Musicians in Victoria-based band Current Swell got some tough love and sound advice when they signed a Grammy-winner to produce their latest album.
Guitarist/vocalist Davers Lang said there wasn’t any time for second-guessing with Jacquire King, who produced When to Talk and When to Listen, the band’s fifth release which came out earlier this year.
The intensely focused King (who’s worked with Tom Waits, Kings of Leon and Norah Jones) told the B.C. folk-rockers “what we do here can change our lives forever. We can do some amazing things,” recalled Lang.
But first, King stressed that the musicians needed to stop doubting the choices they were making.
“He didn’t pull any punches,” recalled Lang, who plays with the rest of the band on Tuesday, Nov. 21, at Bo’s Bar and Grill in Red Deer.“He told us: ‘You guys have to be men about this! Pull yourselves up by your bootstraps! You have to commit to something — and just do it!’”
The band members all got on the same page and returned to the studio to show King they were ready for business.
Lang is proud of the “accessible” album they made, which is already meeting the band’s goal of getting more radio play in the U.S.
Some favourite tracks are Marsha, It Ain’t Right and the title tune, which is based on a poignant event in Lang’s life. He wrote When to Talk and When to Listen about imagined conversations between his late father-in-law and his new-born grandchild.
Lang’s wife was pregnant with their daughter when her father was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer. Sadly he didn’t survive to see his granddaughter’s born, leaving Lang to imagine the kind of advice he would have given her.
Woman in White, with its punchy chorus, has become a favourite with live audiences. Lang, a St. Albert native who moved to the coast because of his love of surfing, looks forward to touring in Alberta and playing for friends and family again.
Current Swell was formed in 2005 with fellow musicians Scott Stanton, Ghosty Boy, and Chris Petersen, who perform an eclectic blend of blues-rock, folk, surf, indie rock, reggae and ska.
When to Talk is the band’s most radio-pop influenced release — but Lang believes it still contains some of the same “surfer vibe” as Current Swell’s earliest work.
For more information about the show, please contact the venue.
lmichelin@reddeeradvocate.com
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