{"id":477,"date":"2011-03-30T05:06:15","date_gmt":"2011-03-30T10:06:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=477"},"modified":"2011-03-30T05:06:15","modified_gmt":"2011-03-30T10:06:15","slug":"broadway-the-hard-way-a-conversation-with-richard-x-heyman-part-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2011\/03\/30\/broadway-the-hard-way-a-conversation-with-richard-x-heyman-part-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Broadway the Hard Way: A Conversation with Richard X Heyman (part one)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whether he likes it or not — and as you\u2019ll read in a moment, he <\/em>tends not to \u2013 Richard X Heyman is known as a powerpop artist. His string of albums began in the late 80s and continues to present day. Consistent hallmarks of his work include a refreshing DIY aesthetic (he plays nearly everything himself), an unerring ear for melody, and lyrics that are in turns witty, poignant and memorable. And while he\u2019s often pigeonholed into a specific genre, Heyman\u2019s music has always borne the fingerprints of a musical background immersed in many styles; prominent among his influences is a love of Broadway musicals.<\/em><\/p>\n

And it\u2019s that particular influence which Heyman brings to the fore on his 2011 paired albums <\/em>Tiers \/ And Other Stories. Designed as two separate albums but packaged together, this new music is piano-based and quite different from what fans have come to expect. While in some ways the new music is wholly consistent with Heyman\u2019s approach, it\u2019s different enough to stir up confusion among fans and critics alike. And not surprisingly, confusion is not the reaction Heyman was aiming for. I gamely waded into the controversy in a recent conversation with Heyman.<\/em> — bk<\/p>\n

\n

Bill Kopp:<\/span><\/strong> There\u2019s a much wider sonic palette on these albums than you\u2019ve ever displayed on record before. While you\u2019ve always proudly worn your influences, in your previous work you seemed to filter all of those wide and sometimes disparate strains into one particular style. On these new paired records, you touch on all sorts of styles. \u201cThe Real Deal\u201d is sort of soul-gospel. \u201cGood to Go\u201d is straight <\/span>Nashville<\/span>. Was there any sort of conscious effort with these albums to display a wide stylistic range, or was it more a function of the sonic demands for a particular song in the cycle, if you will?<\/span><\/p>\n

Richard X Heyman:<\/strong> Well, the songs came very naturally, due to the fact that I bought this Yamaha electric piano. The instrument inspired me to write these songs. To simplify the whole thing, I would say this is basically my first \u201ctotal piano\u201d album. With a couple of exceptions. The piano is an instrument that\u2026you know, you move a finger or two around and you start hitting things you just wouldn\u2019t expect to do on guitar. So different types of songs, different types of chords can come out of the piano. So I think that is really the main ting you\u2019re hearing as far as the style of music. The piano inspired me to write many of the songs. \u201cGood to Go\u201d was probably written on guitar; I can\u2019t remember. Sometimes I\u2019ll write a song on one instrument and then transfer it to another.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> Really? Because \u201cGood to Go\u201d has a real Floyd Cramer<\/strong> kind of thing happening\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> I\u2019m a big, huge Floyd Cramer fan. You\u2019ll hear Floyd Cramer throughout all of my piano playing. I\u2019m a combination of Floyd Cramer and Joni Mitchell<\/strong>. I really learned to play piano listening to Ladies of the Canyon<\/em>. When that album came out, I just studied how she was playing, what the left hand was doing. I kind of based my whole style on that. And I got into Floyd Cramer, as well as Ramsey Lewis<\/strong>, Ray Charles<\/strong>. All that stuff, and the Left Banke<\/strong>, Paul McCartney<\/strong>. So it\u2019s all in there.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> In terms of the lyrical content of these albums, I get the sense that you didn\u2019t just wake up one morning and decide to take this project on. How long has this idea been knocking around in your head, and why now?<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> It didn\u2019t really start out as any sort of concept. The songs were coming naturally from just sitting down at the piano. The very first song I wrote was the opening song on Tiers<\/em>, \u201cHot on the Trail of Innocence.\u201d And the next one was \u201cGolden in This Town,\u201d and then \u201cLast Thought in My Mind.\u201d And by that third song I realized: in a very abstract way, I\u2019m recounting the story of how I met [my wife] Nancy<\/strong> [Leigh<\/strong>]. And at that point, it just sort of came out; I kept continuing the story: I left for L.A., and so forth. The whole story was writing itself, more or less. I wasn\u2019t making a conscious effort to make a concept album. At a certain point, of course, I knew that that was what I was doing.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> So the songs came out of you in chronological order?<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> Yeah. If you look at the first album, it\u2019s all written in that order. The only one that\u2019s not in order \u2013 and it\u2019s not even really supposed to be on the first album \u2013 is \u201cFire in the Country.\u201d That one is a slightly political song, with a little social commentary. And it was supposed to be on the other album [And Other Stories<\/em>]. But I felt I needed an up-tempo song, so I took \u201cHustler\u2019s Last Stand,\u201d which was supposed to be my first impression of L.A., and I switched the two. Just for musical reasons.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> In the spoken part of \u201cGame Stays the Same\u201d you recount sort of<\/em> meeting Gene Clark<\/strong><\/span>\u2026<\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> That really happened. The thing at the end of that song is a letter I had written. Nancy had sent me a pair of pajamas for my birthday. I had just gotten out there; I had been there less than a week at that point. I was just getting settled in, and I was already disillusioned. So I got this package in the mail from Nancy, and in it was a pair of blue and white striped pajamas. So if you read between the lines you can see that I\u2019m already pining to get back.<\/p>\n

