Mention Smokey Hormel’s name to music aficionados and more often than not their eyes will open real wide with glee. Hormel is just one of those musicians that, while not a household name, evokes a near-rabid amount of discourse among music fans on blogs and message boards. Having played in several bands that lit the underground abuzz and having done session work with some of the biggest names in the music business, Hormel holds an esteemed place in music’s last 25 – 30 years.
Having studied with Jimmy Wyble, Bob Wills’ guitarist, Hormel has played with The Blasters, the Blue Shadows (later renamed the Red Devils), Beck, Johnny Cash, The Dixie Chicks, Norah Jones, X’s John Doe, Tom Waits, Smokey & Miho (Cibo Matto’s Miho Hatori), Forro In the Dark, Justin Timberlake, Rufus Wainwright, kd Lang, RL Burnside and Neil Diamond. He has also played on and composed works for Nickelodeon’s The Backyardigans, a children’s show featuring five animal children that use their imaginations to create adventures.
When I caught up with Hormel last August he was preparing for the release of Smokey’s Secret Family, an album devoted to his love of Congolese dance music. That album placed at #3 of Rock ‘n Roll Ghost’s Top Albums of 2009 and is a must-buy. At the time of our conversation, Hormel was pretty certain that a tour would follow the album’s release and he was sure that Chicago would be a stop on that tour. However, those plans never materialized and Hormel went out on TV and promotional appearances with Norah Jones, having played on her recent album, The Fall, instead.
His newest project, Smokey’s Round-Up, a Western swing band, plays regularly in New York City, has a gig at Sunny’s in Redhook February 3rd if you’re in the area and want to hear some great music. He also plans on working with Black Flag’s Dez Cadena on a project – no word on when that will materialize or what style of music they will be performing, however.
For now, pick up Smokey’s Secret Family to get a taste of what this guitar virtuoso and great composer can do. This music really gets you up and moving and is sure to perk your day up. For those stuck in a winter rut it will help make things a little warmer and sunnier, I’m certain of it. I’m going to crank it up now, as a matter of fact.
Rock ‘n Roll Ghost: How did Smokey’s Secret Family come about?
Smokey Hormel: I’ve been a fan of this music for a long time. When I moved to New York in 2000 I started hanging out at this club called Tonic. And it was there that I met a lot of different musicians and I started a group called Smokey & Miho, a Brazilian, sort of Bossa Nova group with Miho Hatori, who was in Cibo Matto. So through that group I met a lot of great Brazilian musicians and percussionists. In the back of my mind I always wanted to play a lot of this Congolese music, but it wasn’t really until then that I realized that, okay, now I know where and who to do it with. So when Smokey & Miho broke up, which was around 2003 or 2004, I decided to go for it. I called some of these Brazilian guys and I had also met this really great tuba player, a guy named Clark Gayton, who now plays in Levon Helm’s band. All those guys were really open and dug the music. So we started doing shows there. But it took us awhile, a couple of years, before I decided to take the band in the studio.
After playing a few gigs at Tonic, then I got us a gig at another small club. There was no built-in audience. It’s instrumental music, so right there it doesn’t have a lot of appeal. And also, this music is really dance music. So, if it’s not the right venue it really needs to be at a place that people can dance and will dance. I’d be happy to see a concert of this music, but it’s really more for dancers.
I have to pick the right venues, really. It’s really just music for good times. There’s not a lot of intellectualizing going on. That’s what drew me to the music. When I first discovered Congolese rumba, I had been touring with a band called The Blasters in the early ’90s. I’d been listening to Link Wray and Chuck Berry and really muscular guitar playing. To cleanse my palette I’d listen to this African music. It was just really relaxed and very pretty. I could just breathe and relax and didn’t have to force anything.
Was there something making you tense?
I felt like in LA, because of my work with Beck and (Tom) Waits and other people, I felt, very much so, a lot of pressure. Like people were going to be judging me. In New York I wasn’t as well known, so it was easier to try new things.
Is there any chance of this going out on tour?
That’s the problem. Right now we’re faced with all of these cabaret laws which are left over from the World War II-era, where a lot of clubs can’t afford…if you serve liquor and you have live music, if you want to have dance it’s a whole other level of fees that you have to pay. And a lot of these clubs can’t afford to have the cabaret license that allows you to have dancing. They’ve really…I don’t know if it was done on purpose, but they’ve really wrecked the whole concept of dance and music and liquor in one place. There are some places where they let you get away with it, but that’s kind of a rare thing these days. I’ve been reading a little bit of history about this music and in the ‘50s in Africa a lot of people couldn’t afford record players or radios, so the only place they could hear this music was in these clubs.
But that’s true in a lot of different kinds of music. I play in a western swing band (Smokey’s Round Up), that’s the big problem there, too. Dance is being removed from the equation because of economics.
I’ve really been digging this record. It really captures a time and place in history. In my head it has this very hip, very swank vibe.
It conjures up all these images to an earlier, simpler time. It’s funny, because in Africa that music was the popular music…in the ’50s it was heavily influenced by Cuban music. And as soon as western rock ‘n roll and soul hit, it totally changed. So by the late ’60s that music was forgotten. They were listening to James Brown. Everything got a lot more pumped up.
