{"id":14700,"date":"2018-06-12T05:30:53","date_gmt":"2018-06-12T09:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=14700"},"modified":"2018-06-12T07:47:51","modified_gmt":"2018-06-12T11:47:51","slug":"graham-parker-sticking-to-it-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2018\/06\/12\/graham-parker-sticking-to-it-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Graham Parker: Sticking to It (Part 2)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part One<\/a>…<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"Parker was a mere 25 years old when Howlin’ Wind<\/i> was released. Today he’s 67. Because of the straightforward, heart-on-the-sleeve quality of his lyrics, it’s fair to wonder if those early songs resonate with him. Or, when he sings \u201cSoul Shoes,\u201d does he feel that he’s a man in his sixties covering the songs of a twenty-something artist?<\/p>\n

\u201cThat’s an interesting point,\u201d Parker acknowledges. \u201cBut you know what? It\u2019s all seamless to me when I play these things live. Obviously, there are a few lyrical things that I might think, ‘That\u2019s a bit embarrassing,’ or ‘That\u2019s odd.’ Especially when it comes to topical references, [those] kind of make you feel weird sometimes, but most of the songs don\u2019t do that in any literal sense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parker finds that the practice of playing a song in a different format \u2013 solo when the original was a full-band arrangement, for example \u2013 breathes new life into the music. \u201cIt just feels like reinventing,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd so none of them are dated to me, apart from those that just seem to be stranded in a certain time. Most of them fit seamlessly with new things.\u201d<\/p>\n

And as is always the case with the prolific Parker, there are indeed new things on the way. \u201cI\u2019ve got a new album in the bag now,\u201d he says. \u201cSome of the songs could have been on Howlin\u2019 Wind<\/i>, apart from that they\u2019re obviously sung by a 67 year old and not a 25 year old,\u201d he says. \u201cThat obviously makes a difference; you can\u2019t help that. That\u2019s the way it goes: do not try to be a young man any more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parker feels there’s a continuity in his work. \u201cThis is not where you stopped. This is not where you ended up,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople tend to think, ‘Oh, you\u2019ve gone like that.’ Well, I haven\u2019t gone like anything<\/i>, really. I\u2019m just writing songs, and some albums have the onus more on the rock style, some more swing. But it was all there from Howlin\u2019 Wind.<\/i> The whole blueprint, really.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite consistently positive critical response to his albums, Parker hasn’t ever broken through as a major headlining act. With that in mind \u2013 coupled with the economic realities of the music business today \u2013 it’s something of a gift that fans across the U.S. still have the opportunity to see and hear him in concert. He acknowledges that his audiences are often made up primarily of people who have been following his career for a long time. But occasionally he meets fans who haven’t bought one of his albums since, say 1982’s Another Grey Area<\/i>, the superb album that included his minor MTV hit, \u201cTemporary Beauty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s surprising,\u201d he says, \u201cwhen I meet someone and they say, ‘I haven’t seen you since 1980.’ And I think, ‘Well, I’ve been making records all along.’\u201d He laughs inwardly when he recalls being asked, \u201cWhere have you been?\u201d<\/p>\n

He had a ready answer for that fan. \u201cWell, I\u2019ve been working, pal. That\u2019s what I\u2019ve been doing. It\u2019s just that what you<\/i> did was what a lot of us did. You fell in love, got married, had kids.\u201d He acknowledges that that’s just what happens. \u201cI did the same kinds of things,\u201d he says. \u201cI lost touch with all kinds of music. I don\u2019t know who\u2019s doing what out there, because I don\u2019t follow it. All I know is what Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift are doing, because you can\u2019t get away from it. When one of them\u2019s acting out, it\u2019s like, ‘Oh, that\u2019s what they\u2019re doing now.’\u201d<\/p>\n

Parker admits that keeping up with artists requires some effort. \u201cI don\u2019t know what Bruce Springsteen\u2019s doing,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd he\u2019s a superstar. I\u2019d have to punch into the internet ‘Bruce Springsteen’ plus the letter T, and then it comes up ‘tour.’ ‘Oh, my goodness! Look, he\u2019s touring all over.’\u201d He’s appreciative that his fans today make that effort. \u201cThey follow what I\u2019m doing. They know I\u2019ve got a Twitter account. They know I\u2019ve got a website. They know they\u2019re not going to see me in the local paper that often, or on CNN. That\u2019s what following an artist is like now,\u201d he says. \u201cIf you don\u2019t follow their social media, you\u2019ve got nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, he can be surprised \u2013 pleasantly so \u2013 when his audience includes younger people. \u201cI think, ‘How on earth \u2026 why are you here? It must be embarrassing for you to like me!’ And some of them are just over the top about how much they like me.\u201d Some younger fans show up with their parents. \u201cThat\u2019s always good,\u201d Parker says. \u201cI often ask them, ‘Do you really like this? Do you really like me?’ And they\u2019re like, ‘Yeah, yeah. Love it. It\u2019s great.’ Okay. Far be it from me to complain. ‘Thank you. That\u2019s weird.’\u201d<\/p>\n

And for his fans who still buy albums, Parker is readying a new album for release later this year. He says that while making records is \u201can addictive thing,\u201d he might not keep doing it much longer. \u201cI think it\u2019s got to stop for me soon\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019ve got to rethink this, because it costs money.\u201d His method of working involves recording without a record deal. He finishes an album, only then shopping it to labels. \u201cI go to them afterwards and say, ‘Here\u2019s what it cost me. Can you pay me that?’ And of course, as time goes on, they do not want to pay you anything. They just don\u2019t have advances.\u201d Parker believes he has been fortunate up to this point. \u201cI\u2019ve been very lucky,\u201d he says, \u201cbut I can tell it\u2019s wearing off.\u201d<\/p>\n

Graham Parker’s current solo tour brings him to several City Winery venues, and he’s not ashamed to admit that he enjoys the slightly upscale setting of those rooms. \u201cIt\u2019s not a sticky beer floor,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s wine, there\u2019s food, and it\u2019s sort of like an adult kind of situation.\u201d He laughs as he recalls the words of and old friend and associate who caught one of his recent City Winery shows. \u201cHe said, ‘It\u2019s kind of a bigged-up Bottom Line, really, isn\u2019t it?’\u201d Parker was one of countless performers who performed at that famed New York City club in the 1970s and ’80s, one of the nicer venues in the city.<\/p>\n

And if City Winery evokes memories of that room for Parker, that’s a good thing. \u201cYeah, it\u2019s like a classy, Bottom Line-type place, without the pillars in the way.\u201d After pausing a beat, he laughs and adds, \u201cAlthough, there\u2019s always something<\/i> in the way.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part One… Parker was a mere 25 years old when Howlin’ Wind was released. Today he’s 67. Because of the straightforward, heart-on-the-sleeve quality of his lyrics, it’s fair […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14701,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,62,69],"tags":[931],"class_list":["post-14700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","category-rawk","category-soul","tag-graham-parker","cat-41-id","cat-62-id","cat-69-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14700"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14700\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14702,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14700\/revisions\/14702"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}