And the thing with Gene Clark is almost like a metaphor: you\u2019d better grab what you have today. Don\u2019t take it for granted, because it might not be there tomorrow. That was what was going on for me at the time; I had the love of my life on the other side of the country, and I wasn\u2019t taking advantage of it. And I never did get to meet Gene Clark again.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> Did you just plain dig out the old letter — which I assume <\/span>Nancy<\/span> had — and then read it, or did you contruct it from memory and use some artistic license?<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> It\u2019s pretty much the letter. I may have changed a minor thing or two.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> I interviewed you some four years ago, when Actual Sighs<\/em> came out. At that time you told me that the next project you had planned was a collection of piano-based pieces. So this is that, basically.<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> It probably started back then, yes. I\u2019ve been doing the Doughboys<\/strong> project, as a drummer, and doing some other things. So it kind of got stretched out a bit.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> Your fan base is \u2013 if you don\u2019t mind my saying so \u2013 a bit like that of a cult artist. By that I mean that they (we, I should say) sort of value you as the whole package. You can go off in different directions, like a Todd Rundgren<\/strong> or a Neil Young<\/strong>, and they\u2019re open to it. In fact they embrace it. That approach is different from some artists who are more or less expected to turn in the same album again and again. Do you think that\u2019s an accurate characterization?<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> I don\u2019t know yet. There\u2019s this genre that I\u2019ve been placed into called powerpop. And I\u2019m not sure what that means, exactly, or if that\u2019s what I do. I always considered myself \u2013 as far as my solo work \u2013 a traditional singer\/songwriter trying to express myself with a lot of different influences. I never considered myself a powerpop artist.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m just getting the sense that some people who expect me to have the jangly guitar powerpop sound may not quite \u201cget\u201d this album. I\u2019m not sure. It\u2019s so different. I hope to gain a new audience from this music. While I was making the album, I thought, \u201cI may alienate some people who like the guitar pop.\u201d<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> There\u2019s some of it on there\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> I tried to keep it to a minimum. I could have done a whole other album, still telling that story, but in that style. I put one or two guitar songs in there. But there were many times where I left songs off, saying, \u201cWe\u2019ll save that for when I do a real pop album.\u201d On this album, instead of guitar, we put on strings. Or harpsichord, or orchestration. That was sort of the theme of the album: Let\u2019s be a bit more bold.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> The down side of that, of course, is that it makes an artist what the industry likes to call \u201chard to market.\u201d While your music is highly melodic, accessible and impeccably crafted — what I would call \u201ccommercial\u201d in the strict and best sense of the word \u2013 the music on Tiers \/ And Other Stories<\/em> is a little less immediate. The songs aren\u2019t built around catchy guitar riffs and such.<\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> I\u2019m sort of outside that whole argument. To me \u2013 I can\u2019t be objective, of course; I\u2019ve been working on these songs hundreds of time \u2013 they\u2019re very<\/em> immediate. But I guess, for a first time listener\u2026this is what I\u2019m hearing. And it\u2019s a surprise to me, because they were sort of what I dug, and put together. I thought they were<\/em> very hooky and immediate. But I\u2019m getting a lot of that, that people aren\u2019t getting it on the first listen. Maybe on the third or fourth listen. Again, I can\u2019t really be involved in that, because it\u2019s the listener\u2019s perspective. I\u2019m a little disappointed that people feel that way, and yet I know that the songs are there. And if people are willing to put the time in, they\u2019ll be more into these songs than to some of my other songs.<\/p>\n

BK:<\/span><\/strong> Not to belabor that point, but I would argue that the albums that wear the best over the long term are the ones that do reveal their charms on repeated listening. <\/span><\/p>\n

RXH:<\/strong> It\u2019s a little disappointing to me, I have to say, that reviewers so far \u2013 mainly from the powerpop community — I really don\u2019t feel like they listened to it more than once. And they\u2019re making that same comment abut it not being as immediate. I feel that the songs they\u2019re not getting on the first listen will surpass the more immediate ones as far as the impact.\u00a0 <\/span>On an emotional level, I really poured my heart and soul into the lyrics. I know it\u2019s got that in there; it\u2019s just a matter of whether it affects the listener or not.<\/p>\n

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Whether he likes it or not — and as you\u2019ll read in a moment, he tends not to \u2013 Richard X Heyman is known as a powerpop artist. His string […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interview","cat-41-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477","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=477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}