gigging and rehearsing and doing all the other stuff. So looking positively, 2020 has given me a little bit of time to to finish off a whole lot of stuff that needs to be finished.
And Good Man was recorded pre-coronavirus? Post? Because that’s a lot of horns.
Yeah, the the horns are all recorded pre-corona, although having said, that there were a couple of tracks Danny recorded after he was recovering from corona. I’ve got another friend who’s a sax player in London and she’s had it really badly. It’s been about three months and she still can’t breathe. She doesn’t have that depth of breath to play or to sing and it’s affecting some people a lot. Danny was working on this latest album, and the last two numbers that he recorded for me he was recovering from corona. So he just about made it through the sessions. You know, it’s a difficult thing when you need that breath and it’s terrible when you don’t have it.
How did you hook up with Danny?
It started off 12 years ago, something like that. It was online. Obviously, Danny is in New York. It was through a mutual music network. We were online and discussing the early 70s big horn singer, big soul sound, you know, Blood, Sweat and Tears, Ides of March, that kind of stuff, which I particularly like. All these guys who were doing things back then, I really like that, and I was on this online forum and chatting about how people are doing it with keyboards now. And, it’s kind of odd to me. It just doesn’t have that same feel. And, of course, Danny had this New York Brass and he was totally agreeing with me. And we said ‘why don’t we try and do something together?’
So that’s where that started. We’ve got a similar kind of interest in that kind of music. And Danny does everything, he puts across the whole spectrum of music, but he’s particularly keen on this, this classic R&B. My vocal kind of suits the big horn section backing, so it kind of works. And it’s good fun.
I thought Ain’t No Man was really good. It reminded me a lot of Louis Armstrong between your voice and like all the horns. I thought it had a very cool sort of retro air without being precious.
Yeah. Those guys are legends and you aspire to them. I love Louis Armstrong’s work. Louis Jordan, all these guys that were doing that stuff. It was kind of the popular music of the time. The big horn section, the big band stuff, I really enjoy all of that. There’s a real skill to the charts and the charting of the instruments for these guys, and of course you had the once in a lifetime vocal of Louis Armstrong. What a talent! What a fantastic bloke. I liked Cab Calloway as well. He’s kind of got that showmanship thing going on which I like to bring to the stage. So it’s kind of a fun aspect of things. But yeah, ‘Ain’t No Man,’ I would say is more the 70s thing than going back to the 50s, Armstrong sound. It’s more Blood, Sweat, and Tears and Ides of March and early Chicago; the first album ‘Chicago Transit Authority.’ That that was the huge horn sounds and just groovy music and I just love it. I grew up listening to that kind of stuff.
I love the theme tracks to police shows too, because you know cop shows back then had all of this mad horn section stuff. And it’s just a mad talent that goes into scoring these things. Absolutely great. So if anything its a nod to that time, you know, that’s as much as I can possibly do.
You often collaborate with guitarist E D Brayshaw. What’s the difference between collaborating with E D and working with Danny?
The horn sectional thing is one side of me. E D is much more the guitar driven music. And I love all that kind of stuff too. I’ve got the best of both worlds. E D’s an amazing all-around musician. I’m working on another album with him actually, that we’ll follow up sometime later in the ether. He’s actually a classically trained cellist. So as well as all these mad brilliant guitar solo type stuff that he comes out with, he’s got all the sensitive cello, violin, mandolin, and all this kind of stuff that he plays. He’s such a talented person and great to work with. As I said, it’s a total contrast to the thing that I’m doing now. E D’s not so much into the horn sectional thing. Whereas, you know, I like that as part of my resume, which is part of me. So I’m very lucky to work with all of these talented guys.
One of the things I like about your work is how you’ll like revisit songs between albums.
Yeah. It’s like me doing cover versions of my own stuff. It amuses me. And plus maybe there’s a little bit Scottishness about not paying license fees for covering other people’s songs. I don’t know. (laughs) You can tell it’s the same thing. It’s the same story I’m trying to get across. “Night of the Hunter,” for instance [which appears on ‘Ain’t No Man a Good Man’ and 2019’s ‘Roads We Ride’], E D and I wrote that, kind of, and as part of the whole ‘Roads We Ride,’ that whole cinema thing that we were doing. And I spoke with Danny about it and we looked at it and kind of made it more soundtracky. There’s another guitar player and keyboard player that I’ve got on my ‘Good Man’ album. And it just lends a different texture to the song. For me, I love both versions equally and they’re both great. I just love to hear other people riffing off the song and seeing what they come up with.
I was watching a video recently, it’s kind of a game, looking back at all these greats like Steely Dan. They were producing ‘Aja’ and they were in a certain position because of multi-million pound contracts. So they got on all these top session people to come in and play on the songs, and they just kept going until they found the one that had the exact feel for the song. I mean, that would be a marvelous thing to be able to do. And what great albums, they produced. Down to where I am, you know, working with so many different people, and each person brings something different to the table. It is kind of wild. There’s no wrong way to play this song. If you brought something that significantly changes the mood of the thing, well, I think then it warrants being heard too. “Night of the Hunter” is a good example of that. I think that’s a really nice cover, if you like, of the song we released. And I don’t have to pay a license.
I picture you constantly tinkering with your songs because of the way you’re saying, ‘what would it sound like like this?’ Do you tinker with your songs?
No, no, no, I don’t, no. All of these songs are performances. And that’s something that is just part of what I want to do. I don’t tinker with a song per se. I go to the studio with what songs that we’re going to do. I want to record that version, that moment in time, and get it to its best. So if I do a vocal, for instance, I’ll do three takes in the studio. And if I haven’t got it, I’ll dismiss the song. I just don’t carry on with it. Life’s too short to spend time just tinkering. Of course in my Pro Tools studio, I could be here forever changing stuff, but it doesn’t make sense to me. There’s much, much more to explore. So, I’m not so much a tinkerer. I like to get the good takes. I’ll spend time on production, so that it sounds professional and it’s nice for people to hear, but that is it.
