(Acoustic Blues) Kelly Joe Phelps - 7 albums - 1997 - 2012, MP3, 160-320 kbps

#777Although there are certainly more singer songwriters in the world today than there ever were before, greatness and originality are still as hard to find and precious as ever they were.
But there are people around making truly great singer songwriter records and acoustic driven music, and you'll find a number of them in Puremusic, if you check out the clips. One of the artists we're most impressed by is Kelly Joe Phelps, because of his unique voice as a writer and a player, and a singer. His earliest recordings were very guitar oriented, even pyrotechnical at times. He came to acoustic blues based music through the jazz door, that's not a common way in. From the top, he's been an artist who blurs the boundaries between folk and blues, and jazz. (God bless him.) He didn't play an obvious version of any one of the three consistently.
We reviewed his excellent CD from 2001, Sky Like a Broken Clock, and later the companion EP of alternate takes and unreleased tracks, Beggar's Oil. Those were memorable sessions that featured the artist live in the room with Larry Taylor, who's played bass with Tom Waits, and the drummer from Morphine, Billy Conway.
#777Since that time, KJP has entered into a relationship with Lee Townsend of Songline/Tonefield Productions in Berkeley, CA. That looks to be a fascinating and inspired team out there. Along with KJP, Lee also both produces and manages Bill Frisell and Joey Baron, both jazz leaders well known for projects that also run afield of jazz. Although most of Lee Townsend's many productions are in jazz, he himself goes far afield, making records with singer songwriters like Noe Venable, Paul Sprawl, and Stephen Yerkey, among others. But all the artists he works with are extremely high caliber, and all originals.
This blessed collaboration of Kelly Joe Phelps and Lee Townsend has produced a whole new sound for the artist, I think one that will increase his profile. The mix is different, a little less dense, and easier to walk into the middle of. Two different tracking crews were used. One includes three members of Canada's Zubot and Dawson band: Jesse Zubot on fiddle and mandolin, Steve Dawson on Weissenborn, and Andrew Downing on bass. Chris Gestrin plays organ and accordion and Petra Haden sings beautiful backgrounds on a couple of tracks. Scott Amendola (whom we first encountered on the Charlie Hunter records) plays fabulous drums and percussion throughout. And on two of the cuts, Bill Frisell on guitar and Steve Lowe on bass help create pure magic, to this writer's ears.
Along with being a formidable vocalist and a rare guitarist, the artist has become one of the most unique and profound songwriters on the scene. We caught up with him early in his morning at the Center in Banff, Alberta, where he'd played a concert the previous night. His new tour had just begun.
A CONVERSATION WITH KELLY JOE PHELPS
Puremusic: Sorry, man. It took a little while to track you down. The number I got turned out to be the voice mail of some lady in the theater department.
Kelly Joe Phelps: Oh, man.
PM: I hope it doesn't cramp your schedule or style that I'm calling twenty minutes--
KJP: No, I'm okay.
PM: Okay, good. So, we met ever so briefly at that show you played at the Bluebird in the round with Steve Earle, Eric Taylor, and Greg Trooper.
KJP: Right, right.
PM: So how you doing, man, you working hard?
KJP: Yeah, well, I'm just getting started. I've only played two dates on this tour so far. It's going to last a couple months. I'm trying to pace the energy.
PM: Yeah, right. This new record, Slingshot Professionals, I think it's really, really great. It's the best one, I think, don't you?
KJP: Thanks very much. I like it--still. [laughs]
PM: Right, after hearing it a thousand times.
KJP: Yeah. It was a lot of fun to do, though.
PM: It's such a different conception from the ground up than anything you've done so far.
KJP: Right.
PM: There are so few singer songwriters who play at your level. As a result, do you find that people tend to regard you first as a player and second as a writer?
KJP: Yeah, I think that's a general sweep, for sure. But it's understandable if only because up to this point the music has been centered around the guitar. The recorded history, anyway, of what I do highlights the guitar far more, so maybe it'll just be a matter of time until that kind of focus is changed.
PM: Because certainly, yeah, the scope has grown, and the songwriting just seems to get deeper and sharper, and I don't know, pardon the expression, more brilliant every record.
KJP: Oh, great, thanks. I mean, that's where my energies are going. Developing as a musician over time is a very slow process, and usually you can only see it when you look back at what you've done, rather than at what you're doing. So you spend a lot of time trying to figure that shit out. Really what I'm trying to do is figure out a way to use words in a personal way--I mean, in a personally creative way.
PM: Right, something that's you.
KJP: Yeah.
PM: Strictly as players, though, do any favorite songwriters come to mind?
KJP: I'm sure there's a lot of them out there.
PM: There's precious few, I think.
KJP: [laughs] Oh, okay.
PM: But that's why I asked.
KJP: Well, man, I pay so little attention to it that they can slip by me without me even noticing. But no, there's not a lot, at least in my scope of vision, meaning what I see out there. It's hard to find people who inspire me to do something musically.
PM: It's funny that the kinds of people who like to write a great song and the kinds of people who just love to play their guitar are not necessarily the same people. And you're becoming one of those same people--"Yeah, I love to play the fricking guitar, and I'm all about a song."
KJP: Yeah, yeah, right. Who knows why that situation is? It's always surprised me that these types of musicians didn't pay more attention to the instrument.
PM: Yeah! People are often saying to me, "Frank, I like your songs, and you're using all those chords from the back of the book." And I'm thinking, "Are you serious? This is only the middle of the book. I mean, come on, get into it."
KJP: Guitar is an odd instrument, man, because there are very few instruments you can get away with being a hack on.
[laughter]
KJP: You know what I mean?
PM: I think that's part of it.
KJP: I mean, imagine, what saxophone player is going to get a gig if he can't play the damn thing?
PM: Yeah, right, it's like, "Hey, get off the stage, Clinton."
[laughter]
KJP: Well, this is turning into a good interview.