“Music can be such a powerful and healing thing” – Jarrod Dickenson

American singer-songwriter Jarrod Dickenson is coming back to the UK this spring. The mature, soulful artist will be supporting Grant-Lee Phillips at The Deaf Institute, in Manchester on April 20 and Don McLean at The Bridge Water Hall on May 7.

Jarrod kindly spoke to me ahead of his shows and talked about working with these two great artists, his album “Ready the Horses” and the power of music.

 

You’re coming to Manchester on two separate occasions, you’re supporting Grant-Lee Phillips and Don McLean, what does it feel like supporting these two great artists, cause they’ve had long careers so far and I bet you can learn so much from them?

Yeah, absolutely, with Don McLean, I actually opened for him in 2015 as well, in Ireland and in Europe and it was an incredible experience just to be able to watch a songwriter and artist of his calibre, this guy’s contributed so much just to the craft of songwriting and to popular music that it’s definitely a thrill to be able to watch him every night and try to soak up as much knowledge as I can and with Grant-Lee Phillips it’s very much the same, I’ve been a fan of his now for about 10 or 12 years and followed his career and to finally be able to share a stage with him is gonna be something very special.

 

You came out with a new album last year, “Ready the horses”, can you tell us more about it, like what was the creative process behind it?

Sure, yeah, so that album, I kind of call it “the little record” because we had virtually no money to make an album but I was just coming off of a month long tour in the UK supporting Waterboys and I had a big band with me just made up of my friends and after the tour finished, the very next day, we went down to Eastbourne, on the south-east coast of England, where a friend of ours had a studio and he was willing to let us come in and record for far less than he probably should have and he just got us an old Atari tape machine so we all just set up and played the songs live, straight to 2” tape, just like we were playing a gig and it was such a great way to make an album. There is such an energy in the studio and an excitement and I think that was definitely captured on the tape. It took us a while to actually get the record out. We were kind of chomping it around to various labels and at one point had made arrangements to self-release and then some guys from Decca came out to a gig that I was playing in London and that kind of set the wheels in motion and September of last year the album finally came out on Decca records.

 

What I like about your songs and your music is that with every song there’s a story behind it. Do you think that storytelling in music is important nowadays?

I think it’s possibly the most important part of it, I know for me, that’s what’s always drawn me into music and to songs, it’s the story that’s being told and I think now, possibly more than ever, in the world with all that’s going on, music can be such a powerful and healing thing and something that can bring people together, where it seems like around every corner all we’re finding are ways to tear us apart, so I think music in general is incredibly important at the moment and I think the story that you tell within a song is possibly even more important than that. Just from a personal standpoint, storytelling is certainly something that kind of embroiled me, whether it’s in literature or music,  a good story draws you in and sticks with you long after the 3 and a half minute song is over.

 

You said music is a powerful thing and it can heal people, some people can listen to your songs and for just like 3 or 4 minutes they forget about their problems and and they look up to you. Do you feel some kind of pressure because of that?

I wouldn’t say a pressure, it’s certainly humbling, when people come up after a gig or wherever and say that your song have done something to them, it’s certainly a humbling moment. For me anyway, when I’m actually writing the songs I’m not necessarily thinking about an audience, I’m just thinking about the story, I’m thinking about what I’m trying to say and so when you actually get it out on a stage and it does impact someone it’s just humbling, it really is, it’s humbling to know that something that you created has touched someone else, so I wouldn’t call it a pressure necessarily but it’s certainly something that keeps you going, it’s food for the soul to know that other people are connecting with what you’re trying to say.

 

So when did this passion for music and storytelling start?

It started pretty early for me as far as just a passion for music goes, there was always music in the house, my dad was and still is a huge music fan and so growing up I was always sorting through his record collection and listening to everything that he had, The Beatles, The Stones, Simon and the Garfunkel, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, all of these kind of records and so from a really early age music played a big part of my life, but it wasn’t until I turned 18 that I actually picked up a guitar and started making music of my own. It never really seemed like something that I could do, music was this thing that I loved and that other people did and that I loved kind of experiencing but it never even dawned on me that I could do it myself (laughs) and even when I started playing guitar there were no career aspirations at that point I just thought “oh this will be fun, I’ll see if I can learn how to play this thing and maybe learn how to play some of my favourite songs” but what I didn’t expect was how quickly it would kind of take over everything (laughs). I really quickly just couldn’t think of anything else and was always playing and always trying to write and it was certainly a big change in my life when that came about.

 

You wrote a lot of songs. What is your favourite song that you’ve written so far?

Oh wow (laughs). That’s tough, that’s like choosing your favourite child. I’d say if I had to pick one, a favourite, I like them all for different reasons but the one that probably means the most to me is a song from my last album, “The lonesome traveler”,  it’s the very final track on the album, called “Seasons change” and it’s one that I wrote about my grandfather. It’s been about 10 years since I wrote this song but when I wrote it his health was not the best and it didn’t look like he was gonna make it too much longer and so that song was sort of about just looking back at people you love and life in general and how it changes and doesn’t always go the way you expect it to but in the end, I think anyway, it’s all gonna turn out alright, so that one was always a very emotional one for me, and thankfully my grandfather 10 years later is actually still here and about to turn 97 which none of us thought was possible at the time but that’s still a very powerful one for me personally.

 

You said you had music in your house your whole life. If you had to think about it now, what would be your dream collaboration?

Wow. It depends how realistic we’re trying to be here. If it could be anyone, I’d say let’s get myself, Paul McCartney and Tom Waits in a room and see what happens, but I’m not sure I’m ever gonna get that chance (laughs) but yeah, we’ll go with that, I’ll shoot for the stars.

 

Do you have any advice for any aspiring musicians that want to get into the industry?

I suppose my advice would be two fold. First of all, I think where a lot of musicians sort of go wrong, maybe that’s too strong the language, but what I’ve often seen with musicians is some of them maybe don’t take it as seriously as if it were a 9-to-5 job and if it’s something that you’re wanting to do as a career I think that you need to actually treat it as a career. I think you need to go to work every day, whether that’s going in your room and trying to write a song or practicing your instrument or trying to book gigs, I think you need to treat it with the same sort of reverence that you would a job that you could get fired from if you weren’t doing your job. I would say that kind of approach is definitely necessary. And the other side is just to develop very thick skin and have tenacity because rejection is something you’re absolutely gonna face if you’re going to go down this path whether it’s a bad review or even on a more basic level just not getting replies to your emails whenever you’re trying to book a gig or people saying ‘no, what you do is not something we’re interested in’, you kind of have to be prepared for that and just know that for every 1000thing that you’re trying to do one of them is actually going to happen and the others you just have to put behind you and keep climbing forward. I do think in this industry especially, just kind of staying in the game and making sure you’re always pushing forward is always the key.

Ready The Horses album stream: https://soundcloud.com/jarrod-dickenson/sets/ready-the-horses

Social Media: https://twitter.com/jarroddickenson

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Tickets: https://www.jarroddickenson.com/tour