Upon This Rock… By Benjamin Cooper oo much non-music is popular right now. Everywhere I turn the happening thing is this fake electro stuff; what’s even worse is that’s the stuff that is winning Grammy Awards.”
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communion. It’s whatever you need it to be. I definitely consider myself a spiritual person,” he adds. “But I just don’t believe that the ten percent of my brain that I do use is best served by doing what I used to do.”
Allen Stone likes music played on instruments that soak up and radiate years of sweat and weariness. He’s searching for the genuine article – his own thread of the rock‘n’roll narrative – and he doesn’t care if he offends a few electronic artists along the way.
Reviews of Stone’s live performances rush to note the preacher persona Stone inhabits onstage. It’s an understandable touchstone of the genre, and one that audience members have praised for its transformative effect; his gigs convert sweaty band-rooms into shared spaces to attack Christian hypocrisy and to worship the audience’s shared, hopeless optimism.
The softly-spoken young man from Washington state is an exceptionally unlikely troublemaker. In many ways, the strength of his opinions concerning the quality of pop music is a product of circumstance. Over the last six months the hype around him has grown: he’s now internationally touted as part of the next wave of successors to Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. “Oh my goodness, what’s happening right now is so foreign to me,” Stone admits. “There are people talking about my music in ways I never even began to imagine. I’m sitting here, in a hotel room, surrounded by my band, and talking to journalists from all over the world. The momentum of it is crazy. Good crazy.” Things were much simpler where Stone grew up, in the tiny rural town of Chewelah, near the Idaho border. His father was a preacher, and it was through involvement in church choirs that he first became interested in singing and performance. “I was pretty sheltered growing up,” he says. “I had a great childhood, but it’s crazy to think that there are more people buying tickets to one of my shows now than the entire population of my hometown.” Stone survived on a diet of gospel music from his home and church until his teenage years. Once he heard classic recordings by Bill Withers and Aretha Franklin, and in particular Wonder’s classic album Innervisions, he was hooked. He left home and attended Bible college for a year, but ultimately decided that his calling lay elsewhere. “I understand the importance of religion. I get that it’s a part of most people’s lives. I just think that your version of religion – which is obviously based on the beliefs that are important to you – is what it is. Some people drink a 24-pack of beer and watch the football, and some people take
“I’m really not aware that I seem to be ‘preaching’,” says Stone. “That’s just how I learned to sing songs. I’ve always had a love for music, and I grew up watching my dad on stage and in the church. It naturally just comes out of me that way. Both my dad and my brother are ministers, and the reality is that when they’re up on the pulpit, they’re entertainers. They might be communicating a different message to mine, but we’re all entertainers.” Stone has self-released two albums – 2010’s Last To Speak and 2011’s self-titled effort, which was re-released by ATO last year (and in March 2013 through Universal Music Australia) – and has developed a fanbase through relentless touring across America. “I’ve been travelling and performing since I was 19 years old,” he says. “I’ve played almost 50 shows a year for six years, and about 350 shows in the last two years.” Many of those shows have been in small rooms in the homes of fans, and his current success was largely generated by a clip of him performing his song ‘Unaware’ in his mother’s living room. The video went viral, eventually catching the attention of late night television host Conan O’Brien and then being picked up by Ellen Degeneres. Both invited Stone and his band to appear on their respective shows, increasing his presence in even more living rooms. When we speak, his band is holed up in a Los Angeles hotel following their performance on Ellen – another experience that he describes as “good crazy”. “It’s one more thing that we’ve all done together in this crazy year. Thankfully they’re
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Aretha Franklin
