After listening to guitarist Jimmy Herring’s new solo album Subject To Change Without Notice it would be easy to say that the man is on top of his game – but it wouldn’t be accurate.
The fact is, Herring’s already-amazing game keeps getting better.
The 50-year-old guitarist (who hangs his hat in Georgia when he’s not out on the road with Widespread Panic or his own Jimmy Herring Band) may be an idol to pickers all over the world, but in his mind, he still has a lot to learn. And he still wants to learn.
In transcribing my conversation with Jimmy on the eve of his tour behind the release of Subject To Change Without Notice, I was tempted to edit out some of our diversions into guitar talk. But in re-reading his words, I decided they had as much to do with passion and love for his craft as they did guitar neck radiuses and chord progressions. Trust me: you won’t have to be a picker yourself to enjoy Jimmy’s thoughts about friends, family, bilgewater … and the mantra of “Just show up.”
BR: Jimmy, I promise I’ll do my best to stay on top here and not get talking about guitars too much – because I could seriously derail this interview.
JH: (laughs) Oh, me too, man – me too. (laughter)
But I am going to ask you about that sweet-looking Tele you’re holding on the back cover of the new album. What’s the story with that guitar?
That’s just a Fender reissue that I found, but it felt really good. Somebody had cut into the body to put a humbucker neck pickup in it and they didn’t do a good job, you know? So the guitar had a nasty, ugly, chewed-up part of the body underneath the pickup – but I don’t care about that stuff. I got the neck refretted – I like super big frets and flatter necks than the way Fender usually builds their guitars.
That’s the sort of a thing that’s been going on for years among players – get a guitar that you like and flatten the neck out quite a bit so it plays a lot better. It’s not a secret. I fought normal Fenders for years without fret jobs or flattening the neck and I’d see people like Steve Morse or Stevie Ray Vaughan play and I’d be, like, “How come I can’t do that? How do they do it so easily?” And then I found out about the flatter neck and big frets – it made a huge difference.
So anyway, yeah – I love that Tele. I used it on a bunch of stuff on the album.
When I wrote about your solo album Lifeboat in 2008, I described it as a very personal album – you were dealing with some loss in your life at the time. How would you compare Subject To Change Without Notice to Lifeboat ?
You know, you’re right that I was dealing with some stuff on Lifeboat – although some of it had happened years earlier … like the loss of my father. Sometimes I’m not the greatest at dealing with those sort of things, so I have to put it aside or it’ll just kind of consume me … and the music helped me release some of that.
Another thing about Lifeboat was I was really determined not to have a guitar record; it was important to me that the music come first and not the instrument that I happened to play. And I felt really strongly about getting a lot of other instruments on there so that the solo time was shared equally … like say, Kofi Burbridge on the flute or Gregg Osby on the sax or Matt Slocum on the keys. It was important to me to have the music first.
Plus, I was really into the trance thing on that record. There’s a lot of minor 6 chord-oriented stuff, like “Jungle Book” or “Grey Day” – those tunes were centered around a minor 6 chord. I’d really just discovered it and the minor scale that goes with it just kind of puts me in a trance … I wanted to explore that. Those were the things that Lifeboat was going for.
With this album, I really just came around to wanting to play some simpler music – bigger melodies and not really worried about whether it was perceived as “guitar music” or not, you know? I mean, if it is, that’s fine, but what I really wanted to do was play some simpler melodies and simpler songs. There are a couple jazz fusion-type things on the album, but a lot of it singer/songwriter-type songs – except there’s no singer. (laughter)
The guitar is the voice. Or the keys, or the sax.
Right, right.
Speaking of sax, one of the things I noticed on this album is how much more horn-like your playing is – not just in terms of tone, but in the phrasing and the way you’re offering the ideas. That seems like something that’s developed over the years.
Well thank you, man – thank you so much. That’s been a conscious effort for a big part of my life. Back when I was in Bruce Hampton’s band, there was a lot of ridicule – it was tongue-in-cheek; it was all in fun – but Bruce would give me a lot of crap about the guitar being more important than the music. (laughs)
Bruce knew the kind of people I liked to listen to and he was teasing me, mostly … he just wanted me to think about it, you know? Think about where your influences are coming from. Don’t just listen to other guitar players; listen to all music – listen to music that doesn’t even have guitar in it. And as a result of that, I ended up going through a long period of time not listening to any other guitar players – but listening to a lot of horn players. I think that had something to do with what you’re talking about.
