Kenny Meeks’ bluesy Americana: “I just want my songs to make the listener feel welcome.”

Kenny Meeks makes great bluesy sounding Americana music. He has worked extensively alongside artists such as Sixpence None the Richer, Buddy and Julie Miller, and Al Perkins, and has four albums to his credit over the past 12 years or so. He’s a great guitarist and gritty singer – and an accomplished songwriter. His new album, New Jerusalem, which we had in our Best Americana list for 2016 is a very fine collection of original songs, all with a gospel flavour. Down at the Crossroads has the opportunity to talk to Kenny recently, and he was gracious enough to be very open and honest in response to our questions –

DATC: Kenny, congratulations on the new album, New Jerusalem. It’s great – chock full of very cool bluesy Americana songs, with unmistakable gospel content. Tell us a bit about how the album took shape.

Kenny: Thank you very much Gary. What got these songs flowing, and this record, was the suicide of an elderly neighbour who was a bit of a grandfather-figure to our kids (especially my boys) – which impacted our family deeply. Also, the sadness of the sudden death of my brother Paul was pretty rough.

These events stirred something in me that became a response to suffering, pain, and isolation. As I began writing songs, a little bit of my history came out. I wrote all but one of these songs through this season of grief and reflection. Also, it’s a bit of a legacy record for my progeny……a peek into my soul and my story. I’m not sure I’ll ever make another record this personal again. It’s not just about those topics, but that’s what got things going.

DATC: Tell us about the title track, New Jerusalem – what is that all about?

Kenny: It’s about the afterlife. I do believe in it, in a biblical way. I wanted to sing about it. I wanted the song to be a celebration and a proclamation. It’s also about a vision of greater unity among followers of Jesus. The absence of schisms, and unity, in Heaven. It’s for me as much as for the listener.

DATC: Mercy Pays the Toll is an interesting song. It talks about “when pain moves in to stay,” and “when this world wears us down…and leaves us tired and sore.” It sounds like there’s some personal experience in there. You ask the question – “how do we live?” What’s the answer, in your experience?

Kenny: This song is in response to the pain I was seeing around me. I’ve certainly had – and caused – my share. But people live with chronic pain, chronic poverty, chronic sadness, post-traumatic stress, or mental impairment. I don’t think I necessarily ask the question looking for an answer. I think the question is meant to be a meditation. How can we share burdens of others? Some so heavy, they think their only way out might be to take their own life?

But, I think the answer is to always love. If only love could be my default response to every situation….. and when it isn’t, we have mercy. Maybe “How Do We Love” would have been better said?

DATC: There’s a bluesy feel to your music, but it’s never downbeat. How have the blues as a genre influenced you and your music?

Kenny: Maybe the blues has been misunderstood as a sad genre. It’s not. I mean, life is sad, and the blues are certainly about life. But, I hear a lot of joy in blues music. But…there is the presence of a yearning in all music, and certainly in the blues. So, I think you’re right in a sense.

I read in a Time article about Delta music history, that lyrics like ‘I’m gonna leave you baby’ were sharecroppers speaking in code that they were going to leave their landowner for a better deal. That was the author’s take. Dunno if there’s any truth to it. But, allegory has always been very present in African American oral tradition and music.

American blues music shaped me early, through a trip to a family farm in Horse Cave Kentucky, where I wandered to the sharecropper home next door. I was real little. The neighbour was on the front porch, playing a dimestore electric guitar through a little amp with a jack-knife slide. That’s where they found me, slack-jawed, standing in front of that porch. This instantly became the music to which I would compare all other. It’s still in my mind like it happened yesterday.

I also really liked Dixieland music as a 9-year old trumpet player. My dad took me to meet Al Hirt at a record store. But, when I bought my first guitar with paper route money at 12, it would most certainly be manipulated with a jack-knife slide. When my mother passed away that same year, the blues became important to me. But, beyond sadness, maybe yearning? Some folks equate tempo with …you know – fast = happy, slow = sad. Man, the slower the better for me. And sometimes the real slow stuff is downright joyous!

DATC: How come the blues, with some of its associations with the crossroads and the devil and so on, can be a vehicle for gospel music?

Kenny: As for the ‘deal with the devil’ I kinda see the “Crossroads” legend, as we know it, as a deal for fortune and fame, not specific to the blues. I’m fairly certain the music we consider to be the genre called the blues was uniquely born from the music of the African American slave population in America. And if their spiritual music wasn’t the birth mother, it certainly was the midwife. So, I think the blues have more kinship with the music of the African-American church than any other genre. It seems really natural to me, in an organic kind of way. I’m not fond of obvious “repurposed” blues-Gospel music. But Rev. Gary Davis …man… that is the absolute loveliest stuff ever!

DATC: Who are the blues and other artists that have influenced you most, either musically or lyrically?

