DAVE'S DIARY - 25 JULY 2006 - KIERAN KANE INTERVIEW
FAMILY WHEELS ROLL AGAIN FOR DEAD RECKONERS
"After three hundred thousand miles/ the upholstery's looking sad/ who knows how many tyres/ but the last ones look pretty sad." - Them Wheels Don't Roll No More - Kieran Kane-Sean Locke.
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The
genetic creativity of the Dead Reckoning musical family sprouted new
wheels on release of the second Kieran Kane-Kevin Welch-Fats Kaplin
CD. Kane's son Lucas joined him on a Canadian tour to promote Lost John Dean (Dead Reckoning-Shock) that also features another new tune penned by Welch and prolific progeny Dustin. |
The genetics
were immediately rewarded - the dynamic disc hit #12 on debut on the prestigious
Americana charts before its release in May.
And, now months down the track, it's still winning widespread airplay
on Americana and alternate radio stations.
Now, the trio plans another Australian tour to capitalise on popularity
for a collective 18 albums dating back to 1982.
"I'm very happy we're taking my son Lucas to play percussion for
the first few dates in Canada," Kane now 56 and father of three,
told Nu Country TV from his Nashville home.
"I did a concert with Fats and Lucas in December. It was Lucas's
first time on a band stage - something we've been wanting to for a long
time."
The performance at now defunct Sutter bar was a fertile font.
"He's now working in the duo Jimmy The Lung with talented song-writer
Jim Reed. It has nothing to do with me - there is no mentoring at all."
Kane dedicated his 2002 disc Shadows On The Ground to Lucas.
KEVIN
AND DUSTIN
"So much rain must fall/ for our daily bread/ through it all, to
the harvest look ahead," - To The Harvest Look Ahead - Kevin Welch-Dustin
Welch.
Meanwhile
Dustin Welch, who first won exposure with Steve Earle's son Justin and
Gary Nicholson's son Travis in Nashville band The Swindlers, has graduated
to a new California group that recently toured Europe.
But it's a inter-generational pairing on new tune To The Harvest Look
Ahead that adds to royalties ignited by their teaming on Glorious
Bounties on Kevin's fifth solo album Millionaire.
"They used a seasonal metaphor to illustrate that no matter how bad
things get there is something in that relationship that pulls them through,"
says Kane.
SEAN
LOCKE ON 1953 CADILLAC
"It's probably got a million stories/ but I don't car what they are/
don't want to know the history/ just love the lines of that old car/ the
chrome, the glass, the steel/ and the locks on all four doors." -
Them Wheels Don't Roll No More - Kieran Kane-Sean Locke.
Kane and fellow singer-songwriter Sean Locke didn't use metaphors for Them Wheels Don't Roll Anymore - one of their three new collaborations.
| "It
was actually a real car parked next door to my little writing painting
studio," Kane revealed. "This girl had a black 1953 Pontiac in perfect condition, I went on the road and came back and it had been pushed up into the back yard with wheels caved in. It sat there a long time - we looked at the car and started writing about it. We didn't really want to write about anything but the car. Now both car and neighbour have gone." Kane's writing with Locke has traction dating back to his 2002 disc Shadows On The Ground where they wrote five songs - the title track, Better When You Take It Slow, The Baby Keeps Crying, I Ain't Holding Back and Mountain Song. Kane and Locke also collaborated on Hillbilly Blue, Callin' Me and the title track of the Kane-Welch-Fats Kaplin disc You Can't Save Everybody. |
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Chart topping
Californian cowboy Gary Allan and Pinmonkey have also cut Kansas born
Locke's songs.
"Sean is a lot younger than I am, we're good friends," says
Kane.
"We have written about 30 songs together. He also writes a lot on
his own. You'll hear lot more of him. He wrote Barbed Wire & Roses
for Pinmonkey. Gary Allan also recorded his song Don't Look Away
for his new album See If I Care."
LOST JOHN DEAN - NO WATERGATE
"Did you ever hear the story about Lost John Dean/ a bold bank robber from Bowling Green/ put him in the jailhouse the other day/ late last night he made his getaway." - Lost John Dean - Traditional - arranged by Kane/ Kaplin/Welch.
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Kane
and Welch also wrote with Scandinavian singer Claudia Scott - Kevin's
real life partner - on their new disc whose title track Lost John
Dean is a revamped song on a thirties Kentucky bank robber. "No, he wasn't an ancestor of John Dean - the Watergate lawyer for Richard Nixon," quipped Kane. "It's a very old song Fats gathered." The title track features Kane on banjo was recorded at Moraine Studios in autumn of 2005 with the CD cover designed by Melbourne Shock Records roots music executive Dave Laing in his Yarraville abode. |
Although
the title track didn't have political roots it wasn't the case with Mr
Bones - penned by Welch, Scott, Olney and Hadley.
