Luther Dickinson is excited. It’s not the fact that, at the age of 41 the Mississippi guitar player has already built a towering musical legacy as a founding member of the North Mississippi Allstars, the band he has fronted with his younger brother Cody since the mid-90’s. Nor is it any of the many (and there are many) bands and projects he has been involved with, some of which include his work with artists like Beck, Robert Plant, and John Hiatt to name a few. At this very moment Luther Dickinson is excited about the recent release of Rock ‘n Roll Blues (New West), his second solo album and easily the most personal collection of songs he’s every released.
Recorded with the help of family friend and renowned fife player Shardé Thomas, as well as singer-songwriter and upright bass player Amy LaVere, Rock ‘n Roll Blues is an autobiographical look at Luther’s life growing up in Memphis as the son of the prolific musician and producer Jim Dickinson, and his own experiences as a working musician. The music is acoustic, raw and heartfelt, done in a style Luther refers to as “folk-punk-country-blues,” and in listening to songs like the confessional “Vandalize,” fife-driven “Mojo, Mojo,” and reflective “Karmic Debt,” you can feel Luther’s enthusiasm in getting his music and stories out. In a sense the album feels like Luther Dickinson is looking back in order to move forward with his life in music, and if that’s the case every one of us has a reason to be excited.
Hambone’s Meditations was historical in more of a cultural heritage sort of way whereas Rock ‘n Roll Blues is historical in an autobiographical sense. At this point in your life, was there something that told you it was time to do such a personal album like this?
Well the sense of urgency was I was about to turn forty. It was a planned thing; some of those songs are older than others – some are brand new but some have been out for years – and they never had their rightful place. I knew I had a collection of songs and then I realized pretty quickly that they all fit together into a song cycle. At that point, because so much of the album is youthful about the early days of being a musician – you know, plastering your hometown with fliers and just being a rock ‘n roll kid – and then getting on the road. Once I realized that’s what the record was about I did have a sense of urgency to get it out before I turned forty [laughs].
At first I felt like it was going to be a real heavy kind of rock ‘n roll record because we recorded it that way. So I applied the general aesthetic that I built up with the acoustic record – you know I did an acoustic record after my dad passed and the South Memphis String Band record and then the Wandering with the girls, and that is where I hooked up with Amy LaVere and Shardé Thomas as the rhythm section. Shardé is Otha Turner’s granddaughter and I’ve known her since she was just a child. We’ve been making music together our whole lives and she just has my back. And Amy can just hold down a one-note groove on her upright bass. I just love the fact that you can let the song speak for itself with that setting.
Do you approach your solo work differently when it’s just you versus with North Mississippi Allstars?
Yeah, totally. [With] the Allstars [we] would funnel every song that we had into the one band, but that was careless! Now I know that everything can be put in its rightful place and everything can be stronger for that. I know what we’re good at and it’s really gratifying. With Cody [Dickinson] too, we all have a lot of different things that need outlets. It’s way more healthy not to strangle everything into one outlet when it really shouldn’t be that way.
Yeah, absolutely. I don’t know how you have the time to do all that you do.
I wish I had more time to get what I want to get done! I got a lot I need to get done [laughs]. If you look at cats like [Jimi] Hendrix [with] such a short career of amazing music – we’re kind of late bloomers. I’m definitely a late bloomer [laughs].
Your dad (legendary producer and musician Jim Dickinson) had a major hand in so much different music. Growing up, was there ever a feeling to do something completely different?
I loved it – our whole life together. We were best friends and I had soaked up so much of his tastes and aesthetics. Production aesthetic wise we would have different tastes and arguments, but for the most part I adored his record collection and I adored the record collection he made. I was 13 and he turned me onto The Replacements. They gave him the demo tapes. At that age I had already started writing songs and [with] that whole experience I learned a lot about songwriting studying [Paul] Westerberg at that age. It was amazing to have such a close up experience with those guys. And I’m still friends with Tommy [Stinson], we talk all the time. And Chuck Prophet and Alejandro [Escovedo] – my dad worked with the True Believers. His relationships were so beautiful staying in touch with his friends, because we all miss him. Just a great rock ‘n roll character; the dude was just a first generation rock ‘n roller. He grew up in Memphis in the 50’s with blues and R & B in the frat houses before the folk and blues cats were rediscovered. I loved it! But when I finally found music that alienated him that was Black Flag.
Black Flag was my favorite for multiple reasons. The story I remember most is that the first single I had was “Six Pack” and I asked my dad if I could learn it on guitar – because it’s kind of like “Louie Louie” or Chuck Berry – and dad was like, ‘what’s this shit? This doesn’t make any sense!’ He got so frustrated because he couldn’t figure it out – ‘it’s rock ‘n’ roll that I can’t relate to!’ [laughs]. When I put that single on the turntable and that guitar intro kicked in I was like, ‘whoa! This is music from my planet!’ I love all of the music I was around but that was my jam.
Was that the first time you brought something to Jim and challenged him?
It was, totally! A few years later there he is working with the Replacements – and he caught the Sex Pistols on their Southern tour and he knew about punk rock – but harmonically the Sex Pistols were a little more traditional than Black Flag. He later claimed that hearing all the SST records through the wall helped him relate to when he made Please To Meet Me, and I thought that was cool. As much as he influenced us, we influenced him.
You’ve described your new album as “folk punk country blues.” What made you think those different styles would work together?
They don’t! That’s the thing about acoustic music is that you can play a punk rock song or an R&B song, and the song will just stand alone. That’s what I love about acoustic music is that it brings everything down to the lowest common denominator, just the song and the attitude behind it.
Gibson released a signature model guitar for you this year. How did that come about?
Man, that’s still like a ‘am I dreaming?’ situation. The long story short is that I have a friend at Gibson, Mike Voltz, and we met when the Allstars’ debut, Shake Hands With Shorty came out in 2000, and after all these years he was recently stationed in Memphis running the custom hallow body shop, and they’re doing amazing things. The cool thing was that we designed something that people really liked. We had an idea of combining an ES-330 and an ES-335, and putting P-90 [single-coil pickups] on a 335 was pretty rare in the Gibson world. It’s even cooler that people want to play it and like the way it sounds, and it sold out. What happened was that Gibson moved to Memphis and set up a factory on Beale Street. For Memphis guitar players it’s just super cool to be able to run down to the shop and sign something out or get something worked on.
It seems like Memphis is finally getting some attention again. What do you think about that as someone who’s been there the whole time?
I’ve been listening to a lot of soul music, you know, Memphis classics. It’s just one of those music towns and it’s always kind of the underdog. It’s the outsider’s town with so many different sounds and not just one thing. I’m really proud of Lucero. We’ve been friends since before they were a band and I think they’re really representing Memphis so well and have evolved into such a beautiful state of modern Memphis rock ‘n roll.
One Response
Luther is awesome!! I have been building his CBG’s for him for a while would give up a week of sleep to keep this cat playing his brand of tasty music !! Keep Grroving on Luther !!