Kenny: Robert Johnson. Ray Charles (my desert island artist…just Ray…all I need…ha!) I love John Lee Hooker. I love Taj Mahal. Jimi Hendrix. Aretha Franklin. Ralph Stanley. Leon Russell. Grant Green. Les McCann and Oscar Peterson. Bob Dylan. John Prine. Rev. Gary Davis. And Duane Allman. I could go on and on (laugh). If you go back, listen to some of Robert Randolph’s mentors in the Sacred Steel tradition…oh boy. I know I’m forgetting some real important musicians that have influenced me, sorry!

DATC: Tell us a bit about yourself, Kenny – first of all, your website mentions your “migratory childhood, and blue-collar upbringing.” Explain that and how that plays into your art.

Kenny: We moved to Dearborn Michigan from Henderson Kentucky when I was 7. It was like a foreign country. So, exile, longing for the familiar surroundings of home. And the music I was hearing through this time kinda changed from country music to Motown, plus British invasion stuff and psychedelia. So the migration to Detroit brought lots of new music into my world. The blue-collar aspect is simply that my dad was a working guy. He was a brilliant mechanic, and he could fix stuff that other guys in the shop couldn’t figure out. I miss him. [Kenny’s father Alvis passed away in 1992].

DATC: You’ve been performing and writing songs for nearly 30 years – how has your music and career evolved over that time?

Kenny: Thanks!…Actually, about 40, but who’s counting? (laughs) Ummmm, pretty much same ol’ Kenny (laughs). I’m trying to learn how to learn better. And learning how to unlearn stuff I’m supposed to forget! I try to make honest music; hopefully that comes through. I think my songwriting has improved a bit. And, I learn from my kids and all the younger people I work with.

And, I’ve always really loved playing with other artists too. That hasn’t changed. I have made music with insanely talented people. Pretty humbling. If I started naming them…well, I’d leave out someone. But you know, it’s very humbling. As for my artist career, I mean, my friends know I always say “why would someone come to see me when they could stay home and listen to a Ray Charles record?” These days I sometimes play guitar for a very special lady named Sandra McCracken, whose music just takes your breath away. We’re going to play with Liz Vice next week. I’m really looking forward to that.

DATC: How do you find audiences at your shows react to the gospel feel of your songs – people, perhaps, who don’t share that faith?

Kenny: Very positive response, not unlike, maybe…a Mavis Staples audience? I think my music is non-confrontational, so the listener isn’t ‘put on the spot’. I never ‘preach’ with lyrics. Proclamation is kind of a good Gospel music method (and I guess that is a kind of preaching). Not all my music is Gospel music, but I think a song like Jesus Knows communicates that He is tuned in to you even if you’re not tuned into Him, you know?…and that’s ok. I just want my songs to make the listener feel welcome. Does that make sense? The important thing about Gospel music is to express that God loves us completely. We ARE loved. Just as we are. Nothing we could ever do could make God love us more. And there is nothing we could ever do to make God love us less. That is the grace of God.

DATC: Are your touring the album at the minute, and where will that take you over the next few months?

Kenny: I don’t have any shows coming up, but thanks for asking. I’d love to play some in the UK. I go where I’m invited, and that’s always such a pleasure. And it has been a pleasure speaking with you Gary. Thanks so much for your interest in my music. God bless you and yours.

 

Grammy Nominated God Don’t Never Change – Producer Jeffrey Gaskill in Conversation

God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson has earned plaudits from all quarters and Grammy Award nominations for Best Roots Gospel Album and Best American Roots Performance for the Blind Boys of Alabama recording of Mother’s Children Have a Hard Time. The album was produced by Jeffrey Gaskill of Burning Rose Productions. The album features a star studded cast which includes Tom Waits, Lucinda William, Derek and Susan Trucks, Luther Dickinson and the Cowboy Junkies. Down at the Crossroads chatted with Jeffrey Gaskill to find out more about how the album came about:

DATC: First of all Jeffrey – congratulations on God Don’t Never Change. It’s a wonderful record; it’s been very widely acclaimed; it’s had two Grammy nominations. That’s no doubt been very pleasing for you – but have you been surprised at just how well it’s gone down?

Jeffrey Gaskill with Lucinda Williams

Jeffrey: I guess I’m not so surprised. I’m grateful for the Grammy nominations – I was hopeful they would come. But I like the fact that it’s gotten great reviews. These are uncertain times – everything’s uncertain, the music business is uncertain, you can’t take anything for granted. But, yes, I’m pleased with the nominations.

DATC: One writer said that your guidance resulted in “Eleven stirring renditions which replicate the soul of the songs, not just the sounds.” Presumably that was what you were striving for?

Jeffrey: Yeah, that was exactly it. Exactly. You know, just going for the heart of the song, and what Willie Johnson was saying at that time. Just bringing it up to contemporary times. And bringing artists together who can convey the song, convey the thought. Really, you know, it’s the thought in the song behind the music that matters the most.