What I hear – and I’m probably over-simplifying it, but it’s what I hear – your guitar takes breaths.
Oh, man … (laughs) Thank you for noticing!
Is it a conscious thing while you’re playing?
Thank you so much, man … it’s one of those things that I really didn’t know if people were going to notice or not. Yes, it’s a conscious effort; like I said, I listened to a lot of horn players – and singers, too. The latest influence on me has been singers.
It seems like where I’m headed right now is to have a vocalist-type of quality. Especially in instrumental music where you don’t have a singer – something needs to be there. Plus, the human voice is the most splendid instrument of all.
Derek Trucks is a profound influence on me in that way. He can sound as much like a singer as any instrumentalist I’ve heard. The idea of playing in phrases is something I’ve been trying to develop for a long time. Horn players have to take a breath, you know? But guitar players don’t … they don’t need it to produce a note, while horn players and vocalists do. So horn players just naturally play phrases – and where you leave spaces really defines your style. You hear that cliché all the time about “what you don’t play is just as important as what you do play” … and I’m trying to implement that. I think it’s important.
To the point where I’ll hear the same thing a horn player might do when they have that last little blast of air left and they’ll let fly with a flurry of notes …
Yeah! Yeah! (laughter)
You produced Lifeboat yourself; this time around you had John Keane as a producer. How much did it change things having him there?
Oh, John is brilliant, man. Yeah, I produced Lifeboat, but I also had an engineer there who knew what he was doing. Real producers to me are also engineers – and I’m not an engineer. (laughs)
John worked with me and let me make myself happy on a number of issues. Some producers, you know, don’t let you make yourself happy – you just play and they’ll say, “Okay, that’s it – we’ve got it.” Even if you don’t really like it, that’s it.
I told John, “The reason I want to work with you is you’re brilliant and you know how to get these amazing sounds. You’re the fastest engineer I’ve ever seen in my life and I’ve worked with a lot of really good engineers.
Plus, John has a million great musical ideas. If I hit a wall, and I’m trying to come up with a melody, John can help me with that because he’s a musician himself. He just has a great idea of what a song should be.
John may not have written any of the music, but he had a profound influence on this record. I would not have wanted to make this record without him … he was an integral part in every way.
How structured were the arrangements going in?
It’s probably about what you would guess: like on the first song – “Red Wing Special” – we just had a simple form that we followed. In the middle we gave the drums and bass a chance to solo over the same form as the fiddle player and I were soloing over. It was pretty regimented, but not in a way that was confining. In jazz, that’s kind of a standard thing to do. And then there are songs like “Miss Poopie” – that section in the middle where the guitar solo is? That was free-form, live in the studio. I just played a solo, you know?
I was looking at the studio as a different kind of entity than what a live gig would be. It’s already got me thinking about how to approach the next record – more from a live perspective.
It’s hard to go into the studio and play live unless you put everybody in the same room with their amps and everything … but the downside of that is, your guitar amp will bleed into the drum mics or whatever. People will do it and put the amps in different rooms, but then you have to wear headphones to hear yourself …
And it changes things.
It does, man – it changes things greatly. Most of the time, that’s why I end up re-doing my solos: I can’t get into the spirit with headphones on.
But I learned a lot during this process and I think next time we’re going to set everybody up in the same room- a big room – and set up like we do on stage. We might even set up on a stage; bring the studio equipment there and play live. Not necessarily in front of an audience, but live as far as we’re concerned. And then if there’s anything that I want to overdub on it, it could be added later.
I love orchestration and, unfortunately, in a 4-piece band, there’s only so far you can go with it. As a result, I write all these songs that need orchestration and we end up overdubbing. On this record, we had John Keane’s pedal steel which added a nice texture to the music on some songs. It sort of takes the place of having a string section or a horn section holding long notes behind the music, you know?
Maybe for the next album, we’ll pare it down a little, but that might change … who knows? (laughter)
You mentioned “Red Wing” – the notes from my first listen to the album were “Django Reinhardt! Stéphane Grappelli!”
(laughs) I’ve always loved Django, but I couldn’t possibly delude myself into thinking that I could ever play anything along that level … really man, there’s a whole sub-culture of people who are brilliant at playing Gypsy jazz. To me, it was just an influence, but it is the first thing people say when they hear the tune. It does have that kind of swing to it.
