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Traditional music collector and interpreter Jake Xerxes Fussell joins us to talk about his gorgeous new album, When I’m Called, his first for Fat Possum.
When we first heard the welcome news of a fresh Jake Xerxes Fussell album, his follow-up to 2022’s Good and Green Again, it was quite startling to see that Fat Possum Records, a label based in Mississippi, was putting it out. Having released his last three albums on Paradise of Bachelors, it’s interesting to see a change of direction. “Well I actually made the album before it landed a label,” Jake begins. “I lived in Mississippi for about ten years and knew some of the guys at Fat Possum and when I reached out, they were very receptive. It’s nice to be there, it’s been a good experience so far.”
The album is beautifully restrained and carefully put together, with lush arrangements working well with a definite sense of space. “I didn’t have any overarching theme or idea going in,” Jake says. “But I liked how the last one turned out and I especially enjoyed the process of working with Jim Elkington and knew I wanted to work with him again. I also wanted to get really good basic tracks done. On some of my earlier records it had been a little bit slapdash; I had the songs but the recording process was its own thing. I think it helps to have a producer, because it allows me to really focus on the songs and Jim really helped with that.”
The focus is certainly there across the nine tracks, and Jake had sonic ideas going into the recording process. “Most of my ideas were around textures,” he explains. “I wanted to have certain horn sounds and on one song, I wanted this sound of saxophone and harmonica playing together and stuff like that. But it was generally picking up where the last record left off, although it was a different set of songs and I thought the mood of the songs would dictate some of the changes, you know?”
The mood is an interesting point, one that Jake elaborates on. “Well, I always set out to make a record and say it’s not going to be as sad or as wistful as the last one,” he grins. “I always think it’s going to be breezier and more upbeat and then I hear the playback and think, ‘oh, it’s sad again’.” He stops and laughs. “It’s funny because my friends have the opposite thing. I know this guy called Will Sheff and he has this band called Okkervil River and he was telling me he has this instinct to just rock and has to search for his softer self. I think I have the opposite problem, where I’m reaching to get a bit faster and have a bit more swing. But then I always think it would sound wrong for me, and, all that said, I’m happy with how this record turned out.”
Unusually for Jake, much of the music for When I’m Called was composed before the song was chosen, a different approach for him. “Yeah, I’ve been doing more of that in the last few years,” he nods. “Before, I would take an old song and mess with it and rearrange it in my way, draw an interesting element out or add an instrument, and that would make it different by the standards of traditional music. But increasingly in recent years I’ve been messing around with some instrumental motif that I draw a lyric into, which I hadn’t done so much in the past. But some of the songs on there are pretty faithful to their source material,” he adds. “Maybe not in terms of instrumentation, but certainly in terms of melody, chord progressions and tempo, things like that. Some of the other songs I took more liberties with.”
This is interesting when listening to When I’m Called, because, although there are no purely instrumental tracks, some songs, particularly the title track, have a minimal vocal part surrounded by a more substantial instrumental section. It brings to mind Washington, the final song from Good and Green Again. “That’s a good observation, because both songs were formed in that way,” Jake says. “I think maybe I’m increasingly drawn to that lyrical idea or small couplet that lets the music speak around it and see where it leads. It can be quite powerful sometimes and those two are similar in that way.”
As we mentioned above, there are lush arrangements in places on the record, but they balance with a real sense of space that allows the lyrics and melodies room to breathe. “I wanted this to be more spacious and we were reaching for that on the previous one too,” Jake affirms. “In the past I felt there was a little bit of clutter from bleed and not having a deliberate idea of arrangement. And it’s a real temptation to fill it with sound, but I find that although these kinds of recordings might not have as big an impact on the first go, through time they tend to stick with me. I think about earlier country recordings by people like Lefty Frizzell and Hank Williams to some degree; there’s an open simplicity to those recordings that I like and tend to go back to.”
When I’m Called feels like a record split between travel and childlike innocence, with songs like Going to Georgia and Gone to Hilo blending with Who Killed Poor Robin? and the title track, which Jake built from a schoolboy’s notes. The artwork too is quite childlike and wistful in that the horseman is travelling forwards while looking back. “I think you’ve got to the heart of the record there,” Jake smiles. “I say whenever I start a record I don’t have a theme in mind, but often as I’m recording I realise there is a theme and that’s happened on every record.”
“On this album, I realised that a few of the songs had ‘going’ or ‘gone’ in the title,” he continues. “And another more material theme is that I learned at least half of these songs from Art Rosenbaum, who was a mentor to me and passed away a little over a year ago. So I was thinking about him too and, although I didn’t set out to make an Art Rosenbaum memorial record, it sort of happened in a roundabout way. But also, I’ve been travelling so much in the last few years and missing home; and I’m a dad myself now and as much as a lot of these themes showed up on my previous records, they feel more amplified and pointed. So yes, moving forwards and looking backwards was important, as was travelling and travelling through life.”
When I’m Called is Out July 12th on Fat Possum.
Jake Xerxes Fussell Upcoming Tour Dates
Tue. July 16 – San Diego @ The Casbah *
Wed. July 17 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Barnsdall Gallery *
Thu. July 18 – San Luis Obispo, CA @ Brisol’s Cider House *
Fri. July 19 – Felton, CA @ Felton Music Hall *
Sat. July 20 -San Francisco, CA @ The Chapel *
Sun. July 21 – Sacramento, CA @ Harlow’s *
Tue. July 23 – Bend, OR @ Volcanic Pub *
Wed. July 24 -Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios *
Thu. July 25 – Seattle, WA @ Tractor Tavern *
Fri. July 26 – Bellingham, WA @ Wild Buffalo *
Sat. July 27 – Vancouver, BC @ Wise Hall *
Wed. Aug. 28 – Dublin, IE @ The Workman’s Club
Fri. Aug. 30 – London, UK @ Lafayette
Sat. Aug. 31 – Lewes, UK @ Con Club Lewes nr Brighton
Sun. Sept. 1 – Bristol, UK @ Lantern Hall
Mon. Sept. 2 – Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club
Tue. Sept. 3 – Glasgow, UK @ Mono
Wed. Sept. 4 – Manchester, UK @ The Deaf Institute
Fri. Sept. 6 – Paris, FR @ L’Archipel
Sat. Sept. 7 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique
Sun. Sept. 8 – Rotterdam, NL @ Kantine Walhalla
Thu. Sept. 26 – Lafayette, LA @ Acadiana Center for the Arts
~ with special guest Kath Bloom
* with special guest Robin Holcomb
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