DATC: So why did you want to do an album of Willie Johnson songs?

Jeffrey: Well I wanted to do it way back in 2003, after my Dylan project, Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan came out. But you know, I had to give some things a rest after that and it was hard to find a label that was willing to go to bat for the project on paper before it was recorded. This was at the time the record industry was collapsing.

DATC: So what is it about Willie Johnson’s music that really appealed to you, that made you want to do this album?

Jeffrey: I think it’s the sense of permanence – and I think it’s the same thing with Dylan’s music – these are themes that everyone needs to think about in their lifetime, no matter  when in the spectrum of time they’re living their life – it’s really timeless, enduring music. It’s not something to be sung today and forgotten about tomorrow.

DATC: And that’s the thing about his music – it really has endured over the years. It’s been covered by so many artists, in so many ways over the years. There’s something about it that seems to appeal to people in different eras, perhaps coming from different genres of music.

Jeffrey: Yeah, his music can be interpreted in any number of styles, so seminal is it. He himself, we might say, is hidden in plain sight, to the extent that most everybody is familiar with at least one or two of his songs, if not all of them. Although maybe not familiar with him as an artist.

DATC: The interesting thing, Jeffrey, is that Johnson’s music is quite unashamedly Christian; it springs right out of his vibrant faith. How come people still have an appetite for it, and how come artists who may have no particular interest in faith want to cover his songs and find his songs compelling?

Jeffrey: Well, of course some people only see Blind Willie Johnson as a blues artist, with those universal themes. It takes perhaps a little bit more understanding  and appreciation of the lyrics and what he’s getting at to really fully realize him as a gospel artist, which he truly is. But he can be taken either way I guess.

DATC: Can you tell us a bit about the process of making this album, Jeffrey? From what you’ve said I gather it was a long time in the making?

Jeffrey: Labels loved the concept of the album and the artists who were interested in recording, but the budget and the financial end just wasn’t feasible while the industry was collapsing. So inevitably I wound up raising the funds through a kick starter campaign. I was grateful for kick starter, but it’s not really in my nature to want to go out and do things like that. But, you know, when your back’s against the wall, and you want to get something done like that, you’ll do what needs to be done. And then the thought came to me about his dilapidated home in Marlin in Texas that I had visited, and what could be done about the wood from it, and through some extraordinary generosity, a woman down there whom I had befriended was able to secure some wood from the house before it was demolished. And that became the Blind Pilgrim Collection – the cigar box guitars.

[Wood that had fallen free from the dilapidated house where Johnson lived with his wife and singing partner Willie B. Harris in Marlin was delivered to the capable hands of George Brin at String Tinkers in Putnam, CT.  He carefully cleaned up this old Southern Yellow Pine and painstakingly hand-made ten magnificent finger-jointed boxes book-matched front and back to create these cigar box guitars.]

DATC: And there were some guitar picks as well weren’t there? I’m kinda kicking myself – I wish I’d tried to get one of those picks!

Jeffery: Well, they were made from the same wood that the guitars were made from. I said, “do you have any scraps left?” and in fact there were three very small pieces of wood left, and so I sent them out to a fabulous pick maker out in California, and he was able to get a hundred picks out of that wood. [Chris Brossard Picks (www.brossardpicks.com)]

DATC: Wonderful. So how did you go about recruiting the artists – I mean it’s a fantastic cast on the album, and all the performances are very, very strong. So how did you go about recruiting them, Jeffrey?

Jeffrey: Well, just sending letters to management, saying, hey, I’m Jeff and I made a record called Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan, and I’m working on this Blind Willie Johnson project, and here’s a song, and I wonder if you’d consider singing it?

One artist we tried, an Irish one other than Sinead O’Connor, was Van Morrison, but we never heard back from him. That would’ve been nice.

DATC: So you suggested songs for particular artists, rather than artists choosing?

Jeffrey: In most cases yes. With some exceptions – like for Sinead O’Connor, I think I gave her different suggestions up front and then she came back and said she wanted to do a different couple of songs. But then I gave her Trouble Will Soon be Over. So that took a little bit of back and forth. But I think we landed on the right one.

Down at the Crossroads’ review of God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson is here

DATC: You sure did! It’s probably the surprise of the album, but it’s really fabulous. I wouldn’t have thought of Sinead O’Connor doing a song on an album like this. But she really nails that one, doesn’t she?

Jeffrey: Yeah, she totally nails it. And when I heard that, it really surpassed any expectations I had for the record. That and the Cowboy Junkies. I’m proud of all the tracks – they’re all great – but I really feel like, Sinead O’Connor and the Cowboy Junkies take it to another level, to a real contemporary sound, and show the relevancy of the words and of Blind Willie Johnson’s music. And these are the sort of songs that can be played on the radio, you know, anywhere, anytime.

