A Conversation with Dave Barnes – HuffPost 7.1.10

Mike Ragogna: Hey Dave.

Dave Barnes: (singing) I believe the children are our future.

MR: (laughs) Speaking of children being our future…

DB: Look at that segue (laughs).

MR: Wow, it’s as if we had it planned (ahem). One of your songs, “10,000 Children,” was performed recently on Idol Gives Back. You want to tell us a little about that?

DB: Yeah, it was so funny, we got the heads-up about a week before because it’s such a big machine that things happen really quickly. They called and said they were going to use the song, and we had kind of heard some whispers in the wind, but we got the confirmation about the week before. So it was just a crazy cool moment watching Morgan Freeman and Randy from the show talking as the song was playing and I just thought, “this is really, really cool.” It’s so rare to see a song that you’ve written for a reason actually be used for that reason. It was really cool.

MR: And your family must have gone out of their minds when they saw it, right?

DB: Oh yeah, I think people finally thought, “You know what? He may be able to make something out of this stuff, that Dave.”

MR: That was from the Me And You And The World album, right?

DB: Yes.

MR: And that also had the single “Until You” right?

DB: It did, that’s exactly right.

MR: Razor & Tie has been your home for the last three records. What’s the story behind that?

DB: Well, Beka Callaway, who is my A&R person there, used to live in Nashville and has been a big supporter of what I do. We had wanted to work together for quite a while, so finally, when she landed there, she said, “This is a great label for you.” She called and they came down to a show to check it out and it’s been great. They are so easy to create music for because they really give me freedom to do what I do. I’ve really enjoyed that, and they’ve been kind enough to link arms with me as I do this.

MR: Let’s get the story behind how you ended up on All My Children singing one of your songs from What You Want, What You Get, “God Gave Me You.”

DB: Well, Razor and Tie kind of had a brainstorming session, and they’ve really been so supportive of that song and had a real vision for it. What they said was, “We’d love for this song to be in some weddings. We’d love to see it on TV.” And someone at the label brought up that it seemed like there are a lot of weddings on soap operas. So they just reached out to some of the people at those shows and, oddly enough, they sort of caught a good position.

We then flew out and we taped for two days. One of the days was just me playing in front of a black backdrop, but the second day we were actually on set and I had a line, which was kind of big time. I was really, genuinely blown away by how much fun it was because I didn’t know if it was going to be people that were way too cool for school and I was going to be the scrub, or if it was going to be a really cool time, and it really was. The actors were so cool.

MR: For the readers who haven’t seen it, what was the scene like?

DB: It was during a wedding, so Jake and Amanda on the show are renewing their vows and he’s been surprising her throughout the episode with little gifts before the wedding. After the wedding, I’m kind of his last surprise, so I’m there and I just completely blow her mind, basically, because she is such a big fan.

MR: Was it one episode, or did they spread this out between two episodes.

DB: Well, me speaking was one episode, that was just one. But they had sort of a montage of the song and me singing for another.

MR: Where do they film this thing? New York?

DB: They just moved to California, it was in Studio City.

MR: Now, I interviewed Jonny Lang a few of weeks ago for HuffPost, and he’s such a stand-up guy, one of my favorite interviews. And lo and behold, on Dave Barnes’ What We Want, What We Get, we see “What I Need,” a duet with Jonny Lang. Coincidence? I think not…

DB: Well, Jonny wouldn’t stop calling me, he just wanted to be on my record. He’s really belligerent that way. (laughs)

MR: You just can’t keep him out of room with a microphone, huh?

DB: That’s right, that’s right. (laughs)

MR: Man, he’s such a great guy, I feel icky about our kidding about him like this. Say something nice, quick…

DB: No, it was really, really cool. He and I did a tour together in 2008 and after that became buddies. He’s been in and out of town since then writing for his new record, so we ended up hanging a good bit the last time he was here which was last summer. So we were recording the record and I called up and said, “Dude, do you think there’s anyway you can sing on this song?” So after paying him five-and-a-half million dollars and mowing his yard for a month-and-a-half, he decided he would come and sing. It was such an amazing moment, I was just freaking out the entire time.

MR: Another interesting HuffPost intersection here. Seems you went on tour with Hanson on the Walk Around The World Tour. I also interviewed Taylor Hanson a few of weeks ago, and the new Hanson album is another of my favorites of the year. How did that tour come about and how did it go?