"It was written after the last presidential election and they were
not happy about the result," Kane explained.
NELSON ALGREN - NOVEL SONG
Kane admits
he and Locke drew on a book by late celebrated author Nelson Algren for
entrée tune Monkey Jump.
"We were sitting around late one night and had written all these
verses but didn't have a chorus," Kane said.
"I started re-reading Nelson Algren book Never Come Morning
- I'm a huge fan. His character Bruno Bicek is in jail. He gets a new
cellmate and asks his name. The guy's crazy and says I'm the guy that's
giving it all away - he starts listing all these things. I took some lines
from the book."
Bob Dylan is name checked but it wasn't the Algren novel The Devil's
Last Stocking penned about jailed boxer Ruben Carter that produced
the Dylan hit.
That book was released in 1983 after Algren died.
"No, I didn't realise Nelson had written a book about Carter,"
says Kane.
"I was familiar with Walk On The Wild Side and The Man
With The Golden Arm. Very dark stuff. He's a brilliant writer. I kept
re-reading the same paragraph."
CLAUDIA SCOTT AND TENNESSEE SPEED LABS
"There's a blue light down that road/ over the hill and out of sight/ in that shack down that road/ something's cooking day and night/ I know well and so do you/ it's that lonesome devil's brew." - Satan's Paradise - Kevin Welch-Claudia Scott.
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Kane
revealed that Welch and his partner - Scandinavian singer Claudia
Scott - wrote Satan's Paradise about the lethal speed labs
that have replaced moonshine liquor and grass as the illegal drug
of choice in the south. It's a subject tackled by James McMurtry in his song Choctaw Bingo - also covered by Ray Wylie Hubbard. "It was written about a methamphetamine lab," Kane explained. |
"It's based on a million cases in these parts.'"
Scott also
co-wrote I Can't Wait with Kane and Locke.
"It's a song about faith," Kane revealed.
"I'm not sure exactly what it's about. We just sat down and banged
it out - it's about whatever people can get out of it, that's fine by
me."
But Kane was more explicit about the Welch-Chris Stapleton song Heaven
Now.
"It's about regrets over temptation of the flesh," Kane said.
"It's a song Kevin had written and didn't have a melody or wasn't
happy with the melody.
He got together with Chris - a great writer - and finished it. Chris and
Fats are in Mike Henderson's bluegrass band. It came out quickly."
DAVE OLNEY
"Liquor store, she takes the money/ easy score, later honey/ drops the gun in my lap/ takes off, I take the rap/ hands up in the night/ go to court, lose the fight." - Postcard From Mexico - John Hadley-Dave Olney.
The trio
also recorded Postcards From Mexico - penned by Dave Olney and
John Hadley, long time collaborator of Kane and Welch.
"Olney like it and sent it to me," Kane recalled.
"I liked it but didn't know if we could pull it off. I was reluctant
initially but when we got in the studio it came together straight away.
I played drums - it somehow seemed to make sense. There was a female villain.
They were in this room writing things on pieces of paper and worked on
separate characters. Two different singers were not necessary for the
story - it's really one voice. It's hard to do with one singer but Olney
is recording it for his new disc."
Olney released his 13th album The Wheel on Austin record label
Loudhouse in 2003.
He was born in Rhode Island and moved to North Carolina to attend the
University of North Carolina.
Olney, 58 and father of two, has been living in Nashville since 1973.
Although the title of Welch song Clean Getaway seems like a stark
contrast sibling to Postcard From Mexico it has different roots.
The song's character is unsuccessful in escaping from the memory of a
past lover.
"It's in the songs I sing/ it's the price I pay/ there's no such
thing as a clean getaway."
KANE - AN ABLE ARTIST
Kane reverted
to his own artistry for the drawing on the front cover of the CD slick.
"It was another way to dodge a photo session," Kane quipped.
"It was just a painting I had, it was like the previous one."
Well, not exactly one.
Kane's drawings have appeared on the covers of his solo discs Six Months
No Sun (1998), The Blue Chair (2000) and Shadows On The
Ground (2002) and their 2004 disc You Can't Save Everybody.
"It was not painted for the cover specifically," Kane added.
"It was another painting that speaks to the tone of the record."
Lost John Dean was released in Australia in April, 2006.