DATC: What do you think the songs of Willie Johnson have to say to the modern world? We’re going back a long time to a particular social context, to an individual in very difficult circumstances, singing songs about faith – what can these songs say to the modern world?

Jeffrey: Well I like to think that the world is an improved place since his time. But I would think Willie Johnson would think that the lessons from his songs are still relevant. I would hope there is less desperation now than there was back then, and that there would be more empathy and understanding.

DATC: Have you another project in mind, Jeffrey, or do you just want the let the dust settle a bit on this on at the moment?

Jeffrey: Yeah, maybe let the dust settle for now. I do have another project in mind, it’s more of a audio museum exhibit of shaker music. I’m from New England and this music comes from the area in which I live. It’s got real historic importance.

DATC: Sounds like a great project. Thank you Jeffrey. Again – congratulations on the album our best wishes for the Grammys.

 

A world gone wrong, injustice, the human condition, and hope for a better world.

Check out Scottish musician and broadcaster Lins Honeyman’s excellent blues radio show. You can “listen again” over the next week to this broadcast, which features an interview with Gary Burnett about his book, The Gospel According to the Blues.

The Gospel Blues Train Radio Show

(Click on 18 June)

The book dares us to read Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount in conversation with Robert Johnson, Son House, and Muddy Waters. It suggests that thinking about the blues-the history, the artists, the songs-provides good stimulation for thinking about the Christian gospel. Both are about a world gone wrong, about injustice, about the human condition, and both are about hope for a better world. In this book, Gary Burnett probes both the gospel and the history of the blues as we find it in the Sermon on the Mount, to help us understand better the nature of the good news which Jesus preached, and its relevance and challenge to us.

You can read the first chapter here.

And get a copy of the book at: Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk or indeed any Amazon in you part of the world.

Interview with Eric Bibb: “I’m the happiest man in the world”

Vicar Street, Dublin. It’s a few hours before the show and I’m shown in to a room backstage. Eric Bibb, looking very cool in his grey suit, pink shirt and grey hat looks up, as he strings a guitar which is sitting across his lap. He smiles welcomingly and invites me to sit down. There are no airs or graces, just a man who’s relaxed, at home with his art, his band and ready for another show.

I’m at ease now too, so we start chatting. I tell Eric that I first saw him play about seventeen years ago, and apart from the music and the incredible feel-good vibe of that evening, what I’d come away with were the stories he’d told about the songs and the blues artists – all of which had led me on a journey of exploration into the blues and the social history of the blues and resulted in Down at the Crossroads and my book, The Gospel According to the Blues.

He remembered the gig and appreciated the comment. We begin to talk…

I ask him first of all about his new album, The Happiest Man in the World, just released last month, already getting great reviews.

Eric Bibb: It started out as a project inspired by Ollie Haavista the Dobro player. He was keen to do this project with Danny Thompson, and he knew that I had a connection to Danny, that we’d toured together. So I contacted Danny and asked if he’d be interested in making an acoustic band album with him on bass. And Danny said, yeah, if we can make the scheduling work, so we found a window of time last July where all of us could get together. The band which I put together called North Country Far is based on my friendship with the Haavista brothers, and they introduced me – quite some years ago when I lived in Finland, I now live in Sweden – they introduced me to another wonderful musician, Petri Hakala, a great mandolin player, and they all said, “Let’s do this thing, we’ll worry about the business side of it another time.” So we got a residential studio in the countryside near Norfolk, because we had a very limited time.

And it all just came together. I had some new songs that I’d been waiting with for the right opportunity and, yeah, it just came together pretty quickly live on the floor – some post production, but mostly live on the floor.

DATC: On the album we have a couple of songs we associate with the blues. Tell Old Bill is a classic blues song where Bill dies and his wife gets the news. Then there’s Tossin & Turnin’ – a typical blues song bemoaning, perhaps, the terrible conditions of African Americans in the Deep South when the blues were growing up.

Eric Bibb: Yes, that’s right, but not only African Americans – it’s kind of a story that could apply to folks who were part of the great migration from the South to the North; it could also be Okies who suffered during the Depression. I wanted to include all of that together.

DATC: And it has a resonance today as well.

Eric Bibb: Absolutely

DATC: But then we get the Happiest Man in the World; and the whole album is very upbeat. How does this sense of loss, of trial, cohere with a more upbeat, positive vibe?

Eric Bibb: Yeah, well, that’s me in a nutshell! I’m a lover of history, I read a lot and I’m inspired by the history of the people who make the music that really moves me. The broad term Americana, which includes blues, and all kinds of old time country stuff, folk, gospel music – that’s all in the mix for me. I called the record the Happiest Man in the World, named after that song which came to me because I’m just very happy with my spouse and my life with her, and I really wanted to talk about that.

