Eugene Weekly : Music : 07.06.06

Janiva Magness

The woman who almost gave up singing the blues.

BY JOHN GINN

Janiva Magness is a star on the rise. Recently named Contemporary Female Artist of the Year at the Blues Music Awards, and touring behind Do I Move You, a sizzling CD of some of her most riveting work yet, she is finally getting some of the recognition she so richly deserves.

Janiva Magness. 8:30 pm, Wed. 7/12. Mac's at the Vet's Club, $12 adv./$15 dos.

Speaking by phone from her home in Los Angeles, Magness laughed about the recent attention. "It's an overnight success, where the night is 31 years long," she said. "That's how long I've been at it, but yes, things are going pretty good right now."

Her voice, so powerful on record, was a little hoarse as we spoke, probably the result of a grueling weekend. "It's going to be a very busy summer," she said. "This past weekend we did two blues festivals, a club date, and I did a House of Blues Radio Hour."

Trying to commiserate, I suggested that all that passionate singing must have taken a lot out of her, but she instantly objected. "Music doesn't take from me," she said, wanting to make that point crystal clear. "The music is energizing, it gives to me. It's all the rest, the other stuff, that is tiring."

The other stuff she is referring to is the business, the stuff that's not singing. The stuff you have to go through in order to make music. Much earlier in her career, it got so bad she tried to give up singing and the business, just drop it like a bad relationship.

"It's a rough business," she said. "After awhile I didn't want to deal with it." She entered the workaday world, trying to quit cold turkey, seeing it as an all-or-nothing deal. To sing only a little would be like trying to quit cigarettes by only smoking on weekends. Her plan was a complete failure. After only a year, depressed and agitated, she was forced to admit defeat.

"What brought me back was that I was going stir crazy," she said. "What I found out was that singing, for me, was less of a choice than I thought. I'd tried to give it up and was miserable."

Her inability to quit is the blues fan's gain. At 50, she's learned to cope with the business well enough to survive. Do I Move You takes Janiva's versatile voice on musical side trips through Mississippi Delta and Chicago style blues, straight R&B and maybe a little country swing blues. The highlight is her heartbreaking rendition of "You Were Never Mine," as sad a tale of unrequited love as you're likely to find.

Her singing has been compared to blues greats such as Etta James and Bessie Smith, and blues novices should know that if you like Bonnie Raitt, you will also like Janiva Magness.       

The Socially Conscious

folk music of Tish Hinojosa

BY BRETT CAMPBELL

If you were crafting the ideal singer/songwriter, you'd want her to be a smart lyricist, a perceptive observer of character and social injustice, capable of writing memorable melodies. As a performer, she'd ideally have a warm personality that allowed her to connect with an audience, a first-rate band, a distinctive voice and vibrant singing style and — this is America, where image is everything, unfortunately — she'd even be easy on the eyes.

Tish Hinojosa

In the late 1980s, just such a musician landed in Austin, Texas. Tish Hinojosa really did have it all, with her silvery singing vaulting her to the pinnacle of musical success in Austin, where it's hard to toss a guitar pick and not hit an accomplished songwriter, few of whose vocal skills can match their song craftery. Her major label debut bubbled with unforgettable hooks and singable melodies, as well as clever, evocative, even danceable songs about family, love, and history. She became a success, winning awards, regularly touring the U.S. and Europe, playing at the White House, even gaining a beer company sponsorship and issuing a dozen albums (including one in Spanish and another for kids).

She recorded with Lucinda Williams and Joan Baez and had songs covered by Linda Ronstadt and others. Yet she never quite became the star her talents merited. That might be attributed to the narrow vision of country radio and record companies: While her sound was accessible, it wasn't NashVegas commercial, and it probably didn't help that she occasionally addressed social issues, albeit in a non-preachy, character-driven fashion more literary than didactic. "Something in the Rain," for example, set the story of a farmworker's child poisoned by pesticides to a tear-pulling melody.

And whether overt racism played a role or not, her surname might have misled formula-driven radio programmers to assume that she played conjunto or Mexican pop rather than tuneful country-tinged folk music.

Hinojosa's latest release finds her in a reflective, even wistful mood, tinged with nostalgia: for her San Antonio childhood ("I'd love to be the kitchen table / from long ago when I was 3 / to hold my father's morning coffee / to feel my mother's hand on me"), for a time when Americans seemed to be briefly motivated more by compassion than greed ("calloused in our easy chairs / remember when hope used to dance in the air ... whatever happened to everyone wanting to care?"). And, as in "Blue Eyed Billy," a character sketch of a WWII vet, she eschews hectoring in favor of telling stories about real people.

With her penchant for social activism (she's played at benefits and conventions for many progressive causes) and sparkling songwriting, Hinojosa is an ideal performer — at least for Eugene, if not corporate radio. Folk and real country fans should catch her and her longtime guitarist Marvin Dykhuis at Luna on July 21.

