Description
On my Love for Michael Hurley, the upcoming tribute tour, and this new record coming out July 16:
It was Lemon DeGeorge who first gave me a Michael Hurley record in 2003: Lemon, who would go on to engineer my records Escondida and Springtime Can Kill You. The record was Long Journey, which I could hear was sourced from the same ancestral swamp where all folk/rock/blues musicians of his era were fishing. He had evidently been using different bait. The way he referenced melodic lines from earlier jazz and gospel felt so fresh.
In Michael’s work you do not hear the shallow noodling of an appropriative musician. He is not gesturing or alluding. He is deeply grounded, even as his work is truly folk, truly part of this long, long conversation with the ancestors. In his transmutations, he is not a thief, but an alchemist. The way he approaches guitar reminds me of Thelonious Monk at the piano, coming to his instrument with curiosity, composing with sharp and specific flavors.
Our friend Alex Dupree had recently hosted a wake for Townes Van Zandt on the anniversary of his death. A string of LA based musicians got up and sang a few Townes songs apiece. It felt so good to focus on the songs of a master, the burden of ego removed from every musician who partook. I conceived of that Townes wake as a template for a tour honoring Hurley’s work. I put together a great band and reached out to friends on route to locate the musicians who love Hurley. Locals will open, and our band will back people up if they like.
I threw together a record of Hurley songs, some of which I’d recorded a decade before, some fresh, for the album Max Knouse and I are releasing called Wolf Dispatch. Its’s a spare little thing, 34 minutes, 7 tracks.
Track one, B Bottom Girl is a song Hurley asked me to sing. I’m playing it with my NYC band, Adam Brisbin on acoustic guitar and Doug Wieselman on mandolin. I’m on violin and singing. I don’t know if Hurley ever released a version.
Track two, I Paint A Design, Max Knouse and I recorded at my place, just playing live. I altered the lyrics slightly to be more gender neutral. Instead of his “crazy momma” I sang “rounder.” And instead of “woman” I sang “Love.” As in this line- “the best kind of love that ever I’ve found will never bring you up and won’t let you down.”
Track three, O My Stars was made at my home shortly after Covid lockdown began. It felt like such a relief to sing again. This the quintessential Michael Hurley love song. His line about the spider is a cartoon iteration of Blind Willie McTell’s Warm It Up To Me, singing about teaching the ladies a new dance.
Track four, Wolf Dispatch is led by Max Knouse with Shane Kennedy on drums and Walter Stone on bass. They cut it in Vermont at Shane’s place, and I overdubbed backing vocals in LA at David Robbins’s home studio. Max’s interpretation on guitar is a real distillation and refinement of Hurley’s kinda muppety ham fisted piano version.
Track five, The Vt.-Ore. Floor is a dreamy, horny song conflating stars and bars and women. It is simultaneously ridiculous and transporting. Max has a great routine checking Hurley’s math in the third verse, where Hurley says, “there’s a thousand women — there’s one in every state” Max Knouse leads the song with Shane Kennedy on drums and Walter Stone on bass, fittingly recorded in Vermont at Shane’s. I overdubbed viola and backing vocals in LA at David Robbins’s home studio.
Track six, New Tea is a live recording from a house in LA. Hannah Marcus is playing acoustic guitar and singing backup. I’m the lead singer. And Max Knouse is off mic on electric guitar. We compressed the hell out of the track to bring up Max’s playing. This is one of my favorite songs ever.
Track seven Ghost Woman Blues is a helluva recording. It is pretty poor quality, but we chose to use it because of the pure kismet. Just as I pressed play, the coyotes of my neighborhood erupted in song just outside my open window. You can hear LAPD sirens and helicopters. And the great David Coulter (who was In the Pogues) shreds musical saw over it all as an overdub. The original song is by George Carter, but we first heard it through Hurley’s version. I rode the line between Hurley’s and Carter’s version here. As a Southerner, I think I may have been able to hear some of Carter’s lyrics a little better than Hurley did? In any case, Hurley and I never got to talk about his interpretation.
1- B Bottom Girl – Jolie Holland on violin and vocals, Doug Wieselman on mandolin, Adam Brisbin on guitar
2- I Paint A Design – Jolie Holland on vocals and guitar, Max Knouse on backing vocals and guitar
3- O My Stars – Jolie Holland on vocals and whistle
4- Wolf Dispatch – Max Knouse on vocals and guitar, Shane Kennedy on drums, Walter Stone on bass, Jolie Holland on backing vocals
5- The Vt-Ore Floor – Max Knouse on vocals and guitar, Shane Kennedy on drums, Walter Stone on bass, Jolie Holland on backing
vocals, viola
6- New Tea – Jolie Holland on vocals, Hannah Marcus on vocals and guitar, Max Knouse on guitar
7- Ghost Woman Blues by George Carter, adapted by Michael Hurley – featuring the wild, unbidden and serendipitous coyote chorus of
East LA, sirens and helicopters of the LAPD, Jocko the dog woofing, Jolie Holland on vocals and whistling. The only overdub on this
track is David Coulter on musical saw
Mastered by Jamie Hill at Department of Energy Management, Tacoma
With additional engineering by David Robbins, Rob VanVranken, Ben Boye, Doug Jenkins and Larry Crane
Illustration and design by Jack Fallows
