The Tim “Napalm” Stegall Substack Interview: Jesse Dayton, Part Three
The Beaumont Hardcharger on playin’ the blues, and punk’s connections to ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll.
It’s Monday, Napalm Nation. Are you ready to tackle the day? I’m not, considering I’m posting this at 1AM! LOL! I am betting by the time most of you read this over your Post Toasties a few hours from now, you will be, however.
Revisions on the ‘70s punk book ended Saturday. There’s more work to be done still, but we should wrap it up in three weeks! Be expecting an announcement soon, complete with a pre-sale launch.
Meanwhile, maybe I’ll finally have some time to work on this damned page…?
Nothing to add to this installment of our ongoing Jesse Dayton conversation from back in August. Except maybe here’s a link to Part One. And here’s Part Two. Just so you’re all caught up, if you aren’t already.
JESSE: I'm actually working on a record right now with Johnny Moeller and Ian Moore. We're doing a three man record, kind of like the way that Johnny Copeland, Albert Collins, and Robert Cray made a record in the 80s called Showdown. It was a cool record. I was like, why don't people do this anymore? You need to go grab my manager, Reuben Williams. He has this great Cajun accent, from South Louisiana, New Orleans. and he's like, “Y'all need to go get your friends over in Austin and put out that!” I think we've got like five songs recorded. So that'll be something we can go do together and have fun and do that.
And then I've got the record that Shooter Jennings produced that's coming out, which is basically a rock record with some acoustic blues songs. I just didn't want to go and get with Waylon's son and make a record that sounded like a Waylon record. And Shooter's become a high commodity now, winning Grammys. So it was great to give him the freedom. I actually thought about what are some grooves and things that Shooter could do. Me and Shooter really meet in the ‘70s on what we like.
TIM: What do you mean, like the Stones or something like that?
JESSE: Yeah, yeah, there's some stuff that sounds kind of like The Who, and stuff that sounds kind of like the Stones.And then there's some other stuff that I do that's like acoustic that's more like East Texas talkin' blues, like Mance Lipscomb and Lightnin’ Hopkins and stuff like that. It's just full-on, balls-out Texas blues stuff. And it's vibey and roomy, and I'm pretty excited about it.
TIM: Somebody on Facebook the other day just recounted one of my favorite tales about Lightnin’ Hopkins. An early version of ZZ Top was backing Lightnin’ somewhere, and they think they're playing a standard 12 bar blues. They get to what they think is going to be the four and they all transition, while Lightnin’ is still on the one!
JESSE: That's what I did on a bunch of songs. I call it 13 or 11 bar blues. You just watch the guy. There's no rhyme or reason. You just have to keep your eye on him.
TIM: That was the thing. I think Gibbons actually asked him, “Hey, Lightnin’! Aren't we supposed to be doing the change?” And he just looks at them and says, “Lightnin’ changes when Lightnin’ wants to change!” [laughs]
JESSE: Absolutely! That's a beautiful thing about doing gigs with just you and the drummer. I still want to make that record someday. I call them performance records. You know, that's really what they are. It's not about being produced. It's like Jerry Lee Lewis said: “You're the producer, huh?” He said, “Yeah, bro, I'm the producer.” He goes, “Can you produce me a bottle of wine?” [laughs]
But, you know, I love American music, and I just don't hear it now like I used to. I hear it. I'm not all caught up in genres, and I'm way past scenes. My kid will never really know about scenes like we knew about them. People were loyal to those scenes because that was their identity. That's who they were, even if it was not a cool scene. And now, you know, you look on someone who's 25's playlist, and it's all over the map. It's just the ultimate cherry-picking. And I am glad that I got to be a part of the country scene in Austin, or Americana or whatever you want to call it. But I was never a true part of any of the scenes, because I didn't feel like I was. But it's like what we were saying earlier, when we first started talking about The Road Kings. We'd go out and have our hair all greased up and these 50s clothes on and our English creepers that we got from London. The punk rock guys were like, “Oh these guys are cool, yeah, they can come hang out with us. They kind of look like The Clash.”
I mean, I've become friends with Joe Strummer's widow, Lucinda Tate, and she was saying that Brian Setzer and Joe Strummer were best friends. They had bought this amazing Airstream, a drivable one, not just the trailer. And they were like, let's get our families together and go on vacation. And then I guess Joe died, unexpectedly. But I think there's an old love affair between those two camps. And Joe kind of straddled that divide better than anybody, which is the thing that was great about him. I mean, he may have written “No Elvis, Beatles or The Rolling Stones” back in 1977, but he had all those records.
I mean at some point, the accouterments and the aesthetic of it becomes kind of silly. Because you know it's like Steve Jones told me one time: He loved Boston! He used to hide it from the rest of the guys in the band! Right. And before I got into The Clash, I was chopping needles with three quarters on it on my brother's Hendrix records. I was listening to his records, learning songs, learning leads off of Hendrix In The West and Fandango, that kind of blues stuff. But for me, it was always about the message and the energy with punk rock. So I'm just glad that I got a taste of it, and I didn't become too overtly involved. When you're just carrying the torch for somebody else, what's the point?
Initially, what punk was supposed to be was stripping rock ‘n’ roll back to its essentials. It was Eddie Cochran. You hear that Eddie Cochran riff in almost everything. And it was obviously Johnny Thunders who inspired all those guitar players. He was drawing from Chuck Berry. He’s my all-time favorite number one musician. When i was a kid, I saw Chuck Berry on The Tonight Show, Johnny Carson. He duckwalked across the stage, and I was just mesmerized. I was like, he has the best lyrics, he's got the wittiest lyrics, he's got the greatest voice, he plays the coolest guitar parts, he can out entertain everybody. I mean, obviously Elvis and Little Richard are great, but you know what I'm saying. But to me, I still want to be Chuck Berry.
TIM: Me too, me too. I mean, if you have to find one guy that defines rock ‘n’ roll? I can't think of a better definition than Chuck Berry.
JESSE: Well, they say that “Ida Red” influenced “Maybellene.” So, when we played in London, Chrissie Hynde came out to our show, and she goes, “Man, you got a lot of country in your rock ‘n’ roll!” To me, that was the best compliment I ever got. Rock ‘n’ roll is usually more rock than it is roll. It doesn't always swing. To me, even in some stuff today, I hear country music in the rock ‘n’ roll. They might not know they're doing it, but if they're putting an acoustic guitar, flat top rhythm part down, and it's cranked up in the mix, then I just immediately think of The Everly Brothers. And if you get that Appalachian harmony in there, then you definitely are getting Don and Phil somehow. So it's interesting to me, to still try to do some of that alchemy.
End Part Three
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