listen to new music & Catch Jamon on the road in 2023!!!
News
September 5, 2023
To quote, well, myself, I'm ready for the Fall. With two new records on the horizon and a number of remaining dates on the 2023 calendar, the rest of the year is gonna be fun.
As I type this update, the digital release of "September" is 3 days away. The album will be available on all streaming services on September 8 even as the first single, "I Can't Listen to the Radio", goes out to Americana radio stations all over the country. The CD version of the album will be available on September 15.
In addition, "Black River" is slated for release on October 31, which only seems fitting since it's about giants and demons and monsters, oh my.
And that's what's going on, in a nutshell. Keep an eye on this page and on my Facebook page for periodic updates...and catch me on the road when you can. Click on the link near the top of the page for tour dates.
"South of Somewhere"
"South of Somewhere" was born during the recording of "One Hillbilly Place" when I decided that two of the songs I was working on for that album just didn't work as bluegrass songs. We tried several angles with both "I Got Lucky" and "Southern Woman", but nothing felt right. Finally, I had to face the fact they just weren't going to work. I still believed in both songs, though, so rather than scrap them, I came up with the idea of doing an outlaw country record that would consist of a handful of recent compositions along with reworked versions of a few songs that had appeared on other projects.
"One Hillbilly Place"
"One Hillbilly Place" is not so much a follow-up to "American Cemetery" as a continuation. It began as an 8-song set before two of the less bluegrass-y songs splintered off and became the "South of Somewhere" record. The remaining six songs consist of four original compositions along with cover versions of Fountains of Wayne's "Hung Up on You" and Mike & the Mechanics' "Silent Running". The former was a tongue-in-cheek country song that lent itself well to a melancholy bluegrass arrangement while the latter's synthesizer hook took on a lonely urgency when played on the fiddle and helped to form the theme of the album. That theme was one of isolation & uncertainty in the Covid-obsessed climate that existed during the recording of the album and was further verbalized in the grim lyrics of "Running Out of Time". The greater arc, however, became apparent when I wrote the title track and "Take Me Home", both of which echo the idea of "shrinking your world", so to speak, and going back home, both physically & figuratively. Of course the album ends on a high note with "Everything will be Alright". As I stated earlier, "One Hillbilly Place" feels very much like a continuation of "American Cemetery". The major difference between the two is that the songs on the first record were mostly written as rock or country songs and rearranged as bluegrass songs whereas the songs on the second record were written as bluegrass songs.
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"American Cemetery"
“American Cemetery” is a companion to “Strange Devils”, albeit an unintentional one. During the recording sessions for the latter, I recorded a bluegrass version of a song called “The Fall”. Having been born & raised in Southern Kentucky, I guess I always knew I would record a bluegrass song at some point. However, I never anticipated that I would become so enamored with bluegrass music that I would literally put the brakes on the project I was working on and write & record a full-blown bluegrass album…but that’s just what happened.
Even though I was raised hearing bluegrass music on my mom’s radio, I was far from being an aficionado of the genre. I did possess a passing familiarity with the classics, though. And I’ve always been a HUGE fan of Ricky Skaggs who, after racking up an astonishing number of country chart-toppers in the eighties, had transitioned to bluegrass music in the nineties and even rerecorded some of his biggest hits in a bluegrass style a few years back. I was also a fan of contemporary bluegrass artists like Old Crow Medicine Show, Nickel Creek, The Dead South, Trampled by Turtles and Devil Makes Three, among others.
My “sound” would develop as an amalgamation of three basic elements: my influences, my guitar-playing style and my general musical philosophy. Obviously, my influences were a mixture of traditional & contemporary bluegrass styles, so I decided to apply traditional arrangements to my contemporary & sometimes quirky songwriting style. I also decided early on that I wanted a very “live” sound that didn’t rely on a lot of fancy studio tricks like layering & effects. I wanted a guitar player, a mandolin player, a fiddle player and a bass player…and NO DRUMS. That was a philosophy that I picked up from legendary bluegrass deejay Cowboy Bob Glover when I had the honor of working with him during my radio stint in the nineties. “If it has drums, it ain’t bluegrass,” he would always say…and I guess I took that to heart.
