Key to the Highway: Jimbo Mathus

Americana Highways’ Key to the Highway series

Fans always clamor to learn more about their favorite, most beloved musicians and those who travel with them. There’s such an allure to the road, with its serendipity, inevitable surprises, and sometimes unexpected discomforts. This interview series is a set of questions we are asking some of our favorite roots rock Americana artists to get to know more about them and what they’ve learned and experienced on the road. We are sure they have key insights to share and stories to tell. Here’s one from Jimbo Mathus.

Americana Highways: How do you like your coffee or other morning wake-up beverage?

Jimbo Mathus: I like my coffee as soon as possible.

AH: What’s the most interesting or strangest motel/hotel or place you have stayed (while on the road?)

JM: I like the creepy, out-of-the- way motels and I’ve seen a bunch. I’d have to say 7 Star Motel in LA

AH: If one CD is stuck in the player in the van for the entire tour, what do you hope it is? And why?

JM: Charlie Parker’s Savoy Sessions. If music is continuous, I’d like it to be instrumental. Other people’s words get in the way of my writing or conceiving of my own words. I really don’t listen to a lot of music in general though.

AH: What’s one personal item you must have with you on your road trip?

JM: Personal item – I’d say my notebook/datebook

AH: What is your relationship with food? How do you handle this on the road, and what’s your favorite dish on the road, (or restaurant, and what do you order there)?

JM: I usually it’s whatever’s in the dressing room, and whatever’s leftover, I pack up and take with me.

AH: If you could pause your life for a few weeks and spend some time living in a place you only have passed through, which would you choose, and why?

JM: That’s a tuff one. I find all places have their charms and their pitfalls. I think Nevada City, California is pretty cool. Or any place on the river where there’s good fishing

AH: What quote or piece of advice have you gotten from someone on the road that has really stuck with you?

JM: “Never be insulted by money” – Jim Dickinson

Find lots of Jimbo Mathus’ music, here: https://jimbomathus.bandcamp.com

See other Key to the Highway interviews here: https://americanahighways.org/category/interviews/key-to-the-highway-series/ (click here for: Bruce Cockburn Charlie Musselwhite Jim White Danny Barnes Patterson Hood Jerry Joseph BJ Barham Rodney Crowell Todd Snider Elizabeth Cook Tommy Womack Eric Ambel, Dan Baird, Robbie Fulks, Malcolm Holcombe Jon Langford Steve Poltz, Lilly Hiatt Sarah Shook & the Disarmers )