What’s your writing process like? How do you write?
I’ve always got a guitar next to me. But I’m very much lyric driven. And it’s personal stories, but I like to cover it up; the typical Scottish thing of covering up your emotions with something else. So I’ve got this thing that I want to get out but I tell it in the form of a story. It’s storytelling but a lot of it is personal. Although if I’m out, I’ve got my beautiful dog here, I’ve got fields, and I can wander off and walk. And a lot of ideas come just when I’m out, you know, taking exercise. Maybe something I’ve watched. I really love cinema. And there’s some concept of it that I like and that I want to explore [in a song]. And so writing tends to be lyric driven. And then melodies are one of these things that seem to come along with them. I pick up the guitar and and what have you. And when I’m working with people like Danny or E D or anyone else, I give them a rough idea of the concept of the song, and they’ll come back with it and then we kind of work up the whole thing that way.
When you’re writing, do you have visual images in your head? Are you picturing the song and what it looks like as a movie or as a show?
Yeah, I think so. My writing notes, which I have got dashed all over my desk here, they’re the little bits of thoughts on how I’m feeling . So it might come out as maybe a chorus line or what have you. But when I’m writing the finished thing, when I’m fine polishing it up, I do tend to take it into the third person. So then I visualize this other person, whether it’s a character in an imaginary film, a “Theme for an Imaginary Western,” to use a Jack Bruce type thing. So this imaginary cinema, which I mean, I would love to do, I think ever since I was a child, whenever I listen to music, especially stuff that involves long guitar solos that you just sort of drift off into this music and there are things happening then. And I just love that aspect of it. There are long solo songs on ‘The Roads We Ride’. And it’s kind of like the cinema in your head where you go with your imagination and if if a song or a piece of music can take you somewhere else well I think it’s achieved something. That’s the kind of driving thing behind what I’m doing. If it can give somebody the same feeling I get listening to a piece of music.
This is just more a personal curiosity but are you a big Loudon Wainwright III fan? I know you’ve covered “Motel Blues” a few times. I’m always a little surprised.
I can’t say that I’m a huge fan of Loudon. I can’t say that I’ve listened to a lot of his music. Now the reason “Motel Blues” is kind of special to me, it was on on an album that my good friend bought when I was about 16. So formative years. It was a sampler album called ‘New Age of Atlantic,’ it was 73-74 something like that [NOTE: 1972]. He bought it because there was a rare Yes song on it: Yes with a cover of “America,“ the Simon and Garfunkel track, but this album also had John Prine, Dr. John, Loudon Wainwright, and a guy called Gordon Haskell, and these tracks were just stunning to me. The songwriting element of it was just mind blowing.
So I learned “Motel Blues” back then and I’ve played it since in various forms, whether it’s solo acoustic gigs or what have you. It’s just traveled with me. It just resonated back then and it still resonates with me, but that’s to say, I can’t say that I’m a a huge fan of Loudon Wainwright. You know, I like his music, of course, but I haven’t gone out to buy tons of his stuff. I liked the kind of empty loneliness to the production of it, that song back then, I think it was off ‘Album II’. It was on this ‘New Age of Atlantic’ sampler and it was a standalone track for me. And it was just it was a feeling that he evoked with production: really sparse. It’s him, telling a story. Nice reverb room, acoustic guitar, and [Wainwright’s] plaintive voice. I just love it. It still tingles up the spine when I listen to it.
So what else do you listen to to unwind? Steely Dan?
When I was growing up Steely Dan was the thing. I was big into their horn section stuff. Of course they had the horns going in there and they had this great production. What do I listen to? Recent bands? One of the last gigs I went to see was Black Pumas. I went over to Amsterdam to see them at the beginning of the year when gigs were a thing. Gosh I miss gigs. Who else? Americana. The Lowest Pair. I love them. I saw them at the Green Note in Camden a couple of years ago. Really good. And the second to last gig I saw was Amigo the Devil. I don’t know if you’ve heard this guy, but it’s Southern Gothic, and it’s him with an acoustic guitar. But he plays it through pedals he kind of goes down well at heavy metal gigs; it’s a real odd thing. And he’s just wonderful on stage. It’s this bloke singing these mad songs with a real twist in the lyrics and it’s the lyrics that got me when I first heard this guy. And yeah, a good memory for me to have. So it’s people like that.
It’s a golden age for music in many ways.
It is. Because you know, small artists can release music. Bandcamp’s great because it can suggest all these people you can tap into. Even Spotify will suggest new artists and it’s fab. People can record stuff. I mean there always has been a quality thing going on but for me I’m looking for a particular thing; especially an Americana thing. There’s a goldmine of good lyrics. I just love when somebody puts a twist on a song that I never would have thought of and it moves me. I think of the two people in the Lowest Pair. I think they both write independently of each other, but they come together and do these wonderful harmonies and they’ve got this great banjo thing going on. And the lyrics are out of this world. They take me somewhere else. I’m there, wherever they’re describing, and it’s fantastic, you know? What’s a great talent.
It’s just nice to hear about positive things coming out of the pandemic.
Absolutely! I blame David Bowie, you know, whatever it was, and things have just gone down ever since [he died].
He was holding it all together.
In the UK, we’ve had this whole Brexit thing which is hanging over us. And then we’ve had all of a sudden all the politics that affects everybody’s daily lives. You have that, which I ignore most of the time. And now we’re focused on this virus. It’s kind of a time to not be online so much. I’ve got my dog. Then we disappear into the wilderness and just look at the sky.