The third thing that contributed to my sound was my distinctive “washboard” style of guitar-playing. I don’t play like a bluegrass player and I never will. I couldn’t if I tried. Therefore, if the players didn’t play to MY guitar track, then I would never be able to play with them. To their credit, they did an amazing job of adapting to me and I think it gives the music a unique feel.
The songs on “American Cemetery”, for the most part, weren’t written as bluegrass songs. They were mostly songs that I had written as rock or country songs but adapted to my new sound. I also knew that I wanted to reinterpret a couple of classic songs. Here are the songs that made the final cut of the album:
BURY THIS OLD BODY: One of two songs actually written for “American Cemetery”, this one was originally conceived in Natchitoches, LA at the same time that I wrote “When I Die” for “Strange Devils”. I had just left Salem, Massachusetts and had recently been to Southern California, so I guess all of those places were still fresh in my mind. I had also had a recent health scare that, luckily, turned out to be nothing but had provided me with a very real sense of my mortality. That played a huge part in the lyric, as well. The references to an Irish wake made the Celtic approach to the production of the song a no-brainer.
TRASEIGH: I wrote this song in 2002. At the time, I was a huge Goo Goo Dolls fan, so a lot of what I wrote at that time had the same jangly rock feel of their biggest hits. This one would have sounded like “Slide” had I recorded it back then. I changed up the strum pattern and played it more like Trampled by Turtles might have. The original title was “Tracey”, but I went with the Irish spelling of the name for the this version.
MOONSHINE JACK: The other song written specifically for “American Cemetery”, this one is obviously influenced by bands like The Dead South and Devil Makes Three but has also been compared to Bela Fleck which I consider a HUGE compliment. The lyric tells the story of what happens to me every time I drink moonshine. By the way, Moonshine Jack IS a real person and you definitely want to invite that guy to your party. He brings the best refreshments.
THE FALL: This is the song that spawned the “American Cemetery” project. It was originally recorded for “Strange Devils” and appears on both albums. I wrote it in 1999 during my aforementioned Goo Goo Dolls phase, but the bluegrass treatment suits it well. The lyric is probably the closest thing to poetry that I've ever written. I added the bridge section on the day we recorded it.
HARD RAIN: This one was originally written for The Toluenes and would probably have been more of a “cowboy song” if I had recorded it with that band. The lyric makes references to “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door”.
I’LL GIVE YOU THIS: This one was also written around the turn of the century as a rock ballad, but the guys did an amazing job of turning it into a mid-tempo bluegrass song.
16 TONS: This song has probably been recorded a thousand times. I recorded it a few years ago for a project that a friend of mine in Hollywood was working on. I dusted it off & reworked it a little and it provided the perfect quirky interlude to “Ain’t No Grave”.
AIN’T NO GRAVE: I’ve heard this song all my life, but I never realized until recently that several recorded versions of the song feature “new” verses written by the artist. I decided to adapt the events of Genesis 6 for my version. It acts as a perfect bookend with “Bury this Old Body”.
"Strange Devils"
“Strange Devils” was a labor of love that took over 3 years to record and most of my life to write. As crazy as that sounds, it’s literally true. Six of the eighteen songs on the album were brand new compositions written specifically for the project, while one was written when I was 19 years old - the other eleven songs fall somewhere in between. Each one was chosen for its particular autobiographical nature to serve as a chapter in what became the story of my life & death.
Early on in the recording process, I realized that I wanted to experiment with a few genres that I had never attempted before. Of course the final cut of the album would feature its share of rock, pop and country, but there was also some bluegrass, folk, jazz, blues, Celtic and gospel in the mix. As a result, I was able to utilize instruments that I never had before - a couple of songs had fiddle, a couple others had saxophone and one had pedal steel. I even played a harmonica part on one song. It was the first time I ever played one.
The album was never meant to be so long, but it just kept “growing” as we worked on it. Every time I thought I knew what the track listing was going to be, I would write something new or something old would pop into my head and demand to be included. We actually started referring to it as the “Winchester album” at one point in reference to the famous Winchester House. I started to worry that I might die if I ever finished it. In all, we recorded 22 songs for “Strange Devils”. Here are the eighteen that make up the official version of the album:
WHEN I DIE: This was the first song I wrote specifically for the album and it actually defined the concept. I had a bit of a health scare in early 2017 which, luckily, turned out to be nothing. It did force me to face my eventual mortality in a way I never had before, though. I was sitting beside the Cane River in Natchitoches, LA in the exact spot where the final scene of “Steel Magnolias” was filmed when I came up with the idea. When it came time to record it, I decided that I wanted it to have a Celtic flavor right down to the traditional Irish melody that immediately precedes the song. That melody became a musical motif that appears in several of the songs including the final melody in the final song on the album. This was the first one of my songs that Jason ever played fiddle on, but he’s played on a bunch of them since then.
