 |
Be sure to pick up Don Rigsby's Hillbilly Heartache CD featuring Jim Kelly's "Daddy Was A Moonshine Man"
|
Jim Kelly was born around the end of WWII in one of the more remote regions of eastern Kentucky. He grew up around what he nostalgically refers to as "the pure salt of the earth". He spent many hours listening to old timers tell stories and repeat legends pertaining to that region.
He still conjures up visions of overall clad backwoods men (and backwoods women) whose physical features, mannerisms and even speech patterns he later learned paralleled closely those peculiarities of the inhabitants of the British Isles of the 16th century.
It was only natural to learn to play an instrument and sing at an early age - most everyone did. "No electricity, phones or paved roads, and very few cars insured plenty of privacy and idle time even when attending to farm chores," he reflects. The songs he grew up hearing and learning were either ballads brought to the hills from the old countries, or later creations from those images. "It seems only natural that I would gravitate toward similar veins of music".
Studying for degrees in geography and sociology, and subsequent graduate research illuminated his understanding of the isolation which had kept the older generation he knew as a child virtually unchanged for centuries. "I had grown up surrounded by a population made up of the purest Anglo-Saxons remaining on earth" he quips.
After leaving the area of his childhood to work for years in counseling, social work and college teaching, Jim gleaned a keen appreciation for "things that make people do what they do." I guess that's why I like to write…to paint verbal pictures of what people do and why," he has often stated.
While Jim has always had a huge appreciation for story songs, literature and poetry, he also likes the smooth - softer mode of acoustic country. For the most part he blends these themes into a genre which can be best categorized as simply "Jim Kelly Music"!
Enjoy!
1. Big Motel on the Mountain* --A night spent in a motel returning from a vacation several years ago inspired this one. (Thanks to Tom T. for recording it on his Faster Horses album. So I'm doing it in a little different vein.)
2. Love Is --I absolutely did not set out to include a sweet love song in this project. The song had been floating around in my head for a long time and when we put it down with Alecia's harmony I couldn't resist.
3. Hard Times in the Country --Imagined reflections from a simpler, i.e. harder time. I've never lived in West Virginia.
4. Daddy Can I have a Puppy? --As a child I enjoyed listening to some of the old timers sit by the fireplace and tell "haint tales". This was related as a true story with the dog being a benevolent ghost. I prefer to call it an angel as it appears in the song.
5. Where are You Goin' Kentucky Boy? --Once again back to the "you can't go home" scenario.
6. Where the Waters Run Slow --From a conversation with an elderly gentleman in western Virginia who had returned to the home of his youth only to discover as Thomas Wolfe had previously pointed out---that you can't.
7. Your Last Breath** --When Don Rigsby bounced the idea and original story over the phone I thought he was throwing me a "Jonah"; however I sat on it a month and then weaved it together. Thanks, Don.
8. The Ballad of Peddler Hill --From a story that I'd heard long ago and more recently rekindled by Pat Pelfrey. A distant relative (Brown) was convicted and subsequently hanged for killing a traveling peddler. As a child one of the stories I heard was that the peddler's ghost still haunted the hills and hollows nearby.
9. Color Me Blue --A familiar scenario to many, I'm sure.
10. Jim Crowe, the Banjo Man --I've seen Jim play at carnivals as well as on country store porches. He always sang "Jackie went a' Fishin".
11. Dance with the Devil --A friend was out one night cruising the parking lots of every motel in the area thinking his wife was cheating and that he might spot her car. Actually it was he that had been cheating and she was looking for him.
12. Just an Average Sort of Guy --The fellow in the song is thinking he's seen a lot and been around some but pauses to reflect that he's Just an Average Sort of Guy.
13. Painting Pictures --From reading old books and watching late sleepless night TV shows these "pictures stood out " so I painted them in this song.
* All selections published by Good Home Grown Music BMI except Big Motel on the Mountain published by Hallnote Music Sony/ATV Music Publishing Nashville BMI.
** All selections written by Jim Kelly except Your Last Breath, written by Jim Kelly and Don Rigsby.
This entire project was recorded at Tom T. and Dixie's Studio in Franklin, Tennessee and mastered at Hill Records in Richmond, Indiana. It's offered in conjunction with our Pine Park Records affiliate. Musicians and background vocalists include: Alecia Nugent, Andy Leftwich, Booie Beach, David Talbot, Duane Sparks, Kim Gardner, Larry Cordle, Mark Poe, Terry Eldridge, Tish Robinson and Troy Engle.
Favorite Links
Dixie & Tom T. Hall "Good Home Grown Music"