Joe Henry’s Second Anti- Disc Civilians Drops September 11th, 2007
Acclaimed Artist and Producer Readies Most Alluring, Artfully Direct Disc Yet
Van Dyke Parks, Bill Frisell, Patrick Warren and Greg Leisz Lend Talents To Henry’s Personally and Politically-Informed Tenth Studio Album
Joe Henry – the veteran singer, songwriter, guitarist and acclaimed producer – will release his second Anti- disc, Civilians, on September 11th, 2007. The twelve song set, which arguably stands as the most alluring and artfully direct album of his storied ten album tenure, was recorded and mixed in his home studio and counts the talents of guest pianist Van Dyke Parks on the brilliantly poignant “Civil War” and the emotive, lilting “I Will Write My Book.”
With jazz guitarist Bill Frisell, pianist, arranger and chamberlain organist Patrick Warren, guitarist and dobro master Greg Leisz, bassist Dave Piltch and longtime drummer Jay Bellerose, Henry has assembled an ideal cast for his latest disc. And from the blues-inflected, “Time Is A Lion,” or the memorable love-torn ballad “Scare Me To Death,” to the album’s centerpiece “Our Song,” Civilians finds the troubadour balancing sharp personal and political observations with assurance and sophistication.
On the latter, Henry wryly and soulfully chronicles an overdeveloped, insensitive and downright pushy America as he imagines bumping into baseball icon Willie Mays at a Scottsdale, Arizona Home Depot. “It’s no accident that the song falls where it does, in the middle of the record,” Henry admits. “It’s sort of the hub of the wheel. The tone of the song began to influence the way I heard all the others.”
But if that song and the aforementioned “Civil War” are ripe with what Henry calls “political undertones and overtones,” he insists they weren’t deliberate. “I have never sat down with the idea of writing a quote-unquote political record, or even a political song, for that matter. The process of writing for me is the process of discovering what I’m writing about; and I never really know where I’ll wind up. And in this case, I see in retrospect that the times in which we live have subverted the process. But I would say the songs are more emotionally political than topically so.”
Henry says his only goal for Civilians was, “to make a better record and different record than I’ve ever made. And yet I don’t think I’ve ever made a record where I felt less concerned by what anyone might think of it – be it my label, my manager, my wife, or whomever. I felt completely liberated, and I think that the fact that I’ve been producing so many records for other artists has got me to the point where I’m working from a place of strength, rather than a place of resignation.”
Having produced artists as diverse as Ani DiFranco, Aimee Mann, Billy Preston, Bettye LaVette, Allen Toussaint and Elvis Costello and the 2003 Grammy Award winning Solomon Burke disc Don’t Give Up On Me – plus his longtime hero Loudon Wainwright III for the soundtrack to the upcoming Judd Apatow movie Knocked Up – Henry says all of these collaborations have informed Civilians.
“As a producer, you can see a project in a completely different way,” says Henry, who also recently worked with Richie Havens, Ramblin’ Jack Elliot, John Doe and Bob Forrest on the soundtrack to the upcoming, Bob Dylan-inspired Todd Haynes film, I’m Not There: Suppositions On A Film Concerning Dylan. “Working with other artists allows you to be wholly invested but without your ego in the way, and it has given me an incredible education; so that when I come back to do work for myself I plug into the music in a different way, I’m able to see where I’m going with an aerial view.”
“The songs have the right amount of smoke, the right number of mirrors and the right kind of clarity,” Henry concludes. “I feel like I’m moving forward with Civilians. I wouldn’t say it was effortlessly, but this record certainly feels as if it happened the way it was supposed.”
Track listing for Civilians is a follows: 1. Civilians 2. Parker’s Mood 3. Civil War 4. Time Is A Lion 5. You Can’t Fail Me Now 6. Scare Me To Death 7. Our Song 8. Wave 9. Love Is Enough 10. I Will Write My Book 11. Shut Me Up 12. God Only Knows