Q&A with Dave Alvin
How was the show last night?
I think it was okay, you know? I can be a stern judge, so?no one got hurt, so there's a plus right there.
Had it been a long time since you'd been in Downey?
Yes and no. My dad lived there until his death a couple years ago?but that was kind of 'get off freeway, go directly to the house, go back.' It's just like everybody else and their hometown. You're amazed by what's gone and what's still there. In Downey, when I was a kid, it was a semi-rural place. And then it wasn't one day. In your mind, especially if you're a writer, what you see in like the first 10 years of your life, basically is what you write about. No matter where you go, you write it through that perspective. It was kind of nice to go back?in some ways it felt like I was home and in other ways it felt like I was in a dream.
Have you stayed around L.A.?
Oh, yeah. You can't beat L.A. L.A.'s a shithole in some ways, but it's our shithole.
Let's talk about the Blasters.
The basic history is we all grew up together, all five guys. We all taught each other how to play, or actually I should rephrase that?they taught me how to play.
You're the baby among them, right?
Yeah. Used to be, from your base in Downey you could access just about any type of traditional American music. A lot of that had to do with the Dust Bowl diaspora, a lot of it had to do with the black Southern diaspora, and migration and all that. R&B, blues, Norteña music, honkytonk music?we'd go see it all.
So how old are you at this point? Are you guys in high school?
When we started sneaking into blues bars, I was like 12, 13 years old. We were mentored by some of the local blues and r&b guys, the older guys like Big Joe Turner, Lee Allen [who was later a member of the band], T-Bone Walker.
This was after the blues label Downey Records though, right?
This was after Downey Records. Very hip of you to know about Downey Records. For whatever reason, like, I had to explain to somebody from the East Coast that where I grew up, we never heard the Velvet Underground. I didn't hear the Velvet Underground, to be really honest, until sometime in the 80s. I was like, "Oh, wow! Listen to that, would ya?" The music out there was what it was? [The Blasters'] goal was to play the kind of music we wanted to play, and we wanted to not work our day jobs, and that was really it. And sort of the conceptual idea was to play what we'd been mentored in playing, like blues and r&b and that stuff, and give it the same kind of energy and punch that the punk rock bands had.
You guys were together for about six years.
Yeah. Here's a quick chronology. There was a punk rock magazine called Slash. Slash decided to start a record label?the first act they signed was the Germs. Then the Germs talked Slash into signing X, X talked Slash into signing the Blasters, the Blasters talked Slash into signing Los Lobos. We helped Dwight Yoakam get his record deal with Warner Bros. and all that. Lobos had a couple of hits and Dwight had a string. We never had that, but we did fine.
And then you broke up.
Well, the band never really broke up. Gene, the keyboard player, and I left after a particularly disgusting gig in Montreal. I flew down to New York the next morning to do a Knitters show at Irving Plaza, and John and Exene had just fired Billy Zoom and they said, "Do you want to join X?" and I was like, "Yep." And that was it.
That's a pretty good gig. How are things different when the band you're quitting is your brother's?
Oh, it was weird. My dad was like, "I don't know why you two can't get along." But you know, we never started out to be a songwriter band. It was like, "Hey, let's start a band and play blues and rockabilly cover songs, see if we can get any gigs." And as things developed, it became known as a songwriter's band to some people and to other people we were a band that did great covers. They're both valid, but I became more interested in the songwriting side. There was more and more distance between my brother [Phil] and I over issues like that. I think that if we would have stayed together, things would have been fine, career-wise. It's a great band, and it's capable of doing a lot of things, but it had just stopped being fun.
Your solo stuff is definitely infused with the same kind of bluesy elements?
To me there's absolutely no difference. It's the same music, and it's all pulling from the same references. The biggest difference between what I do as a solo guy and the Blasters' stuff is that, as a songwriter, I can use all the colors in the palette of American music. I don't have to limit myself to certain choices.
Is the original band back together now?
Gene, Bill and I aren't part of the band anymore. My brother has a band called the Blasters out here in L.A. with other guys. The bass player is the only original member that still does it. We got back together earlier this year for a quick tour of the West Coast because Rhino put out the complete Slash/Warner recordings of the Blasters [Testament], and I thought if we're ever going to get together and play, this is the time to do it. The records have been out of print for so many years and I wanted to remind people about how great the band was, because we really were good. We did five gigs on the West Coast [and] recorded this live thing. A couple weeks after the gig, I listened to the tapes and thought, 'Wow, this is the best thing we've ever done.' In the old days, we didn't really know how to make records that well? We'd overthink everything. [Trouble Bound] is the best record the Blasters ever made. There was no thinking going on?it was just a pure rock 'n' roll record.
It's a great album.
I think so. If we did a record like that back then, who knows?
Dave Alvin plays with the original Blasters Mon., Nov. 18, at B.B. King Blues Club, 237 W. 42nd St. (betw. 7th & 8th Aves.), 997-4144.