Jamie McLean Blends Art and Life For One Step Forward
The New York-based Jamie McLean Band have recently released new record, One Step Forward, bringing plenty of positive vibes and reflections on significant moments in life. The Americana and roots rock accented album was recorded at Grand Street Recording in Brooklyn, engineered and mixed by Ken Rich, and mastered by Whynot Jansveld. Meanwhile, The Jamie McLean band are engaged in an extensive tour introducing the new music, which gives McLean the chance to do one of his favorite things, interacting with fans.
The songs on One Step Forward don’t shy away from real human moments and realizations, for instance “Don’t Leave Us Now,” which was prompted by Jamie McLean losing a friend to suicide. However, many of the songs pick out and celebrate the aspects of life that make us happy without us really noticing at times, like “Summer of Who Knows When” and “Calendar Girl.” Something that was new this time around for the band, which features drummer Brian Griffin (The Black Crowes, Brandi Carlile), bassist Chris Anderson (Rachel Platten, Richard Marx), was the return of original JMB keyboardist, Jon Solo (Brett Dennen/Angus and Julia). Bringing keys into the mix adds that much more reflective space, at times, and rocking energy, at others, to the tracks. I talked with Jamie McLean about his book-reading practice, engaging with other people live, and the different ways in which songs arrived for One Step Forward.
Americana Highways: I understand that you recorded close to home in New York this time.
Jamie McLean: That was the first one sort of at home. We did one album in Nashville, we did one upstate in the Catskills. We decided this made it easier, and it was a great studio and Producer that we’ve known for a long time. We played New Year’s Eve at The Bitter End in New York, and on January 1st, we went in. Scheduling-wise, we said, “Everybody don’t drink too much champagne, since we’re going in the studio in the morning!”
AH: That’s amazing.
JMcL: We had it tracked and recorded the first week of January. For me, this is a pretty quick turnaround to have it released at this time. I’ve put records out years after I’ve recorded it before, and it’s nice to still feel attached to this music.
AH: I have to say that recording an album on the first of January means that you could get a free pass on New Year’s resolutions. You’ve already done the heavy lifting!
JMcL: [Laughs] I really don’t do the resolutions, although two years ago, I had a resolution that I wanted to read a book every month, and I’ve sort of carried that on to this year. I feel like that’s always my resolution.
AH: That’s a great one. It’s not that it’s so impossible, it’s just the consistency is hard, I think.
JMcL: Yes, it’s not hard to read a book in a month, and I was an English major. I love reading and writing. This just gives me an excuse. When I’m on tour, I hunt down local bookstores. I’ve just got a pile of books next to the bed. They are staring me in the face, and it’s great.
AH: I am someone who also has a lot of books that pile up. How do you work with whatever your current vibe is when you pick the next book to read? My problem is that I’ll pick one, then I’m not in the mood for that particular book. Choosing the book is actually quite important.
JMcL: It is. Well, I’m about to start Bram Stoker’s Dracula. So, it’s Halloween-ish. I did Frankenstein last year. That kind of keeps me in the spirit. It depends on what I’m doing. I have this crazy gig where I play on a sailboat in the Caribbean in February, so I read In the Heart of the Sea, which a little dark, and the year before, I did Treasure Island. Just depending on where we are in the year, I pick. I try to do at least one music autobiography a year. I just read Robbie Robertson’s autobiography, which is a little bit easier.
AH: Do you recommend that one?
JMcL: I do. I really think it’s great. There’s been a lot of good and bad press with Robbie and Levon, but this is really clear and drama-free, with a lot of detail in there. I bought that when we were playing in Woodstock, New York, which is where they were based, so I’ll buy books based on where I am, too.
AH: The whole seasonal thing is great.
JMcL: If I’m not feeling something, I’ll just plow through it, and get to the next one.
AH: I heard about the Caribbean sailing trip that you play. Can you tell me more about that?
JMcL: I got connected to this through a friend. He asked if I would ever want to play on The Star Clipper. It’s huge. It’s not like a jam cruise or festival; I’m the only artist. A bunch of fans and friends book cabins, and we just start and end in Barbados and sail all over the Caribbean and I play at sunset. It’s probably my favorite gig of the year. It gets me out of the Northeast in February. It’s cool to connect with fans and not be in a loud club.
AH: It sounds magical. This comes under the heading of, “We need to incorporate more live music into other aspects of our lives.” I do think there’s a feeling of people wanting human connection with live events in contrast to all the digital content.
JMcL: Yes. I feel like it gets harder and harder to make it happen. Music definitely feels more separate than it ever has been. But this sailboat is one amazing example of how it can be. I also do some house concert tours. A lot of people during Covid built stages in their backyards. Sometimes there’s a nice stage outside with lights and sound. Some venues will have a bonfire outside afterwards, and always like that connection. I always go out to do the merch after the show. The gig is the highlight, but almost equally, I like meeting everybody and hearing their favorite tunes and stories. But yes, it is getting harder.
AH: Have people commented on the new songs to you yet?