To me, the song is about a train – (chugs out a train-like rhythm) – in my mind, the Red Wing Special is a train; it wasn’t an on-purpose attempt to play a Gypsy jazz tune. I wanted to play a blues that had some interesting chords in it where you could play some scales other than a typical blues scale. We talked about the minor 6 scale earlier – that’s what this is. And playing the melody line with the fiddle player.
Were you thinking about a fiddle being there when you wrote it?
I was thinking about somebody playing the melody with me, and I discussed it with my son. He’s going to be 18 this month and he’s really into music; he has a neat perspective and I consult with him on a lot of things. I was thinking about a saxophone, but I’m not sure it would’ve sounded right unless you tongued every single note – rather than play it like most sax players would. I’m not sure the melody would’ve come off the way I needed it to.
It was my son who said, “Dad, what about a violin?” and that was the first time I thought of it – when he brought it up. And he was right: the violin has a bow, and he can bow every note that I pick … you see what I mean? Every bow stroke for him is like a pick stroke for me. It was the perfect solution.
I’d just seen this great fiddle player, Nicky Sanders, play a show with The Steep Canton Rangers the week before and he blew me away. I thought, “That’s the guy!” Jeff Sipe knew him and thought he’d be interested in playing on the record. I called Nicky up and we worked it out … he played his ass off, man.
And your son who provided the guidance … that’s Carter, who plays cello on the album?
Yeah, that’s right.
Oh, what beautiful weaving you two do on “Within You Without You”.
(laughs) Thank you – thank you so much, man!
It has to be a hoot to have him on the album with you.
Oh, yeah – it was incredible. Carter started playing the cello in – what? – 6th grade, I think. He took to it really fast. But then he kind of lost interest in it and started playing the guitar.
Uh-oh. (laughter)
Yeah – we’re real proud of him. He’s down in Atlanta with a lot of really good young players: Duane Trucks and his buddies are sort of taking Carter under their wing.
Duane – who is Derek’s little brother – and Carter are real tight. Duane’s going to marry my daughter Cameron, so that’s pretty exciting.
Well, congratulations!
Yeah, that’s going to happen next September. They’ve been together a long time – they didn’t rush into it.
That’s cool, Jimmy – I’ve always thought of the circle of players you’re in as family … it’s neat to see the closeness outside of the music, as well.
Yeah, the families are real tight. Duane moved to Atlanta and he’s connected with some really incredible musicians in that scene. They invite Carter to come and play guitar all the time … it’s really awesome to see him doing it.
But on this album, Carter’s on the cello, correct?
That’s right: when we needed a cello part for a couple of things, he was up for it and I was really happy with what he did. It was great to have him involved.
There’s something you’re doing during “Within You Without You” that reminds me of your solo on “Shut Up And Drive” on Panic’s Dirty Side Down. Once again, it’s another horn-like effect – this time, in terms of tone. Are you tickling the whammy bar?
Yeah, that’s it – you got it. It’s long notes and the bar, like you said. The thing about the twang bar is, I never used it until I was like … I don’t know … until I was 46 or 47! (laughter)
I never wanted to mess with one because, well … Jeff Beck, you know? Man, I’m just a Jeff Beck freak and he creates the most beautiful things with the twang bar. I mean, sure, he makes all those crazy noises, too – those guttural sounds – but he’s also able to emulate the human voice in a way that just freaks me out.
So I stayed away from the twang bar only because I knew if I got into it I’d want to be “Jeff Beck Jr.” (laughter) About three years ago Dave Schools had been given a bunch of live Jeff Beck performances and we started listening to them. I was so bowled over that I said, “Okay, that’s it – I’ve got to find out what this is all about.” And that’s when I started messing with the twang bar.
The biggest issue with those things is keeping them in tune, but Joel Byron – who is Panic’s guitar guy – knows how to do it. Joel does certain things to the bridge and to the nut that make all the difference. Of course, I’m not dive-bombing it or anything … the idea behind what I’m doing is to try to have a vocal-ish kind of thing.
When you’re playing straight-on guitar and you hit a note – say, like the E note on the second string at the fifth fret – and you do a vibrato with your fretting hand, you can only go above the note and back down to it. You can’t go below the note. But when a singer sings, they can vibrato above and below the pitch. In other words, they surround the central note with their vibrato.