It seems, as many people point out, fairly un-bluesy to call yourself the happiest man in the world! But the point is, there were people – many of my blues heroes – who lived the kind of lives that were difficult because of where they were born, and who they were, and how they looked – and all of that history that involves racism and post-slavery trauma and all of that. However, there were people who transcended those difficult experiences and were capable of living a fulfilling life, having long term relationships with loving spouses – though that was certainly not the rule – but I know there were people, who, by the grace of God, were able to transcend very rough circumstances and celebrate life anyway.

The person that comes to mind right of the top of my head was somebody like Mississippi John Hurt, who I call the Dalai Lama of the country blues. He just seems so serene and so magnanimous in his spirit. And I know there were others like him. So, I also thought it was pretty provocative to call the album the Happiest Man in the World – that’s a pretty big statement to make! But then I wanted to counterbalance that with the story of people having a hard time just making ends meet.

DATC: You do get that dual track in the blues, though, don’t you? On the one hand, the trials and difficulties, but then – “the sun’s gonna shine in my back yard some day?”

Eric Bibb: That’s the thing. Good point. That optimism, that hopefulness, seems to be an essential part of this culture. The ability to enjoy life and celebrate the good things in life and also to be aware of your own spirituality in the midst of all this difficulty and oppression is an amazing quality which is expressed in the genre we know as the blues and certainly in the spirituals.

And it’s been something that’s spread to all points in the globe. There are so many people who enjoy and play this  music – whether they’re from Finland, or the Philippines, or Sweden or France – I mean you find this music everywhere, people love it, they know it, they’ve read about it, and there’s something infectious about that very resilient culture from which this music springs. So it’s a testament not only to the people who survived all of that and left us with this great musical expression, but it’s also like a cosmic statement of salvation and balance – despite everything, this is the music that has glued the world together and it sprang from people who were perhaps some of the most downtrodden people.

Eric’s set that evening illustrated perfectly how well this tension in the music between on the one hand, acknowledging the suffering and the pain, and on the other, celebrating life and a sense of hope, can be creatively balanced. He sang the soulful, mournful Wayfaring Stranger in a way that could move you to tears, gave us Jimmy Oden’s Going Down Slow with its sorrowful “My health is failing me, and I’m goin’ down slow,” and retold the tragic story of the destruction of an African American community in Rosewood. But he kept the show upbeat and joyful throughout, with songs like New World Coming Through and Don’t Let Nobody Drag Your Spirit Down explicitly pointing to the hope that things can be better.

DATC: There’s a thread through your music of humanity, of a yearning for peace; for things to be better – I’m thinking of Got to Do Better; Hope in a Hopeless World; Dream Catchers; Connected; Shingle By Shingle; and so on. Can music and musicians make a difference to the way we think about the world where there is so much inequality and injustice?

Eric Bibb: Absolutely. The thing about music when it’s good, it kind of bypasses the reasoning part of the brain and goes straight to the heart. It’s something you cannot really resist if it’s got a certain energy behind it. And that’s why this music has caught on all over the world. I think musicians have a role to play in uniting people in breaking down barriers that are false barriers, based on a myopic vision of culture and nationality and all that stuff.

There’s one race – it’s the human race. And I’m happy to see this music gluing people together. I attend festivals all over the world and there are local people from that part of the world and there people in from the Czech Republic, from Chicago, from Mississippi – the music provides a gathering place, a meeting place, and it really has made a difference. It’s really brought people closer together.

And I think it’s not only this genre of music; it’s music in general has that ability to transcend all of these identifications with sub-groups and make some kind of universal family of us, as we’re meant to be.

I feel it’s a privilege to be able to do what I love, to do what I do for a living and also to play some part in making the world a better place. That’s a responsibility and a blessing, you know.

DATC: The other thing that comes strongly through your music is a strong sense of faith – that’s a distinctive element in your music. I’m thinking of songs like I Want Jesus to Walk with Me or Don’t Let Nobody Drag Your Spirit Down or I Heard the Angels Singing. How important is that to you? And these songs always seem to be well received by your audiences – why is that, do you think?

Eric Bibb: Good point. The fact that they resonate with people who are not necessarily emotionally attached to the faith that those songs spring from – to me shows that behind whatever faith it is that you practice, or adhere to, there is something universal about spirituality. And when it’s genuine, one senses intuitively that it’s an honest, sincere expression of faith. And that’s contagious. Because we are all, really, at heart, whether we acknowledge it or not, faithful people, I think we have that faithful gene. We do believe in some kind of higher power, some kind of universe that supports us. And when people hear songs that come from that space, they recognise it.