With the Bach Festival well underway, it's easy to overlook yet another Bach concert, but anyone who wants to know how Bach's music sounded at the time should catch the performance by Oregon's Ensemble Con Spirito at 3 pm on Thursday, July 6 at First Christian Church (11th and Oak). The affordable afternoon show, cleverly scheduled between the two nearby Bachfest performances, offers cantatas, arias and instrumental works including violin and flute sonatas. And, unlike all but one of the Festival concerts, they're all played on instruments from Bach's time or replicas and performed in the tunings and styles of his period, rather than the compromised, often-Romanticized and bland renditions frequently purveyed in less historically-informed concerts. Compare this show to the Festival concerts and decide for yourself.

On July 9, DIVA offers yet another nationally recognized improvised music duo. Chicago percussionist Michael Zerang and "anti-cellist" Fred Lonberg-Hom (members of Peter Brtozmann's big band) bring their long experience in multifarious experimental music and dance settings to Eugene's downtown arts center. With all the emphasis on old music around town this month, this is a show for tomorrow's sounds.      

Sweet Summer Melodies

Barefoot Natives bring the island vibe stateside.

BY MELISSA BEARNS

Billboard Magazine dubbed Hawai'i-based Hapa "the hottest Hawai'ian band," and PBS did a whole feature on them. Well, move over, Hapa, because the Barefoot Natives are coming to town. And for local lovers of island grooves, the addition of this amazing two-man band to the Hawai'ian roster illustrates the saying that you can't have too much of a good thing.

By himself, Uncle Willie K is a musical powerhouse whose guitar playing and vocals can, without too much danger of hyperbole, be compared to those of B.B. King, Van Morrison and Jimmy Buffet. That hits quite a wide range, doesn't it? But along with exceptional chops, the greats share the ability to evoke moods and emotion with their melodies and lyrics, something Barefoot Natives do exceptionally well.

When Willie K teams up with Eric Gilliom, who also plays guitars and sings, the two pull from R&B, reggae, jazz, classic surf music and their own Hawai'ian heritage to create layers of sweet harmony that transport the listener to an endless, white sandy beach where the waves of a clear blue ocean gently lap against the shore and a light breeze rustles the palm leaves. Their recently released self-titled CD is an antidote to road rage, a pick-me-up for those days when everything goes wrong and a ray of sunshine guaranteed to brighten even Eugene's dark winters.

Traditional songs like "Fa Mai Ra Oe" are mixed with covers of Kenny Loggins' "Watching the River Run," George Harrison's "Something," and my favorite, "Going Home" from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. "Home Away From Home," written by Willie K, leans toward rock with a little gospel thrown in and a lilting groove. Another favorite is "Mountain of Gold," which incorporates "The Star Spangled Banner," but does it in a way that mainlines the message of freedom, justice and equality and is a gentle reminder of the kind of nation we could be.

While the CD leans heavily toward the downtempo side of things, their live shows are a showcase for the explosive and dynamic chemistry between Willie K and Gilliom and are not to be missed. Even though this is the Barefoot Natives' first Eugene appearance, expect this to be a packed, sold-out show. Get your tickets early, and then kick back and have a fruity cocktail with an umbrella.

The Barefoot Natives play at Luna 8 pm Wednesday, July 12. $22 and worth every penny.

Bursting At The Seams

The Hatch: ready to rumble

BY VANESSA SALVIA

The Hatch's new album was released officially on June 13, but merely three weeks later, they're already touring the West Coast in support of it. The band's tour diary highlights some of the hard knocks this three-year-old foursome has already experienced. For instance, at a show in San Luis Obispo, the club owner neglected to tell the band they would need to provide their own mics, stands and cables, necessitating a return trip back where they started.

Presumably the audience was glad to hear the band fully amplified. The Hatch's brand of indie/pop/rock just wouldn't have sounded so sweet performed at no volume. The new album is Fit To Burst, and it's easily likeable, danceable rock. The four guys tightened up their sound to appreciative audiences at the University of Washington, where the college newspaper hailed them as the main "campus band." Now that three of them have graduated and are back home in LA, the focus is on the music.

The album's opening strains of "New York City Women" and "Put You Out" reveal that these guys can shake out rock like some people shake hands, rock that's fun, easy and just gritty enough to feel real. "Find Them" finds the band exploring a funky, smooth rhythm guaranteed to fill up the dance floor. On other tracks, the band explores its slow sentimental side. Too literate to truthfully be called ballads, the slow songs nonetheless reveal the heartache of breaking up and making out. Vocalist Sean Douglas croons with an earthy intensity that's just right for dancing, be it slow or otherwise. It's clear these guys all have songwriter's souls, and soulful souls, which they readily reveal in all these songs.

The Hatch. 10 pm, Fri. 7/7. Luckey's • $3-$5.