Photographer Laura Aurora spoke out loud, what all of us were (well I was) hoping...
"Had an amazing few days filming behind the scenes with @rhiannongiddens and @fraturrisi who have just recorded an INCREDIBLE album with @joehenrymusic producing, making magic happen."
This is some of the most exciting news concerning Joe's production work for me. Ever since 'Tomorrow is my Turn', it was verry natural for me that one day, Rhiannon would also work with Joe behind the desk. T bone Burnett is Joe's Mentor, and Rhiannon and Joe have worked together on previous occasions (Carolina Chocolat Drops, Wexford Carols, Birds of Chicago,...)
Yesterday, Aretha Franklin passed away. The entire world mourns, and everyone pays their respects.
I generally don't share the amazing words Joe offers in repsect of those that are hard to honour in spoken language. But this one hit me full frontal.
On his Social Media Joe wrote his goodbye. Its words are strong and beautiful, Pure poetry. The lay-out of it, even shares its beauty. This is how you honor a Queen.
RIP Aretha Franklin, and from here on, I'll offer this space to Joe's words.
MARY DON’T YOU WEEP
I shall say up front that to approach this engagement requires first that one sleep on rocks, drink from shoes; become naked and marked with bramble, weep bitter tears:
Aretha Franklin is dead.
She not queen for a season or region but forever and for all, as if by Biblical prophecy; she of the storied mountain and too the train steaming through its most reluctant and unforgiving chapters;
She like no river so much as the Mississippi that has run forward and back and has born upon its shoulders the building blocks of our confused and bloody history and spied from the center of rushes lauded cities in flames ––consumed by our own unrelenting and misshapen desires;
She of all time and none;
She the winter of ’29, the spring of ’33 ––the fall of ’63 wherein churches burned and pilgrims sank before harbor; she not only of Sam’s fierce grace and slide but of Ray’s grim crawl, Georgia to Washington, carrying red dirt in his cuffs and fish sandwiches wrapped in waxed paper;
She not only of Martin but of Malcolm;
She of scrubbed hands and tired feet, the childless and the over-run with children.
She not of industry but of mystical vision: smokestack, sack- cloth and ashes; thunder and chain lightening; she of unmarked graves, and words beyond ringing words; she of
fire and fury and breathless wonder, the gospel according to love and loneliness and bound for no other glory but that of she who has been and
Mavis Staples throws a party for our right to fight at Lincoln Center headlines newyorkmusicdaily about last saturday's show.
Her voice has weathered over the years, but her message
and presence have not. The heir to a seven-decade, politically fearless
soul music legacy is as relevant today as she was in 1962, when she
marched throughout the South with the family patriarch, Pops Staples,
and put her life on the line.
Joe had the privilege to warm the stage for her.
He’s a very serious guy, choosing his words carefully as he addressed the crowd..... Playing acoustic guitar, using both standard and open
tunings, he led his six-piece band through a breezy set of
slow-to-midtempo parlor Americana ballads..... He’s the missing link between Leonard Cohen and Wilco. newyorkmusicdaily wrote about him.
His set included songs like 'Hungry', Sparrow' and 'Lead me on' (Thank you Sarah for this info).
As a surprise guest, Joe welcomed Amy Helm on stage to sing 'Odetta' with him. It's also the latest single for het upcoming album 'This too shall light', produced by Joe.
In a little more than a month 'This too shall light', the new album by Amy Helm will be released. The album features musicians Doyle Bramhall II, Tyler Chester, Jen Condos, and Jay Bellerose, as well as a background vocal section consisting of Allison Russell, JT Nero, and Adam Minkoff.(source)
Amy Helm did an interview with Chronogram and naturally, one of the Subjects was this new album and working with Joe. But the article brings you up to date with her entire career. Make sure to read it !
Apparently Joe almost mixed an album for Levon Henry ! Well how about that.
...Recorded quickly and with a minimum of fuss with Grammy-winning producer
and musician Joe Henry in Los Angeles, it has a looser, palpably
spontaneous feel that fits its artist well. "Making this record felt
liberating," Amy enthuses. "I'd already met Joe and I was a big fan of
the productions he'd done for Bettye LaVette, Allen Toussaint, Susan
Tedeschi, and other people, and I really wanted to work with him—when
Larry Campbell and I were coproducing Dirt Farmer for my dad,
we'd actually talked about having Joe mix it, but that didn't work out.
So I was more than happy to surrender to his direction, and we did the
new album totally live in the studio in four days, without belaboring
anything. My band just threw our shit in the room and started playing,
Joe set the compass from there, and it was amazing. I pulled in some
songs we'd been doing, and he chose some really good ones for us to do,
too."
Besides the reflective title track, which was written by MC Taylor of
Hiss Golden Messenger and Josh Kaufman (Bob Weir, Josh Ritter), This Too Shall Light's
standout cuts include covers of the Milk Carton Kids' "Michigan" and,
interestingly, "The Stones That I Throw (Will Free All Men)," a lost,
gospel-tinged single recorded in 1965 by Levon and the Hawks during the
brief period between their leaving rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins and
hooking up with Bob Dylan en route to becoming the Band. "I've always
really loved the whole vibe of that song," Amy says. "It's just a great,
straight-up rock 'n' roll dance tune."(Chronogram)
Not mentioned in this interview is a cover of Joe's Odetta.
Well, did I almost choke in my coffee this morning....
I was reading an interview in Hot Press with Gavin Glass, And there I read : The studio he’s talking about is the rightly-famed Orphan Recordings, where he’s steered a myriad of Irish and international acts. “The Eskies, The Young Folk, The Sprockets, anyone and everyone. My favourite is probably Billy Bragg and Joe Henry. They toured America doingfield recordings, Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly songs,but they couldn’t use it so they re-did the whole thing in one day in Orphan, facing each other over two microphones.
Have we all been fooled ?... I couldn't believe it !
What is it, that we are actually hearing on that album? Real field recordings? or a manipulated studio recording? 3 People can answer that question, and I asked 2 of them : Joe himself and Ryan Freeland.
I can now say, that the words in that interview are (not a little bit) misleading. Joe and Billy did indeed record all those songs again in a studio, but the versions on the 'shine a light' album are all really recorded during the trainride.
In fact, the recording in the studio happened near the end of the U.K. leg of the 'shine a light' tour. That implies that : While Joe and Billy were recording these songs in the studio; the 'shine a light' album was already on sale for months.
So, why make these studiorecordings ?
JH :
It was recorded in case a use presents itself for the songs without the travel noise. If and only if....
Today, there are no specific plans on the horizon for those versions.
Well, now I can close my eyes, finish my coffee, and imagine I'm at a railroad station. Don't you just love that background noise ?
Greetings,
Stefan
Edit August 2nd :
Today, apologies have been made towards the artists, and a promise for necessary changes has been done. As for now, the article is not anymore available to everyone, only to subscribed readers.