If you bend a string before you pick it, you can do some of that; I’ve been working on it for years. But the twang bar really allows you to give the guitar a vocalist kind of quality; a slide guitar kind of quality; even a harmonica kind of quality.
There are times on the Frogwings album [2000 release featuring Jimmy, Derek and Butch Trucks, Kofi and Oteil Burbridge, Marc Quinones, and John Popper] when it’s hard to tell the difference between what you’re doing with your fingers and Derek’s slide playing.
(laughs) Like I said, Derek’s had a profound influence on my playing. He’s the one who showed me the power of one note. But I could only get so far without using a slide – and I’ve always figured, “Why would I bother picking up a slide with this guy around?” (laughter) I mean, I don’t dare to even go to that place. (laughter)
But I would still pick up little things from Derek, even without the slide … I would get ideas that I would hear him play a lot; sometimes they would leak into my subconscious. I never picked his brain – “Would you show me this; would you show me that?” – but when you’re around someone like Derek, their influence is lasting. I’m still drawing on things I heard him play when he was 12 years old. (laughter)
So when I picked up the twang bar and started messing with it, I started to find little slide guitar-type things – and the vibrato was much more vocal-like. And I started to find these harmonica-style licks.
You mentioned the harmonica sound earlier. Can you give me an example?
Like on “Kaleidoscope Carousel”: there’s a solo at the end of that song that fades out and I was going for different ideas that I’d heard harmonica players play. The twang bar allows you to do things that you just couldn’t do without it.
“Kaleidoscope Carousel” has a definite melody, but it keeps shape-shifting as you go along – a very fluid feel.
Yeah, actually, it was sort of a collage. The idea was to just create a trance-like state – not have a definitive melody, but create a groove-oriented mood kind of thing. It was sort of an experiment. There are definitely melodies in it, but some of it is just what you said: sort of a shape-shifting thing.
John had me go into the room with my amp at one point to play some long, sustained notes. He’d had me do the same kind of thing on “This Cruel Thing” on Dirty Side Down. I told John I’d really like to try it on this album and he thought that it would work.
So I went and did a track of these long, sustained notes that had very little movement and a lot of feedback. After I did it once, John told me to do it again. I think I did six or eight tracks of these long notes – they were all different; I started at a different place each time. And then John played all of them back at the same time – I didn’t know he was going to do that – and it just sounded freaky! (laughter)
That’s where the “kaleidoscope” thing came in: it was kind of like looking through something and then turning it, changing it – like a kaleidoscope. The chords were changing, but not at the same time as one another. There was no plan to it whatsoever; it was totally spontaneous and totally improvised. The intro is that same part I was just describing, only we edited it down and ran it backwards.
The tune lives up to its title, for sure.
Yeah! (laughs) Thank you.
My take on “Aberdeen” was a theme song just waiting for the movie to be made behind it. What was the inspiration there?
Well … it was two days before the sessions and I knew I didn’t have enough songs … (laughter)
I was just downstairs in my basement, just playing guitar. I didn’t have a plan; I wasn’t trying to write anything; but I knew in the back of my mind I didn’t have enough tunes. That chord progression just came to me out of nowhere – that gospel kind of 3/4 or 6/8 deal – and I grabbed a piece of paper. That first chord progression came all at one time; then I knew I needed a bridge and a chorus so I started messing with it. It probably didn’t even take an hour to write – it just came out.
I didn’t have a melody to go over the chord progression when we recorded it, but I had to do the rhythm guitar part anyway, you know? I mean, I could hear things bouncing around in my head, but I did the improvised solo in the middle before I had the melody.
Which came from …?
Sitting on John Keane’s couch bouncing ideas off each other. I’d play something and he’d say, “That’s pretty cool”; or he’d sing something, sing a phrase and I’d play it back to him … that’s how it came about.
I was wondering if you had Ike Stubblefield in mind when you wrote “Aberdeen”. His playing is … whew!
Yeah, he’s fantastic, man. I knew from the beginning that we wanted him to play on it, but you know what? He wasn’t available when we laid the track down. (laughs) Yeah – we left him a place to play and he came in and did it.
If I had my choice, of course, I’d have everybody together and play it live … but unfortunately it doesn’t always work out that way. Everybody’s busy.
That’s the problem with being talented, Jimmy – you’re all wanted.
(laughs) I’m just lucky to have so many good friends, man! A lot of great people.
We should also mention Matt Slocum, who does some killer keyboard work of his own on this album. The cover of Jimmy McGriff’s “Miss Poopie” is a natural for two keyboard monsters like Ike and Matt.
