Photo credit: Rob Chamorro
Tell us about your tour vehicle. Any notable breakdown stories?
My tour vehicle these days is an airplane, hah. Since I’ve had kids, my touring schedule has slowed down and I’ve become pickier about what I take. I put 100,000 miles personally on my old tour van and that doesn’t even include European dates and bus tours, but those days are gone now. I am all about flying in and showing up, though recently we did a weeklong run in France where I drove the band myself. I actually really enjoyed doing that as it was sort of a reminder of the good old days, but I think once a year is enough.
I did have plenty of breakdowns, costly repairs and general van shenanigans. One of my favorite stories to tell is from my first European tour which was two months long. The tour ended in Spain, but to get there we had to drive from France over the Pyrenees. We stayed the night at an out of the way hotel, literally at the top of the mountain. We got there in the middle of the night and it started snowing. With all the weight in the back the van couldn’t make it up the steep driveway so all 7 of us had to get out and push it up the hill. The next day we drove down the mountain into warm and sunny Spain to finish out the tour.
How do you eat cheaply and/or healthy while on tour?
Food on tour actually changed my life. I started touring in earnest when I was 23 and my palate was quite limited. Touring in Europe and Asia forced me to try new foods, especially whatever was local to where we were. Local food and drinks are the life blood of touring. When you’re on the road, you basically have 24-48 hours in most places. The best way to experience the place is to eat. Everyone is proud of their local delicacies whether it’s Pulpo de Gallego in Galicia, Comte cheese in Comte, Guinness in Ireland or Cognac in Cognac, eating and drinking give you an understanding of a place that you couldn’t get otherwise in such a short time. That is to say, health food isn’t really on the agenda so much, but when you do 100 minutes of full on cardio a night on stage like I do, you can cheat on your diet a little bit.
How many strings do you break in a typical year? How much does it cost to replace them?
I used to break strings ALL the time and it was really frustrating. Since, I have adjusted my guitar setup and I play with very heavy strings. I also play in a very particular style, using a thumb pick, my fingers and the back of my hand to brush the strings. I only attack the strings with the pick when I really need to and the rest of the time I’m using my fingers so that keeps strings from breaking.
Where do you rehearse?
My rehearsal space these days is my closet full of records. I don’t often rehearse my bands and if I do it’s at soundcheck before the shows. My closet at home is where I go to write and play, especially after the kids go to sleep since the records provide some soundproofing.
What was the title and a sample lyric from the first song that you wrote?
The first song I ever wrote was a blues called “The Best I Can.” I wrote it aping the style of Otis Rush and his song “I Can’t Quit You Baby”, but really it was about a teenager being dramatic. I had lots of unrequited crushes in those days and I thought that was what gave you the blues. It turns out I wasn’t exactly wrong, but I also had no idea what I was talking about.
Describe your first gig.
My first “professional” gig was at Red’s Lounge in Clarksdale, MS. I moved to Clarksdale the week after graduating high school and almost immediately was asked to be the guitarist for a band called The Wesley Jefferson Southern Soul Band. I had no idea what that entailed, but I ended up playing guitar, singing and fronting then band in what was then a pretty rough joint. We played from 9-1 and it was a trial by fire. After that, though, I was in the scene.
What was your last day job? What was your favorite day job?
My last non-music day job was also my favorite, I drove a flower delivery van. The van belonged to my best friend and longtime drummer’s stepmom. He had the job but then left to go on tour with his band, The Dead Trees and I took over. I wouldn’t give the job back when he got back from tour, though, because I loved it so much. I got to take the van home with me and use it for local gigs and I wrote songs in it, drumming on the steering wheel while I did my deliveries. The van always smelled like mildew from water spilling on to the upholstery from the flowers but I still used it to pick up my girlfriend who is now my wife. I once tried to take the van to New York for a gig, but somehow the word got back to my boss and she put an end to that. Still, it was an amazing job. I’d do it again in a heartbeat.
How has your music-related income changed over the past 5-10 years? What do you expect it to look like 5-10 years from now?
My music-related income has always been widely varied. I’ve been lucky enough to have had a lot of my songs in movies, tv shows and commercials. That sort of thing comes and goes, but I have also been commissioned to write and record songs specifically for that sort of thing. I enjoy doing that because people only call me if they want something to sound like me. I never got asked to do something out of my wheelhouse.
Touring and shows still provide a nice chunk of it, especially festivals. I probably do 10-15 festivals a year. I don’t expect my touring to slow down and, in fact, it will probably pick up as my kids get older and it becomes easier to leave them for longer.
I’m also doing more producing, custom work and curation. Having 20 years and 9 albums under my belt allows me to tour on the strength of my catalog and the quality of my shows rather than being beholden to record cycles which I really appreciate that. I have at least 100 songs I can choose from to play live which means I can vary the set from tour to tour.
What one thing do you know now that you had wished you knew when you started your career in music?
This may sound crass, but I wish that I had known that people were coming to see me and my show, rather than the band. I loved my early bands and the musicians were amazing, but these days I have different bands all over the world and they’re just as good. I have a band in Europe, one in the UK, one in Nashville, one on the west coast and one in Australia. I love all of them and they’re all professional to the point that we almost never need rehearsals and can just run whatever we need at soundcheck. Taking a band on tour – as wonderful as those guys were – is such a huge expense. If I had known I didn’t have to, I’d probably have a lot more in the bank.