Do you expect putting a band together to be difficult?
No, no. I’ve got these two really great Brazilian percussionists. There’s so many great percussionists around here. There’s a lot to choose from. It’s just finding the ones that aren’t touring. The clarinet player who played on the record, Doug Wieselman, he and I worked together a lot on other projects. For tuba, there’s another who’s really great who may do the tour. Or I might end up using a bass player, because half the record is bass and the other half is tuba. They were kinda interchangeable. And with the tuba what I did was I ran it through a bass amp to make it sound more like a bass. On some of these Congolese records you can’t tell what the hell they’re playing in the low end it just sounds really funky and beautiful.
So you basically figured out a way to replicate it the way you heard it?
Yeah. Just to give it that…it’s just kind of this nasty, funky thing. The thing about this music that’s cool, because there’s no kick drum, the bass has a lot more room and it’s a different kind of groove. When you’re playing bass with a regular drum kit it’s totally different when you’re playing hand drums. I was the bass player in Forro In the Dark for the first few records, It was great because I had to figure out how it works with the drums. It’s a very specific role and if you don’t do it right you’ll tell right away because the people won’t be able to dance. But if the pocket is there it’s pretty amazing. You can pretty much get everybody dancing. It’s like if you hear a good funk band, like early James Brown or some of the Bill Withers records where the pocket is so undeniable. In this music there’s a similar thing.
That was the beauty of playing in Beck’s band. Joey Waronker and I had a really good connection and it was always a great experience to play with him because he knew how to play in an ensemble unlike any other drummer I know.
With regards to making the album was there any difficulty in getting the band together and laying it down? Did you record over a long period of time or did you go in and bang it out?
After playing a bunch of gigs we just went in and did what we did live in front of microphones. It really was simple and quick. The hard part was then it sat on the hard drive for awhile before I was able to get back to it and mix it. I did a couple of guitar overdubs. The hard part was it took a long time in between the actual recording with the band and when I was able to finish. Because in between I got some work with Rick Rubin and I was in LA, so it just took awhile to get back to it.
Did you get nervous or frustrated in that time while you waited to get back to finishing it or were you able to relax?
At this point I’m learning to relax, but it’s always frustrating when you know you have this great thing just sitting there. It’s like ‘oh my God, what happens if something screws up and it’s lost?’ But you gotta make money so you’re working on some other project, but in the back of your mind you’re thinking ‘I wish I could finish that ‘cause I know it’s really good.’ Then you’re trying to describe it to people or you have one song finished that you listen to over and over again, thinking, ‘Am I crazy? Is the rest of the stuff as good?’ It was really satisfying to finally finish it. It was my wife who convinced me to put it out. I was just wanting to finish it.
You obviously have a pretty good connection with Rick Rubin. Do you tend to work with him a lot or does he recommend you for a lot of gigs?
He and I go back quite a ways now. When I was in LA I played in this band the Blue Shadows that became the Red Devils, a blues band that he signed to Def American. But then I left the band right around the time they went to make the record. This was also when Rick signed Johnny Cash with his label. He, just to see what would happen, put Johnny together with all of his different bands. Johnny did some recording with the Chili Peppers, he did some recording with the Heartbreakers and we spent a day in the studio with Johnny. I think that’s when Rick and I first…he got to see what I can do and he ended up putting out a couple of those tracks on the Unearthed box. He thought of me, every couple of years I’d get a call, ‘I’d like to bring you in on this Johnny Cash stuff.’ Because of Mr. Cash’s health, not all of it worked out. It was only the last few times that we got a lot done. It was 2 or 3 of the last records that I’m pretty all over. We had a connection and we had similar tastes and a concept of how to work for Mr. Cash because he had this problem of his health being so poor. If the guitar sounds too good it makes Johnny not as good. I understood what the role was there. Rick used me a lot because I knew what to do and he didn’t have to explain a lot to me. Plus, having played with The Blasters I really had studied Johnny’s early records so I knew what a Johnny Cash record shouldn’t sound like. So after that he started using me on other stuff like The Dixie Chicks, Justin Timberlake we did a couple of tracks with him and the Neil Diamond things came out of that. I’ve had a real good run with him. He can hire anyone he wants. In that world I’m more a support guy. The other thing with Rick, he was a big fan of that Beck band I played in – he came to a lot of shows. He’s seen a lot of different things I’ve done over the years.
I’m sure that’s the exact reason Rick likes you for so many projects. That you know how to fit in and not overplay.
One of my favorite guitar players is Nels Cline. Being from LA I’ve seen him play in a lot of different groups and I recently saw him play with Wilco. He’s the perfect example of that. He totally didn’t overplay at all. And I’ve seen Nels just play some insane shit. But there were moments where he really turned up the heat and knew when to shine, but the rest of the time he totally knew exactly where to fit and how to support and when to turn it on. I don’t put myself in his league. Some of the stuff he does I just sit there with my mouth dropped open. That’s a sign of maturity we all strive for.