Absolutely! Matt is one of the best players I’ve ever had the honor to work with. Yeah they kill “Poopie” … and that jazz tune on the record – “12 Keys”? Matt nails that. His solo is amazing; he learned that head and played it with me … he’s a mother – a real mother. (laughter)
“12 Keys” feels like you wrote it to challenge yourself. You can listen to it with one set of ears and it’s this easy thing that just flows; but if you really listen to it, you realize that there’s some serious shit happening.
Yeah, “12 Keys” is a tough one. It started out as a sketch: we were playing it live and you know the part where the organ and the guitar play that melody together? We were just using that as a solo section – before I wrote the actual melody for it in the studio. What happened was, I recorded a couple of solos over that section and then played them back. A lot of it wasn’t good, but there are a couple moments to it that I thought could be worked into a melody and I refined them from there. On one hand it’s not that complicated, but it is challenging because it does go through all 12 keys and it’s moving at a good pace.
But I’m glad to hear you say that it flows and it’s not hard to listen to. It might be harder than it sounds … which is better than sounding harder than it is! (laughter)
What are you playing for an acoustic guitar on “Emerald Garden” – is that your Baxendale?
Yeah!
Oh, man – I had the pleasure of doing an interview with Scott last year. What a sweet, talented soul.
Oh, he’s incredible, man. Joel Byron introduced me to Scott – Joel works in Scott’s shop when Panic isn’t on the road. I went over to Baxendale Guitar, saw some of the instruments, and said, “Holy crap!” (laughter)
I mean, this guy is world class – and he’s right here in Athens, GA, you know? How lucky are we to have a world-class luthier right here in our back yard? Acoustics, electrics … everything Scott does is amazing. You should see what he does with these old guitars like Harmonys and Kays.
Ah! The first one that caught my eye was a Harmony that he rebuilt for Jason Isbell. I saw a clip of Jason with Justin Townes Earle on Letterman last year playing this beautiful old archtop – great sound. When I asked Jason about it, he told me how Scott had rebuilt the guitar and brought its soul to life.
Oh, no doubt about it, man. He turns them into incredible instruments. And these little teenie parlor guitars – he handed me one when I was there once that already belonged to somebody else – they were coming to pick it up that day. I was blown away: “How much do you want for it?” “Somebody already bought it,” he told me. “Well, call ‘em up and see how much they want for it!” (laughter)
But yeah – he and Joel both do incredible work. I never had a custom-made acoustic before. In fact, I never really played much acoustic, I’m ashamed to say. Part of the reason is, when you’re in the studio, you can put a microphone on an acoustic and get the sound of the guitar – but when you’re playing live it gets harder and harder to do that; you’ve got drums, you’ve got other instruments that will bleed into those condenser mics … the audience, too. Those mics will pick up everything that’s on stage.
So you tend to use a pickup when you’re playing live … and to me, somehow, that’s not acoustic, you know? You’re not hearing the guitar – you’re hearing the pickup. Of course, they have come a long way and the technology is a lot better now … but what you heard on the record is a microphone.
I have a K&K system on my Taylor that I like. It doesn’t change the guitar’s voice – just makes it bigger, which is what I was after.
That’s wonderful to know, man. Taylors are great guitars.
We have recordings of some of those acoustic sets you did with The Other Ones back in 2003 – there’s some beautiful playing there, Jimmy. I would’ve said you were playing a Taylor back then.
I probably was; I had a Taylor and an Alvarez, which I still have. My Taylor was probably the cheapest one in the store; but of all the guitars I tried that day, that’s the one that sounded the best, you know what I mean?
Exactly – same for me. God bless Harvey and Mac at K2 Music up here in Camden, ME. They never try to just sell you something; they help you find what’s right.
That’s cool, man. That’s the way it should be. It’s a matter of what feels comfortable to play.
“Emerald Garden” is a great example of the versatility of the rhythm players you have on the album. Jeff Sipe and Tyler Greenwell both play drums on different cuts, while bass duties are split between Etienne Mbappe and Neal Fountain – and there are various combinations of the four throughout the record, playing all kinds of stuff. “Emerald Garden”, for instance, pairs up Etienne and Jeff. It’s a really versatile bunch.