And I don’t preach, I don’t proselytize, I’m just saying that I come from a culture that has had great success in using this Christian language to express their innate spirituality. And I’m happy with it, because I’ve grown up with it, and it’s familiar to me and it’s universal. And it’s inclusive – that’s the point. I want people to feel that. I don’t want people to feel like I’m choosing to separate myself or exclude because I have a particular belief system. So it seems to really work. And that’s gratifying.

DATC: So, how closely connected are justice and faith? Should they be connected?

Eric Bibb: Absolutely. Because – I know God’s plan for the human tribe is a just world based on love, as opposed to fear. I know that.  And one of the great proponents of love and justice was, of course, the late great Dr. Martin Luther King. He was a hero of mine. He understood the connection between basically doing the right thing and speaking truthfully in the face of fear-ridden people. Somebody’s got to show the way when we’ve all been duped into buying to that whole fear thing. He was a man who, I’m sure, had moments of dread and fear, but basically he overcame that with his faith in a just world. And knew that that was what we’re supposed to be doing – creating that sort of world. So I think there’s a divine connection between justice and faith.

DATC: Eric, I’m really looking forward to tonight’s performance. You’re a hard working touring musician – that’s tough at times, I’m sure. What is it about performing that makes you want to do it night after night?

Eric Bibb: I get so much in return. Not only a way to make my living, but a kind of affirmation that I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing – every night, with so many people. To know that I’m where I’m supposed to be is a great comfort in times when there are many people who feel very lost about their role in this very changeable society. So I’m blessed with that security. I don’t have to fret and worry about what I should be doing. I know that what I’m actually doing is right on point. It’s a great source of energy, actually.

The interview and the guitar stringing is finished; time for a few photographs before the sound check. Eric has been generous with his time, there’s no rush, no fuss, everything is well organized and working towards the show. Vicar Street fills up with more than 500 people, who are treated first of all to a wonderful set of jazzy, bluesy numbers by Eric’s daughter, Yana Bibb, before Eric and the band appear. The crowd listens attentively throughout the show but with whoops, hollers and cheers of appreciation at the end of each song. The energy flows back and forth between Eric and his band and the audience. By the time we reach Don’t Let Nobody Drag Your Spirit Down and Needed Time after nearly two hours, 500 people are singing and clapping enthusiastically with huge smiles on their faces. The feel-good factor is palpable, the sheer joy immense. This is what an Eric Bibb gig is all about – “I’m connected to you, to everyone, and everything.”

 

 

 

 

Asking the Big Questions – God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson

Blind Willie Johnson’s music gets to you, it works its way inside you and asks you big questions about yourself and the way the world is.

God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson is quite simply this year’s best album – and there have been some very fine ones, including those from Luther Dickinson, Mavis Staples and Lucinda Williams.

Produced by Jeffrey Gaskill, ten years in the making and as a result of a successful crowd funding campaign, it features a stellar cast including Tom Waits, Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi, Lucinda Williams, Maria McKee, Luther Dickinson, the Cowboy Junkies, Sinead O’Connor and Rikki Lee Jones. Each song, with the possible exception of Jones’s version of Dark Was the Night, is outstanding, the artists’ interpretations doing full justice to the grit, passion and commitment of Blind Willie Johnson.

Johnson was a gospel bluesman who recorded 29 songs in five sessions for Columbia Records from 1927 to 1930 and who was renowned for his slide guitar – Eric Clapton called him the finest slide guitarist he knew – which he played with a brass ring or a knife. He alternated his tenor voice with a low growl or sometimes just a moan. His haunting gospel blues have endured over the years, covered by a host of artists from Led Zeppelin to Tom Jones to Ry Cooder to the Grateful Dead.

Johnson had a difficult life, as we might expect for a disabled black man living in the Southern States in the early decades of the 20^th century. Details of his life are sketchy – we don’t even know exactly where he is buried (for a fascinating examination of this see Shane Ford’s Shine a Light), but he lived in poverty and hardship, mostly busking and preaching on the streets of Texas. He died pitifully, living in the ashes of his burnt down house in 1945, having contracted malaria.

And yet, his legacy of songs live on. Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground, possibly his most famous song, is one of the music tracks on the Voyager Golden Record, on the unmanned Voyager Project spaceship sent into space in 1977. It takes its place alongside music by Beethoven, Bach and Mozart. Quite what any extra terrestrials might make of Willie Johnson’s eerie slide guitar and moans on Dark Was the Night is anybody’s guess!

Johnson’s songs unashamedly confess and celebrate his Christian faith. (For more on Johnson’s life and faith see The Gospel According to the Blues ). For Johnson, God was a reality with whom we all have to deal – he pulls no punches on God Don’t Never Change and Can’t Nobody Hide from God. He reminds each of us of our responsibility for our own shortcomings in It’s Nobody’s Fault But Mine and he highlights the hardship of life in Lord I Just Can’t Keep from Crying. He gives us the answer to the problem of human frailty in I Know His Blood Can Make Me Whole, and he looks forward to a better world in Jesus is Coming Soon and Bye and Bye I’m Going to See the King. The songs can sound threatening, ominous, gritty – but they can also be joyous and inspirational, when Johnson celebrates his faith in songs like Sweeter As the Years Go By or Let Your Light Shine on Me. This is earthy, blood and guts, committed religion.