DB: I think they have the same booking that I do, so it somehow got intersected that way. And we have a lot of mutual friends, so they were so much fun to tour with. You don’t know how much you’re going to see them, being the closing act because they can be so busy doing a million things, but we actually got a lot of good hang time with them and they’re so easy going. There was none of that, “Hey man, we’re about to go on, we need you to leave.” They were super cool and it was a really good lesson on how to care for your fans well. They just do a really good job of engaging their crowd and their fans and their supporters, so there was a lot to learn from them there.

MR: I was at a Hanson concert a few years ago when working on a compilation for Universal, and I remember being impressed with how the brothers interacted with their fans, and I saw casual things that revealed how genuinely close they were.

DB: Oh yeah. They’re the real deal. I think that’s what I like so much about them, and they’re so talented, they deserve so much more attention than they’ve gotten because they really are that good.

MR: Enough about Hanson, let’s chat some more about Jonny Lang. No, I’ve been following your last few albums, and I’ve really enjoyed this last one. One of my favorite songs on here is “Someone’s Somebody.” I really love what you set up with that, and I love how you juxtapose the words at the end of the chorus, it’s a really clever song.

DB: Well, you know, Nashville is such a young town. I’ve got so many friends that are single and, at the same time, kind of ready to find their husband or wife and settle down. So, I kind of wrote that as encouragement for them because I have conversations with people who are just holding out to make sure it’s the right person. I’ve also listened to way too much Chaka Khan and Earth, Wind and Fire, and that’s what happens, you know? That’s the song that pops out of that. It’s actually one of my favorites. I love the songs that are sort of a tip of the hat to a specific time in music.

MR: Your album visits a lot of musical territories, yet it’s still a cohesive Dave Barnes record. Are you conscious of that as you’re creating?

DB: I don’t know. I hope it’s working, and it’s definitely encouraging to hear you say that it is. The thing is, my favorite guys, and my favorite kind of music during the Elton John, Billy Joel, Steely Dan era where artists could have “The Boy In The Bubble” on one album and then have “Late In The Evening” on another record. I just love that because I think, at that time, people really loved quality. Function wasn’t king.

So, you really gave the artist space to create, and the feeling was, “Hey man, if you think you can pull it off, then do it.” I mean, gosh, Billy Joel other than Paul Simon, is the shining example. How do you pull off “Tell Her About It” next to “Goodnight Saigon” next to “We Didn’t Start The Fire”? But it’s just that he’s good, and the songs especially were good. Five seconds into the song, as long as it’s good, nobody cares that he just went from doo-wop to a contemplative Vietnam song. People were saying, “Look, if you can do it, do it.”

Not that I’m saying I’m in the same league as Billy Joel, but I think that’s the headspace I occupy. I really want to do that, I want to write some songs that, genre-wise, can bend a little bit because, hopefully, they’re written well enough that you don’t see the seams, you don’t see the stitching. It’s all continuous.

MR: Paul Simon and Billy Joel, nice, a couple of my all-time favorites. It’s very rare that anybody’s at the same caliber as any of those artists, but on the other hand, I definitely think Dave Barnes’ music is at least in the same building.

DB: That’s a huge compliment. It’s just sad to me because I don’t think artists get to try that anymore. I think there would be a lot of people doing that if labels or whoever is in the way would let them. It’s like they say, “Hey, this band is known for this, so we need another record like that.” Maybe the artist has been listening to a lot of jazz and is writing different kinds of songs, but that doesn’t matter because it’s not what makes money. And look, you’ve got to pay the bills, but I think at the same time, it’s just a different season in the world. And I don’t know if the chicken comes before the egg in the sense that “we made it that way so the listeners are used to it,” or “the listeners said we don’t want that anymore.” I just don’t know how it works.

MR: I don’t think the listeners said, “We don’t want it anymore.” I think what might have happened is that, as we reached the end of the seventies, things became more genre-fied. A reggae artist was just a reggae artist, a disco artist was just a disco artist, and they really didn’t do too much crossing over. And “artistic” artists who reigned for a long time–like Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon and others–just ran their radio course.

DB: It’s so sad to me, it’s something that really breaks my heart because that would have been fun to be around for.

MR: Who are you listening to lately?

DB: Lately, it’s been a few different people. There’s a band in Nashville, speaking of great music, called The Silver Seas, and they’re kind of like the class before a bunch of us now in Nashville. Some singer-songwriters that formed a supergroup, and they’ve all been in Josh Rouse’s band. About every two or three years, they release a record and this latest one,Chateau Revenge, is just so good. It’s kind of like ELO meets Fleetwood Mac, the really great stuff from back in the day, you know? I haven’t stopped listening to it, it’s really good.