It’s so cool to have people at that level be willing to participate in this thing. I mean, any one of these people could’ve played anything that the other person played – Neal and Etienne or Tyler and Jeff, you know? It was just a matter of let’s try this – an experiment; go with people’s different desires and interests. They’re all so good that there’s nothing you can throw their way that would trip them up – that’s the absolute truth.
We talked about your guitar technique on “Within You Without You”, but thinking about the song in general – why did you choose that Beatles tune in particular?
Well, it’s one of those songs I’ve been listening to my whole life, you know? When I was growing up, a lot of my friends liked The Beatles, but that song didn’t get as much attention as some of the others did, for some reason. I’m not exactly sure why … maybe because it was coming from an unfamiliar culture – from George Harrison’s influence by Indian music? Maybe that’s a part of it.
But it always resonated with me in a big way, although I never imagined playing it until I got older. I figured we could play that melody with a drum groove behind it – we didn’t have a tabla player, but we had Jeff Sipe! (laughter) He knows more about that kind of music than any of us, man. Jeff pointed out things about that song that I didn’t even know.
I figured I’d try to play the vocal melody on the guitar; and for the middle section, instead of going back to the top of the tune, I thought we could have a free section – you could call it a solo or you could call it an “instrumental exploration” – and then take it back to the melody. I figured that would be cool, as anybody who might cover that song probably wouldn’t have the instrumental excursion in the middle.
I hear you. I’d ask the same thing about the cover of John McLaughlin’s “Hope” – what led you to covering that particular song?
John is one of my favorite musicians ever and that song sort of stood alone on the Mahavishnu albums that I had. It was a mantra … it never had a B section, you know what I mean? It was that one section over and over that kept gaining intensity. I found it very hypnotic and interesting … and nobody took a solo over it! It was just melody, which was awesome. And I thought that what I’d like to do someday was to re-harmonize the chord progression and come up with a simple progression that was derived from the original and have that be the B section. Once we had those changes, I thought it would be cool to have Bill Evans come in and play a sax solo over that.
The challenge was having the chord changes I came up with fit the original song – and have it sound natural.
Which it does.
Yeah, I was really happy with the way it came out. And the other thing was, I wanted to play a solo over the original changes. I didn’t have any pre-conceived notions, because John never played a solo on the original recording. It was a chance to play without being influenced by what had already been done, you know?
So, yeah – both “Hope” and “Within You Without You” were chosen because I felt like we could do something with them that was ours and still pay tribute to the original. That’s what I like to do with a cover: make it ours while letting it be known that we have the utmost respect for the original.
It’s cool to have Bill Evans there on sax – not just to hear him, but to compare his tone and phrasing to yours on guitar.
Oh, man … I’m a tremendous fan of Bill Evans. Neal, Jeff, and I all got to play with him – along with Bela Fleck – at Warren Haynes’ Christmas Jam last year and it was just … wow! He’s a great guy and a world-class musician – I’m thrilled to death that he could play on the record. Same thing with Bela and Nicky Sanders … it’s incredible to have friends like these.
Speaking of Bela, did you have his banjo in mind when you wrote “Curfew”?
No, not in the beginning. Once the chord progression came to me – well, you’re a musician; you know what it’s like – once you have it in your head, then it doesn’t matter what you’re doing. I’d be out in the yard, or out on the lake, or trying to go to sleep and the chords would just keep going through my head over and over again, you know? I didn’t have the melody at that point; I just let it come to me, listening to the chords in my head rather than sitting down with the guitar and trying to force something to happen.
Sometimes, you know … you have to go somewhere where there isn’t any other music – no radios, stereos, anything – so that you can kind of go into a trance and listen to that music in your head.
The melody for “Curfew” came to me before I ever picked up a guitar. And as soon as it did, I thought of Bela Fleck. I could hear him playing as that melody was coming to me – and I knew I had to call him.
Bela is such a prince of a guy; he just played his ass off and brought so much to the tune. He brought harmony; he brought drama; he brought a sense of what the tune really needed … it’s a happy tune and Bela brought that to it.
It’s named “Curfew” after a friend of mine who’s one of my favorite people.
And he’s named “Curfew”? That sounds like a Col. Bruce-ism. (laughter)
You got it, man. Curfew was out on the road with us when he was really young – road managing, packing the truck, getting us into the hotels, and things like that. He was really too young to be with us – not underage, but a lot younger than us – and Bruce started calling him “Curfew”. His name is Matt, but to this day, I still call him Curfew. (laughs)
Wicked. When I first heard that tune I scribbled down “Danny Gatton”.