And it needed to be for Johnson with the life he led. He had to know there was something more than the trials and difficulties he had to go through; he had to trust that God was, somehow, on his side, and that there would be a better day ahead. That’s why he sang, “keep your lamps trimmed and burning, see what the Lord has done,” and “let your light shine on me.”

For those of us cosseted in comfortable 21^st century Western lifestyles, Johnson’s music is a stark reminder of the harshness of life for many people in today’s world – motherless children, the poor, the disabled, those caught up in war, the sick – and shows how all this can be faced with fortitude, courage, even joy. In You’ll Need Somebody on Your Bond, Johnson reflects on both the sorrows of life and the way to deal with them:

“I came to Jesus as I was, weary and wounded and sad.
found in Him a resting place and he has made me glad.”
For Johnson, these words could never be trite, given the reality of his own life.

So to this new album, God Don’t Never Change. Tom Waits gets us right into the spirit of the songs with his raw vocals and some spirited guitar picking with Soul of a Man. Lucinda Williams contributes a couple of songs, notably a sparse Nobody’s Fault But Mine with some tasty slide guitar and a little Johnson-esque moaning. The slide guitar playing gets take up a notch as you might expect by Derek Trucks on the joyful Keep Your Lamps Trimmed and Burning. (Check out our post on this song here).

Then suddenly we have Willie Johnson himself rasping his way into our consciousness as the Cowboy Junkies start up Jesus Is Coming Soon. They cleverly sample Johnson’s voice for the chorus on the song and it works fantastically well. After the pleasure of the Blind Boys of Alabama, with Jason Isbell on slide on Motherless Children, we have the surprise of the package – Sinead O’Connor, right in the middle of these top notch Americana artists, treats us to a spine-tingling Trouble Soon Be Over. With some exquisite backing vocals and a little guitar and percussion, O’Connor beautifully captures the dichotomy in the song of wrestling with the struggles of life and the hope of redemption.

More slide guitar, courtesy of Luther Dickinson, who is no stranger to inspirational gospel material on Bye and Bye I’m Going to See the King. Then, after Waits’ and Williams’ second contributions we have the delightful Let Your Light Shine On Me with Maria McKee. With a little guitar, some church organ and some nice backing vocals, McKee’s interpretation is glorious, particularly as the song grows and adds some rocking piano and McKee belts out “I know I got religion and I know I ain’t ashamed.” Ricki Lee Jones rounds off the 11 songs with Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground, giving us the benefit of the lyrics about Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, where Johnson had just played slide guitar and moaned.

These are not trivial songs. They’re about life, trial, hardship, faith, death and eternity. Big subjects. Johnson’s music gets to you, it works its way inside you and asks you big questions about yourself and the way the world is. His music matters. That’s why this album is so important. And it’s why each of these artists has participated in the project and has produced such outstanding work.

And it’s why you should go get yourself a copy of the album without delay. Better still, start listening to Blind Willie Johnson yourself.

Mavis Staples – inspiring, uplifting, joyous.

Mavis Staples is a youthful 76. She says, “It puts a wonder on your mind. I’m losing all of my friends, and you really wonder how much longer you have, and how it will be when you leave. But whenever I have to go, I feel like I’m ready. I feel like I have lived a wonderful life.”

This joie de vivre comes through in spades in the new documentary about her life, Mavis!, which if you’re not lucky enough to see in a movie theatre, you can download from itunes. Mavis! is an hour and a half of sheer joy, taking you through Mavis Staples’ career from the 1950s until now. And what a career, from singing gospel in her family’s band to their becoming civil rights icons with the freedom songs of the 60s, to funky soul in the 70s, to two albums with Prince in the 80s, and of late 3 excellent rootsy, bluesy, stripped back albums produced lovingly by Wilco’s Jeff Tweedie.

The Staples Singers led by the indomitable Pops Staples and featuring Mavis’s charisma and amazing voice moved against the tide of gospel singing in the 60s under the influence of Martin Luther King Jr. whom Pops admired greatly. They began to sing protest and freedom songs, like Why (Am I Treated So Bad), where other gospel groups wanted to stick with the more spiritual stuff. The truth is, of course, that the freedom material is every bit as spiritual as the “spiritual.” Faith without works is dead, as someone put it a long time ago.

Staples still sings these political songs.  “They’re still relevant. You know, sometimes I can watch the news on the television and I feel like I’m back in the 60s,” she says. MLK Song on her new album, Livin’ On  A High Note is based on a Martin Luther King speech she remembers hearing: “In the march for peace / Tell them I played the drum / When I have to meet my day.”

