{"id":23086,"date":"2022-06-07T05:30:22","date_gmt":"2022-06-07T09:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=23086"},"modified":"2022-06-03T11:34:09","modified_gmt":"2022-06-03T15:34:09","slug":"randall-bramblett-lucky-that-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/07\/randall-bramblett-lucky-that-way\/","title":{"rendered":"Randall Bramblett: Lucky That Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The music business has a built-in tendency to categorize artists: they\u2019re a rocker, a country act, a jazz cat, a rapper or something else. And in those relatively rare instances when an artist ventures even slightly outside of his or her appointed lane, they earn the crossover-artist tag. Yet there do exist a few extra-special musicians who \u2013 consciously or otherwise \u2013 defy labeling. Their music draws from any number of rich traditions, but trying to label it as this or that fails to get to the heart of things.<\/p>\n

Randall Bramblett is just such an artist. Born in tiny Jesup, Georgia some 40 miles southwest of Savannah, he got his professional start in music as a session player. Early on, he added his soulful keyboard and saxophone work to recordings by blues guitarist Elvin Bishop, Southern rock legend Gregg Allman and pop star B.J. Thomas, to name but a few. And as a songwriter, his work was recorded by several popular acts including Atlanta Rhythm Section.<\/p>\n

But even when Bramblett launched a solo career, it was tough pinning his style down to one genre. Elements of soul, rhythm and blues and jazz have always been evident in his work; about the most definitive comment that can be made about his body of work is that it\u2019s uniquely American. As a founding member of Sea Level and a valued musical associate of Widespread Panic, Bettye Lavette and many others, Bramblett has always taken an approach that serves the songs.<\/p>\n

That character is on brilliant display on his latest release, 2020\u2019s Pine Needle Fire<\/i>. Thanks to the pandemic hitting the \u201cpause\u201d button on live shows, he\u2019s only just now taking to the road in support of his 12th<\/sup> solo album. Production of the record was well underway when the world sort of stopped spinning in 2020. Bramblett laughs and shrugs, saying that he went to his label and told them, \u201cLet\u2019s just do it. Let\u2019s get it done, and we\u2019ll put it out there even though we can\u2019t go on the road until who-knows-when.\u201d<\/p>\n

With a good bit of the basic recording already completed, Bramblett and his musicians came to the studio one at a time to finish the record. But the result doesn\u2019t have a piecemeal character; it\u2019s a cohesive record. But what kind<\/i> of a record?<\/p>\n

Pine Needle Fire<\/i> rocks, but it\u2019s not exactly a rock album. It\u2019s soulful, but it\u2019s not really soul music. Bramblett sings and writes songs, but his music is too lively \u2013 and the instrumentation’s too engaging \u2013 to fit into the singer-songwriter genre. Bramblett himself offers little help in pigeonholing his music. \u201cIn the \u201880s and \u201890s I was definitely more into Americana and roots music than I am now,\u201d he offers. \u201cBut I haven\u2019t changed that much, really.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Bramblett names Elvis and Little Richard as artists whose work influenced him early on, but he gives as much credit to the inspiration he got seeing and hearing James Brown, Otis Redding and other greats. And when it comes to lyrics, he says he comes from the school of \u201cDylan and the Beatles, where the lyrics could be more poetic rather than constrained to [just] love songs.\u201d<\/p>\n

And even though he\u2019s in his sixth decade as a musician, Bramblett is no stuck-in-the-past relic. He has long employed looping technology in his songwriting process, and counts himself as a fan of current-day artists like Kendrick Lamar. \u201cHe just opens my mind again to what people can do with lyrics and music,\u201d Bramblett says.<\/p>\n

Each Randall Bramblett record has its own character. As its title suggests, 2015\u2019s Devil Music<\/i> is a thematically dark record. Juke Joint at the Edge of the World<\/i> (2017) is even more musically adventurous, and displays the wide-screen nature of Bramblett\u2019s musical vision. Pine Needle Fire<\/i> puts a bit more focus on his always-intriguing lyrical work.<\/p>\n

Bramblett is at the point in his career where he can follow his muse. \u201cI don\u2019t have anything to lose, really,\u201d he says with a good-natured laugh. \u201cI can do whatever I want to. I\u2019m not going to sell that many records!\u201d There\u2019s a freedom that comes from being a highly regarded, universally respected musician whose albums don\u2019t storm the record charts. \u201cI don\u2019t have any of that, \u2018I just had a hit record, so I\u2019ve got to do something similar [on the next one],\u2019\u201d he says, laughing again. \u201cI\u2019m lucky that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

You may also enjoy my 2013 interview with Randall Bramblett<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The music business has a built-in tendency to categorize artists: they\u2019re a rocker, a country act, a jazz cat, a rapper or something else. And in those relatively rare instances […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23088,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,9,41,49,60,62,69,73],"tags":[1781],"class_list":["post-23086","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-americana","category-blues","category-interview","category-new-release","category-rb","category-rawk","category-soul","category-vinyl","tag-randall-bramblett","cat-6-id","cat-9-id","cat-41-id","cat-49-id","cat-60-id","cat-62-id","cat-69-id","cat-73-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23086","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=23086"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23086\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23089,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23086\/revisions\/23089"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23088"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}