JMcL: People have really responded to all the singles, like “The Summer of Who Knows When.” That seems to make them think of childhood memories. The second single, “Don’t Leave Us Now” is something that I’ve definitely talked about pretty publicly as having to do with suicide. A lot of people have come out, either saying, “Thank you,” or sharing stories, so the response has been really nice. Anytime a song resonates and I hear about it, it’s kind of a highlight.
AH: With “Summer of Who Knows When,” something I like about it is right there in the title. It doesn’t try to pin down what year its referring to. There have been songs that do that, and they are very beloved, but leaving it open is more effective.
JMcL: It’s more universal. The stuff that I did in the summers in the 80s or 90s probably aren’t that dissimilar to what people were doing in the 50s and 60s. Hopefully they are fond memories. For me, they are some of my favorite memories, family-related, and have a lot of innocence. It wasn’t like my senior year summer, or anything.
AH: I also like how the song doesn’t capture these experiences and limit them to the past in a bitter-sweet, nostalgic kind of way. It kind of suggests that you can still have those experiences, or that it can be part of your current experiences.
JMcL: Yeah! At one point, there’s a lyric that says, “Let’s go back again.” There’s a section where is says, “They say you can never go home again.” But I try to think of it as a state of mind, rather than a particular year. I try to have that endless summer. I guess the sailboat is part of that. I try to be near the water as much as I can, and those memories are timeless.
AH: I feel like every summer can contribute to that cache of memories as long as you stay in the right state of mind.
JMcL: Yes, I’m glad you see it that way. I see it the same way. That’s how I envisioned it. All of these songs, I sort of hold very gently and leave open to interpretation.
AH: I was paying attention to the guitar on that song, and it made me wonder how you put things together. Was the guitar part first on this one?
JMcL: Usually the music comes first, and the lyrics follow, but that’s not always the case. For this one, I remember that it happened to be summer, but I hadn’t written any lyrics yet. I was walking around my front yard with an acoustic guitar, and I played that opening guitar riff. I then had that for quite a while, months. It could have been over a year. I had this cool riff, but I didn’t know anything more than that. It felt Springsteen and Tom Petty-ish. Then, I started digging into the lyrics much later. I’ve had songs that I’ve written music and lyrics entirely in five minutes, and just fall into my lap, but that’s very rare.
The song “New York Penny Lane” was one where I was almost writing a poem in head, and then I wrote the music. “Ghost of You,” which was on the last record, is the same thing. I actually dreamt the story and the images, and then woke up and said, “I think I hear the song.” Then I had to get the guitar out and figure out what it was. That was kind of magical. It’s always different. There’s no playbook for this. I wish there was. If you’re interested, there’s an amazing book called Songwriters on Songwriting, by Paul Zollo, which is pretty large. It’s basically interviews with a ton of artists, from Bob Dylan, to John Lennon, you name it. Basically, he just asks, “How do you write songs?” The overarching theme is that no one really seems to know how it works. Bob Dylan says, basically, “I got really lucky there in the 60s with a pretty good run.” It’s really hard to capture the lightning in a bottle.
AH: There are always those mysterious ones, too, that turn up almost fully formed. It’s unnerving, as you have said.
JMcL: The song “Feeling Good” on this record pretty much came to me in a morning, almost fully formed. The song “I Believe In Love” definitely needed some work, but came in a gentle way, which was nice.
AH: Do you feel like these songs represent one time in your life, or have a broader scope.
JMcL: I would say all of these were from the past five years or so. I think “Too Little Too Late” and “Summer of Who Knows When” were from a similar time, but they were spread out because Covid was in the middle. I had the guitar for “One Step Forward” and “Summer of Who Knows When” but those sat around for a while, and while they were sitting, some of the others sort of wrote themselves.
AH: It sounds like once you’re in a mindset of doing an album, the songs turn up more easily.
JMcL: Yes, and no. It’s kind of like cramming for a test when you know that you’re going to put a record out. I’ve definitely had songs that turned up in the 11th hour and I didn’t know if I was going to record them. But they turned out to be some of the better tunes. I think I’m sort of always writing, but right around now, when a record is being released, I think, “Okay, I’ve got a clean slate. I should probably start writing.” Over the next 12 months, I feel like I’ll probably have enough music for an album, but I have no idea what it’ll sound like.
AH: Does recording the songs together in a short period of time help to bring the sound together?
JMcL: We typically tour as a trio, with drums, bass, and guitar, but we were very aware that these songs would benefit from some keyboards. “One Step Forward” is six or seven minutes, and I hear it as almost a long meditation. There’s a lot of instrumental parts. As we started to go through the songs, more and more, we began to realize that all of the songs would benefit from keyboards, so that was conscious. I really like the way “New York Penny Lane” came out, which I wanted to sound kind of like The Band, and I really like the way that it came out. They are all definitely their own little stories, with different sounds, but it’s definitely the same four guys in the studio.
Thanks very much for speaking with us, Jamie McLean. Find more information here on his website: https://www.jamiemcleanband.com/
Enjoy our previous coverage here: REVIEW: Jamie McLean Band “One Step Forward”
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