MR: That brings up the burning question of just who are you hob-nobbing with in Nashville?

DB: You know, these days, I’m mowing my yard a lot when I’m home. It’s me and my yard gnomes, which, sadly, isn’t the name of a cool Indie band. One of my best bud’s, a guy named Thad Cockrell, is a monster talent. He just co-wrote Jessie Baylin’s new record with her. It just seems anywhere you go in this town, you can hobnob just eating somewhere. You can look over and you see Jack White on the next stool.

MR: It seems like Nashville used to be more Nashville-centric, it was a smallish community years ago when I lived there. Then, it became a second home for so many L.A. And New York artists, so many that now, it’s this huge music town whose expansion was a bit surprising.

DB: It’s crazy. I think people are finally getting it. I think people come to visit, or spend some time here recording and they go, “Wait, why am I not living here?” It’s got great weather–right now it’s in the nineties which is kind of ridiculous–but it’s a community. It’s the most tightly knit, supportive group of people I’ve ever been around, there’s no jockeying for position. Nashville seems, in my opinion, to recruit very secure, creative people, and it just seems to breed more encouragement and kindness. So, people get here ready to hear things like, “That guitar sucks,” but it’s the opposite. I’ve always said about Nashville, “You get here and you’re either intimidated or inspired.” People that get intimidated usually don’t last, and the people that get inspired, do. And then those people contribute to the community and it becomes this beautiful, cyclical machine that continues to churn out inspiring, creative, kind people.

MR: As you know, there’s also a big Christian market in Nashville too. And “God Gave Me You” is a Christian hit right now, right?

DB: It is, I guess. I’ve never had a hit. A hit, to me, gets played by more than two radios at a time in the same city. (laughs)

MR: (laughs) I hear it’s bigger than that. I hear it’s doing really well on the charts. But let’s get back to your new album. One of my favorite songs is “You Do The Same For Me.” It’s a really great ballad, and in the tradition of Nashville songwriting, you have to have that killer ballad. But you also have to have something that a lot of other people can record, and this seems to be that song.

DB: That’s a really good question because, honestly, it’s one of those songs on the record that I still get the most nervous about, not because I don’t like it, I really like it. But I think, because it’s an acoustic ballad, it’s got a little bit of a neo-country tinge with the dobro. It’s a little bit of a risk, which I always love, and I love to put on records. It’s the one, when it plays, that I love to listen to. But I’m always thinking, “Man, I hope people are listening to that song,” because it clocks in at a little under five minutes, which is a long ballad.

But I love it, I love the sentiment of it, and I think the lyrics are great, so it’s really good to hear you say that. And you know what’s funny? One of my friends that lives in Atlanta that I really respect told me, “You know, Dave, this is a song that I could listen to over and over off this record.” Those kinds of things are always good to hear.

MR: What’s the story behind it?

DB: It’s a song to a dear friend of mine that’s trying to encourage him and tell him how I feel, so it’s a song that comes from the heart. Of all the songs on the record, I think it might be the most heartfelt. It’s really good to hear you say that.

MR: Any time, I love that track, and this is really a fine record. What’s the immediate future for Dave Barnes?

DB: Well, this is fun news. We just got confirmed that I’m doing a Christmas record in July, so I’m really excited about that, it should be super fun and we’re actually starting on that in a couple of weeks, so that will be out this December. That’s the big news, and then just kind of playing shows, and–you’re going to love this–I’m doing some comedy shows this month, which I’ve never done outside of Nashville, so that will be something new. A few fun things going on, you know?

MR: Do you have any strong opinions on something in the news?

DB: Man, you know, the thing that was hard was just the lack of press for the Nashville flood. That was a pretty frustrating thing for a while. I wasn’t here for that, but sadly, it was at the same time as the gulf oil spill and it was a tragedy. There were deaths in the double-digits, and they estimated, I think, right at one billion dollars of damage to the city. It just gets frustrating because you really wish that people would cover it more. And they did, Anderson Cooper ended up coming down here and Sixty Minutes did a tease on it which was great. But I think all of us in the band were wondering why it wasn’t getting more attention when so much damage had been done.

MR: Did your property suffer any damage?

DB: We were okay, thank goodness. We had a little water down in our basement, but it’s concrete, so we were okay. Thankfully, we were able to get out of it pretty much unscathed, which I was very grateful for because I had numerous friends that had really bad damage and a couple that actually had to move. It was just bad, man. It was bad news.

Transcribed by Ryan Gaffney