{"id":8467,"date":"2013-01-01T23:37:10","date_gmt":"2013-01-02T06:37:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=8467"},"modified":"2013-01-01T23:39:47","modified_gmt":"2013-01-02T06:39:47","slug":"john-hiatt-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2013\/01\/john-hiatt-2\/","title":{"rendered":"JOHN HIATT"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/h1>\n

JOHN HIATT<\/strong><\/h1>\n

At 60, the master singer-songwriter still follows wherever the music leads<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

After 40 years and 21 studio albums, John Hiatt knows a thing or two about songcraft. On his new album, \u00a0Mystic Pinball<\/em>, he even manages to make a grocery list interesting, wrapping it up in the grisly story-song, \u201cWood Chipper.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a bit of an homage to the\u00a0Coen Brothers and the wood-chipper scene in Fargo<\/em>,\u201d he explains. \u201cI started playing the chord changes, and when that first line came out, it didn\u2019t make any sense to me: \u2018I\u2019m from the Midwest \/ I know enough to cut a path around a wood chipper.\u2019 What the hell is that? I didn\u2019t even know what I was talking about, which is quite often the case. It just went from there, and this\u00a0crazy story started falling out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Exactly the way Hiatt likes to work\u2014fast and loose. His breakout album, the 1987 masterpiece Bring the Family<\/em>, was recorded in four days. The dozen rollicking songs on Mystic Pinball<\/em>\u2014produced by Kevin Shirley (Aerosmith, Black Crowes), who helmed last year\u2019s Dirty Jeans & Mudslide Hymns<\/em>\u2014prove the 60-year-old singer-songwriter has\u00a0no desire to slow down.<\/p>\n

So revered is Hiatt\u2019s songwriting gift that dozens of artists from across the musical spectrum have recorded his songs\u2014most famously Bonnie Raitt, who scored a hit with \u201cThing Called Love\u201d in 1989. \u201cIt changed my life in terms of people coming out to shows,\u201d he recalls of Raitt\u2019s chart success. \u201cIt helped my career. I hate to use that term, \u2018career,\u2019 but I guess it is a career. I tried to keep my amateur status, but I guess I\u2019ve gone pro.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Why are you so prolific?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve ramped it up over the last couple of years. A lot has to do with working with Kevin Shirley. He and I hit it off, and we have a musical connection and understanding. I enjoy working with him so much that it makes me want to make records. I think age has something to do with it. I just turned 60, and you have a sense of time running out, so it makes you more passionate for the work.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Do you keep an archive of songs?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019d love to think it\u2019s that organized, but it\u2019s not. I\u2019ve always got a few songs scattered about, so I start there, then write some more. We always record more than we put on the record. For Dirty Jeans<\/em>, we recorded 19 songs but only 11 wound up on the record, so there were those songs to look at. We wound up using three or four from that session. Then we recorded about 14 more. I always have old songs around. On the last record, I had songs that were 10 years old, and one that was almost 40.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What\u2019s your song selection method?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s no magic process. Kevin and I go back and forth, and as you start to hang songs together, a record emerges and you see how certain songs don\u2019t fit. For this record, we cut a song called \u201cMystic Pinball,\u201d but it just didn\u2019t fit on the record. I just liked the title so much that I used it for the record. Kevin reminded me that Led Zeppelin did the same thing, naming a record after a song that wasn\u2019t on there. So\u00a0there was precedent.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Are you hands-on in the studio?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not at all, which is good. Working with Kevin is the first time I\u2019ve ever totally trusted a producer. He has a way of working with a crazy man like me. And he has a way of not letting the studio get in the way of making the record. There\u2019s an old adage among jazz players: The first thing you have to do as a musician is get your instrument out of the way. In other words, forget about technique and all you know. You\u2019ve got to get out of yourself and your instrument and go to the music. Both times I\u2019ve worked with Kevin, we\u2019ve done just that. I never even notice that we\u2019re in the studio. He\u2019s not precious about any particular kind of gear or any of that stuff. He just plugs things in and we start making music. He works fast, and I do, too. We cut Mystic Pinball <\/em>in a week back in April. It\u2019s really off the cuff. As soon as we know the changes, we start rolling the machine. We like to do a take live and then do any overdubs or anything that needs to be fixed right. If it\u2019s a keeper vocal, that\u2019s great, but if not, I\u2019ll sing it again, right then. We don\u2019t let stuff sit around.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Mystic Pinball <\/em>feels looser than\u00a0<\/strong>Dirty Jeans & Mudslide Hymns<\/em>. Was that by design?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It just happened. With Dirty Jeans<\/em>, we were coming off that big flood in Nashville and there was a mood that came with that for a year or two. It affected the city, and all of that had an effect on the music. Things have lightened up a little, so this record was more fun, more rock \u2019n\u2019 roll.<\/p>\n

Do you ever feel pressure to write classics like \u201cThing Called Love\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n

No. Maybe when I was younger, I did.\u00a0Bring the Family<\/em> got my foot in the door, so I guess for a minute there in my 30s, I\u00a0felt like I had to back it up. After that, we\u00a0put out Slow Turning<\/em>, which was well received, so I got over it. I just wanted to write good songs. I wasn\u2019t\u00a0concerned with topping myself.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How have you evolved as an artist?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t really look at myself in those terms. I know I\u2019m different than I was. I\u2019m not the guy that made the records before Bring the Family<\/em>. But I\u2019m not the guy that made Bring the Family<\/em>. This is a different territory for me. I look at things differently at 60. You keep writing and chase songs up the mountains and down through the valleys and go different places because of the music. You follow the music, and it changes as you change. Writing, singing, making records and playing live, it\u2019s all one piece. It\u2019s a lot of who I am, and I\u2019m a lot of things\u2014a husband, a father. It\u2019s about the music, and I just try to be ready\u00a0when the music strikes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So you\u2019re not a big planner?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I stopped making plans a long time ago because they didn\u2019t work out. My plans are either foolish or I can\u2019t imagine the wonder that eventually happens and how amazing things actually turn out. So there\u2019s no point. I know I\u2019m playing a gig tomorrow, I know my wife and kids are OK. I know I have some friends I love and who love me, but all bets are off after I go to bed tonight. I don\u2019t know what\u2019s going to\u00a0happen. But it\u2019s all good.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Why do you prefer being an indie artist?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s been a real freedom for me in the last 20 years since I\u2019ve been on a\u00a0major label. I have the freedom to make\u00a0the records I want to make and that\u2019s\u00a0been great. I\u2019m not even signed directly\u00a0to the label I\u2019m working with now. We\u00a0do these lease deals per record. I pay for\u00a0the record initially and then I\u2019m\u00a0reimbursed. I\u2019m working for myself and working with a record company, which is a much better situation than feeling like you\u2019re a contract player as part of the old Hollywood movie studio system.<\/p>\n

\u2013Juli Thanki<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

JOHN HIATT At 60, the master singer-songwriter still follows wherever the music leads After 40 years and 21 studio albums, John Hiatt knows a thing or two about songcraft. On his new album, \u00a0Mystic Pinball, he even manages to make a grocery list interesting, wrapping it up in the grisly story-song, \u201cWood Chipper.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[5097,5691,3186,5690,5688,5692,5689,297,2823,5686,5475,5693,5687],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8467"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8467"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8467\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8470,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8467\/revisions\/8470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}