Oh, wow – that would be in my dreams, man. (laughs) I loved Danny Gatton; I was blown away by him. I consider him to be a real Telemaster – a complete master of the Telecaster. Danny Gatton and Roy Buchanon are two masters of the Telecasters.
I hear you. Jim Weider’s another one, in my book.
Oh, God – yeah. You hear him and realize that’s not a pedal steel; that’s not a twang bar – that’s Jim Weider playing the Telecaster, man. The guy is incredible; I’d put him in that category, too. Those three are like the Kings – Albert, Freddie, and B.B. – of the Telecaster … and there’s only B.B. left, man.
But yeah, Danny Gatton. Thank you for saying that … he left us a lot.
Okay, so “Bilgewater Blues”: growing up here on the Maine coast, I’ve seen, smelled, pumped, wallowed in, and tasted my share of bilgewater in my life. You gotta tell me where that name came from.
(laughs) I love boats, too, man. I’ve been around them all my life – when I was a little kid, my father had a boat.
That was another tune that came to me a day or two before the session. I was messing with a baritone guitar – I plugged it into a Fender Pro Reverb and cranked it up just to see what would come out. The baritone is a good thing to go to when you’re looking for something new; it’s so different from what you normally play that something’s likely to jump out. If you play it for 15 minutes, you’re going to find a riff, you know? And that riff popped out almost instantly – I knew I was onto the beginning of something, so I just kept messing with it.
By the time it was over, I had written the basic sketch of the tune. I didn’t have melodies over the chord changes yet, but I had the general vibe of the song: really dirty; kinda dank; it had a real guttural thing to it in certain places and real funky.
I didn’t have the title for it right away, but after I thought about it for a little while … it was a blues; something down and dirty; kind of guttural … that’s when the title came to me. (laughs)
Makes sense.
Yeah – ‘cause we all know how nasty bilgewater can get, man. (laugher)
So you guys are headed out on the road for a bit; for those who don’t know, can you run down through the lineup of the Jimmy Herring Band?
Sure: Neil Fountain on bass; Matt Slocum on keys; and Jeff Sipe on drums – the four of us are the band … we’re only a four-piece but we make a lot of noise. (laughter)
Jimmy when you look back over the years, it’s been quite a ride, hasn’t it?
It sure has. It’s one of those things that’s staggering to me when I think about it. Really – I have to pinch myself.
I‘ve never had a resume in my life; I’ve had people tell me I needed to have one, but I’ve just gone through my life not looking backwards and just going with what comes my way.
I can’t believe how incredibly blessed I’ve been; it’s one of those things you can’t think about too much, ‘cause if you do, you’ll start to freak out, you know? I mean, people I idolize that I’ve worked with … so many incredibly talented people.
I hear you. But I’d offer that life is just one big old mirror, Jimmy. If you weren’t who you were – both personality- and talent-wise – a lot of those opportunities wouldn’t have come your way.
Thank you so much, man. We all know how hard life can be and we all know that hard times come on to people … how lucky is an individual that loves what they do for a living, right? I mean, my God … I’m so grateful.
I know a lot of people in this world who are fantastic musicians who haven’t had the luck that I have. I mean that; luck plays into it. Some people will say, “Luck is where skill meets opportunity,” and I’ve heard that. It may have some truth to it, but I think in my case? I’m just damn lucky. (laughter)
I never went looking for anything, man. You have all these people who bust their ass trying to get their names out there; get out there and get known …. and maybe that’s part of the problem, I don’t know. Maybe they try a little too hard and they should just go out there and play.
Bruce Hampton said to me a long time ago, “Just show up – just keep showing up.” And that resonated with me in a big way, because that’s really what it all is. Just show up.
Just show up and do your best: don’t get too high to play; don’t be an asshole that can’t get along with people; try to be prepared when someone you’re working for expects certain things from you. That what Bruce meant by “showing up” – at least that’s what _I _ took away from it.
Don’t talk about it; just get out there and play. Go do it and keep doing it.
I feel so incredibly lucky; I know a lot of great players who haven’t been as blessed as I have.
“Just show up.” I guess you could apply that to life in general.
Yeah – I think that’s what he meant, man. Bruce has a way of saying these things that 10 years later have a way of coming back again really true … like you said, in life.
Just keep showing up. (laughter)