EASY TO LOVE: This was the last song written for the album. I had just hiked 2 miles through a sketchy neighborhood in Inglewood, CA at sundown to avoid calling a cab since cab drivers hate it when you call them to take you two miles down the road. I was telling a friend about it and she conveyed her disbelief at all the risky things I do on a regular basis to which I quipped, “I know I’m hard to understand, but I’m easy to love.” The rest of the lyric came fairly quickly. I wrote it to a reggae beat and knew that I wanted to give it a pop arrangement. Dave (engineer/producer) thought I was crazy when I suggested the saxophone but loved the Paul Simon feel it gave the song once he heard it. Andy rocked that sax.
THE FALL: I wrote this song in 1999. At the time, I was a huge Goo Goo Dolls fan and I envisioned this as an “Iris” sort of song. I performed it a lot over the years and even demo-ed it once or twice but never gave it a proper treatment. Even so, I always loved the poetic nature of the lyric. As I scanned my hard drive for candidates for the album, this one jumped out at me. I don’t know what made me decide to do a bluegrass arrangement for it, but I got bit by the bluegrass bug as a result. I actually suspended the “Strange Devils” recording sessions at one point and spent months writing and recording what would become my first bluegrass album, “American Cemetery”.
AS YOU WERE: This is another song that was written for “Strange Devils”. I was playing around with the guitar and came up with an unusual (for me) chord progression that ultimately had to be moved in order for me to sing it (which made it sound even more unusual). The lyrical hook came almost immediately. For the arrangement, I tried to make it sound like “Everlong” by Foo Fighters and “In the Blood” by Better than Ezra had a baby. I think we got close.
YOU DO VOODOO: Another of the six “new” songs on the album, I started writing this one within minutes of arriving on the island of Barbados where I played a private show in 2018. There was a sublimely exotic woman standing near me at the baggage claim. As I sneaked peeks at her, I remember thinking, “I’ll bet she does voodoo. Hmmm…that would make a good song. She does voodoo. She DO voodoo. YOU do voodoo. Yes! That’s it!” As soon as I got to my cabana, I grabbed the guitar and started strumming the chord progression for “Wrapped Around Your Finger” by The Police for some reason, albeit in a different key. It took about thirty minutes to finish the lyric. The arrangement owes a debt of gratitude to “Wicked Game” by Chris Isaak. Andy blew some mean sax on this one, too.
I SAW GOD IN AMERICA LAST NIGHT: Also, one of the “new” songs, I wrote this one just as it was becoming clear that there wouldn’t be a second Falkmore album and it’s one of my favorite things I’ve ever done. The lyric is an admittedly dramatized recounting of the night I was saved, though the chord progression is anything but adventuresome. I remember showing it to Dave and he said, “So, you’re just going to do that for five minutes?” I said, “Don’t worry. It has a bridge where it goes to the five.” Before we started arranging it, I told him to listen to side 2 of “The Joshua Tree”, not to any specific song – just the overall feel of it. For the guitar solo, I told him to start playing “Amazing Grace” and then segue into the Irish melody that began the album. There’s a cool moment after the solo where the pipe organ fades out as the synth fades back in. There’s also a section in the outro where I knew I wanted harmonica, but we had trouble finding someone who would do such a simple part without wanting an arm and a leg. Finally, I bought a damn harmonica and did it myself. I had never played harmonica before and I certainly ain’t no John Popper, but it sounds like it did in my head and that’s good enough for me.
FLESH WOUNDS IN ITHACA: This song was written during the recording sessions for the first Falkmore album and was intended for the follow-up. I was driving on I-70 in the wee hours of the morning coming up on Wheeling, WV and feeling a little loopy when I got the idea. The title is a “Seinfeld” reference, which has absolutely nothing to do with the song. The arrangement was inspired by “In the Air Tonight” by Phil Collins.