Livin’ On A High Note, her 13^th solo album, is terrific, typically Mavis and, like the film, joyous. She told her songwriters, “I want something joyful. I want to stop making people cry. I’ve been making people cry all my life. The songs I sing, the freedom songs and my gospel songs — I know I’ve been inspiring and uplifting people. But now I want to reach them in a joyful way.”

And what a great panel of songwriters she has – a testimony to the respect in which Mavis Staples is held. They include Justin Vernon (Bon Iver), Merrill Garbus (Tune-Yards), Nick Cave, Neko Case, Ben Harper and M. Ward.

One song I find very intriguing is Nick Cave’s contribution, Jesus, Lay Down Beside Down Me. The song is interesting from a theological point of view. We tend to think of God – rightly – as the one who looks after us, cares for us, loves us. This song inverts things and invites us to think about us caring for God, for Jesus. “Jesus, lay down beside me, lay down and rest your troubled mind…lay down your worries,” it says, trying to get us to a perspective other than our own. What is the world like from the perspective of the divine? “The truth has fallen on deaf ears, Lord…And the flowers of your love, Lord, refuse to seed, In a world full of greed.”

It reminds us a bit of those doleful verses in John’s gospel, chapter 1, “He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.” In a world where everyone is more concerned about getting more than their fair share, and truth is whatever you want it to be, and Jesus is irrelevant, can we imagine a God’s eye view of things?

“Are you in need?” sings Mavis to the Lord. It reminds me a little of the old John Wesley hymn, O God of Good The Unfathomed Sea, where Wesley says, “yet self sufficient as Thou art, thou dost desire my worthless heart.” Somehow, incredible though it may seem, God – self-sufficient, eternal, omnipotent – desires human love in return for his love. And Nick Cave’s song somehow seems to me to capture this. Love is never a one-way street where one party does all the giving and one all the taking. So perhaps Cave is onto something here, making us think about our part in a relationship with God – real love given, with a care and concern for the other. It starts to take the divine-human relationship away from a sterile belief system into the realm of something real, tangible, alive.

The relationship, given the nature of God, can never be equal. The dependence ultimately will be us upon God. And yet God’s love calls for love in return and love can never be simple dependence; it must be active if it is to mean anything. As St. Augustine once said, ‘To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek him the greatest adventure; to find him, the greatest human achievement.”

When Mavis Staples first heard the words of Cave’s song, she said “Woah. I’m going to comfort Jesus instead of him comforting me.” Perhaps they’re both on to something.

 

Gary Clark Jr. – When this world upsets me

Gary Clark Jr. from Austin, Texas, is one of the brightest lights in the blues at the moment. Only 31, he boasts three outstanding record releases, the Grammy-nominated 2012 studio album, Blak and Blu, the terrific Gary Clark Live from last year, and now The Story of Sonny Boy Slim. Indicative of the way Clark has been noticed of late is his recent appearance on the Jimmy Fallon Show, where Fallon acclaimed him as “one of the best performers out there right now,” and where he gave a superb performance of The Healing from the new album. “Music is our healing/When this world upsets me, this music sets me free.”

The Sonny Boy Slim from the new album’s title is, in fact, Clark himself. His mother used to call him Sonny Boy from time to time, and for Clark it conjures up images of some of his favourite artists, including Sonny Boy Williamson. On top of that Clark says that “Greg Izor, a great harmonica player, used to call me Slim every time he’d see me, and a couple of other folks called me that, so I just put them together.”

If the album has a theme, according to Clark, it is simply, “Through all the b*s*, there’s always hope.”

One of my favourite songs from the album is the largely acoustic, warm and soulful Church, which features Clark’s sisters, Shawn and Savannah, as harmony vocalists. The gospel music they shared growing up is clearly an underlying influence in this song. The song speaks of mistakes made, regrets, and nostalgia for better earlier times. “I was taught to be patient, I was taught to be kind, But I unwind…” is followed by “I’m all alone, Miles from home.”

But, although Clark himself makes no pretension of faith, nevertheless, the plaintive cry from the subject in the song comes through in aspirational tones:

“Aw my lord, I need your helping hand”

Says Clark of the song, “I think when you are having moments to reflect on challenges in your life or weariness, my folks always taught us to look for spiritual strength. Part of this [song is from] a chapter of my life, thinking about where I came from and where I want to go.”

Although Clark looks to music for his “healing” – “when this world upsets me, This music sets me free,” he’s surely right that ultimately when we face challenges, disappointments, failure or trouble, we need to look for some spiritual strength The question is – where are we going to find that? Is the music enough? Sometimes the labour is too great and the burden too much to carry, that we need something more – check out Matthew 11.28. “Aw my lord, I need your helping hand.”