Stevland Hardaway Morris started his The daughter of Baptist minister and career singing in the local church choir activist C.L. Franklin was dubbed the in his native Detroit. He’s been signed to Queen of Soul early in her career. She then Motown since the label’s Gerald expanded into pop, most notably White, brother of The Miracles’ on 1985 Eurythmics collab ‘Sisters Ronnie White, discovered him Are Doin’ It For Themselves’. singing in a living room. The multi-instrumentalist has gone Marvin Gaye on to win the most Grammys of Yet another child of a minister, any male solo artist. Gaye could sing across three Allen Stone octaves, which was handy early wouldn’t exist on as a member of doo-wop group without… Donny Hathaway The Marquees. He broke away The Missouri-raised singer from the production reins of Tamlastudied fine arts at Howard University, in Motown to do his own damn thing on 1971’s Washington D.C., where he met fellow What’s Going On. Thirteen years later, artistic chameleon Roberta Flack. The following his final Sexual Healing tour and two recorded a number of duets – most an extended period of depression, he had notably ‘Where Is The Love’ and ‘The an argument with his father Marvin Sr., who Closer I Get To You’. shot him dead through the heart. the kind of people who would slap me across the noggin if I needed to be brought back into the game,” Stone says. “I regard the band as my family now. Families get in each other’s faces and annoy each other because they share so much, and do it all frequently. The other side of that is it means you grow a lot. And then there’s the fact that they’re great musicians: it wouldn’t be possible to tour as much as we do if they weren’t such talented players.” The drive to make quality music, and to be associated with quality music, is an ongoing concern for Stone. His latest album was recorded with respected, established session musicians – including Raphael Saadiq’s rhythm section, and Miles Davis’ keyboardist, Deron Johnson. It has gained him a swag of new fans through its digital sales and online hype, yet the satisfaction he takes from it is only possible because he knows the studio sound is a mere reflection of the “real” live show. “I’ve never seen the merit in people who can only make stuff in the studio. I’ve spent enough time in the studio to learn how the tricks work. It makes you sad after a while, because you realise how many records are out there that the singer or the band just can’t pull off. If a band don’t sound better live, then I’m just not interested,” he adds. “They’ve gotta be able to put on a show, and get people moving based on what they can actually do. It’s great to see bands who can actually do that getting some recognition right now. I’m talking about people like Gary Clark Jr., Lianne La Havas and Alabama Shakes – because they’re actual musicians who do their thing and don’t just press play on a laptop.” “Sorry to get on the pulpit, man,” he laughs, realising his spiel is gathering momentum. “It’s just that is where my spirit is at. I really believe in it. But I also believe in the pendulum of music: everything moves and changes.”
SHIPPING UP TO BYRON We asked BRAG writers what they’d put on their Bluesfest road-trip mixtape – we had to cut it down a bit because, you know, printed media! For our extended Spotify playlist, check out our Facebook page. THE STONE ROSES – ‘Driving South’ GILLIAN WELCH – ‘Elvis Presley Blues’ 3 FRANK TURNER – ‘I Still Believe’ 4 THE ALLMAN BROTHERS – ‘Whipping Post’ 5 RODRIGUEZ – ‘Cause’ 6 CHRIS ISAAK – ‘Baby Did A Bad, Bad Thing’ 7 DROPKICK MURPHYS – ‘I’m Shipping Up To Boston’ 8 DRUNK MUMS – ‘The Business’ 9 IGGY POP – ‘Highway Song’ 10 KURT VILE – ‘Jesus Fever’ 11 LOWELL FULSOM – ‘Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?’ 12 FLOYD DIXON – ‘Hey Bartender’ 13 ALLEN STONE – ‘Satisfaction’ 14 BONNIE RAITT – ‘Slow Ride’ 15 BAND OF SKULLS – ‘Sweet Sour’ 16 THE SNOWDROPPERS – ‘White Dress’ 17 THE HONEYDRIPPERS – ‘Sea Of Love’ 18 SKIP JAMES – ‘Hard Time Killin’ Floor Blues’ 1 2
When: Saturday March 30 Where: Blue Beat / 16-18 Cross Street, Double Bay Also: Playing Byron Bay Bluesfest with Iggy and The Stooges, Wilco, Bettye LaVette, Rodriguez, Robert Plant, Paul Simon and heaps more, from Thursday March 28 – Monday April 1 @ Tyagarah Tea Tree Farm
San Cisco photo by xxx
“Too much non-music is popular right now. Everywhere I turn the happening thing is this fake electro stuff; what’s even worse is that’s the stuff that is winning Grammy Awards.”
Stevie Wonder