THE GHOST OF HIRAM JONES: This song was written in 2009 and was originally recorded for a 4-song E.P. that Dan & I intended to release under the name Crawley Scott, although the project was shelved before completion. I conceived the song during one of my many trips to Eggleston, VA where I frequently play at a place called The Palisades. A couple of miles from the venue is a little gravel road called Hiram Jones Road that seems to mysteriously disappear into the woods. I was so intrigued every time I passed it that I eventually created a fictional story for Mr. Jones and set it to music. A friend of mine thought it sounded like a folk song, so we tried to arrange it as such. It’s another one of my absolute favorites from the album.
BETWEEN THE F AND E: This song was written around 2015 for what would have been the next Toluenes record had one ever materialized. It’s basically a 3-minute version of my life story arranged to sound as much like Steve Earle’s “Guitar Town” as legally possible.
MIDDLE OF NOWHERE: The third time’s a charm, I guess, although I won’t promise that I won’t record this song a fourth time at some point. It originally appeared as an acoustic demo on the third Toluenes record. We updated it with a full-band version for the fifth Toluenes record. Neither really reflected the way we do it live, though, and that’s why I chose to record it again when I realized that it needed to be included on “Strange Devils”.
ROAD MOVIE: This song was written in 2009 and originally appeared on the “Crow” album in 2011. Unfortunately, that version contained a lyrical gaffe that somehow made it to tape and a friend of mine never let me live down. This version correctly refers to “Hope & Crosby” instead of “Martin & Lewis”.
STEADY AS SHE GOES: This song was written in 2011 and almost made it onto the “Crow” album but was ultimately held back for “Try Nitro” in 2013. The version The Toluenes recorded had a bit of a cowboy feel. I wanted it to sound more like a traditional country song this time around, so we added fiddle and pedal steel.
JUMPING: This song was written in the late nineties. I was a huge Ben Folds’ Five fan at the time and their first album had a song called “Boxing” that was about Muhammad Ali. I thought it was brilliant, so I decided to write a song like that about Evel Knievel. The lyric comes from a story that I once heard Frank Gifford tell about the time Evel attempted to jump over 13 buses at Wembley Stadium. He almost made it but, unfortunately, "caught" the last bus.
ONE MORE TIME: I wrote this song when I was nineteen years old but never recorded it because, honestly, I didn’t know how at that time. I’m actually pretty impressed that I was even able to write a song like that then. I had developed an affection for big band ballads ever since I heard “Kissing a Fool” by George Michael. As funny as that sounds, it did later lead me to Harry Connick, Jr. and, eventually, Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Jimmy Durante and many others. I’m certainly no Frank, but it was fun finally recording this song after all these years.
BEEN A LONG TIME: I wrote this song in 2008, just a few months after my sister died in a car accident. It was difficult to write and it’s just as difficult to discuss. I’ll just let the song speak for itself.
LAST ONE STANDING: This was another song I wrote during the Falkmore sessions that didn’t make it onto the first album but might have made it onto a second, had there been one. The lyric is about survivor’s guilt, which is a bit of a heavy topic, so we decided to arrange it in a lighter, quirkier way. Musically, it’s an homage to Steely Dan.
WHEN I SEE YOU: Also written during the Falkmore sessions, this song is about the time I almost became a parent...maybe. I had dated this girl for about a year before we broke up. Soon after, I found out she was expecting a child. The math added up to it being mine, but she lost the baby before I got the courage to ask if it was mine. I never spoke to her again. I figured it didn’t matter at that point. Several years later, it crossed my mind for some reason and I began to wonder if I would recognize the unborn child as MY child (if, indeed, it was mine) in Heaven.
AN EIFEACHT FEILEACAN: The last of the six songs written for the album, this one is about “what might have been”. The title is Gaelic for “the butterfly effect”. This was literally the most frustrating song I’ve ever recorded. It’s rare that I don’t have an arrangement in mind when I take a song into the studio, but I truly had no clue how this song was supposed to sound. It started out completely acoustic, but, when that didn’t work, we added a drum loop. That didn’t work, either, so we got Andy to lay down live drums and then ended up combining parts of his track and parts of the loop. We basically “finished” the song four times before we had a version we liked. The key is so high that it’s almost out of my range, which gives my voice a unique quality that I really like. I’m also really proud of the fact that the final guitar line echoes the Irish melody from the beginning of “When I Die”. That melody is the first and the last thing you hear when you listen to the album.
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