MUSIC NEWS
James McMurtry: Songs take years to develop
07/13/2010

from California Chronicle on californiachronicle.com

In James McMurtry's musical world, songs come from hurricanes, Waffle Houses, coal trains, new guitars.

But they don't always come fast.

Take McMurtry's "Ruby and Carlos," a sad song about bad-luck love, encroaching age and Gulf War Syndrome. It didn't start with some sort of rage over the effects of chemicals on soldiers during our first war in Iraq. Instead, it sprang from a Waffle House out on the road somewhere, McMurtry said.

"You know, some Waffle Houses run like NASA," said McMurtry, who brings his band to Attitudes Bar and Cafe in Blacksburg on Thursday. "Some of 'em don't. And this one didn't.

"I came out of the Waffle House, and [soundman/guitarist] Tim [Holt] got in the van and says, 'I guess we must've crossed the Mason-Dumba*--line.'

"So I had to think ... what character would say that. So eventually, I came up with Ruby. It took a couple years to write that song."

What took so long?

"Just messing with a verse here and there, seeing what happens," he said. "Sometimes once you get the story in your head, it'll just flow, but you can't force songs -- or I can't, anyway."

It's in his blood

McMurtry, 48, has a famous father, author Larry McMurtry. The elder McMurtry's work includes the "Lonesome Dove" trilogy, "The Last Picture Show," "Terms of Endearment" and the script adaptation of "Brokeback Mountain."

The younger McMurtry launched his career after getting a demo tape to singer/songwriter John Mellencamp, who was working at the time with Larry McMurtry. Mellencamp wound up producing James McMurtry's 1989 debut disc, "Too Long in the Wasteland." But it was his mother, Jo McMurtry, who taught young James his first guitar chords.

"She got tired of listening to me beat on the thing, not knowing how to play it," James McMurtry said.

Jo McMurtry, a retired professor of English at the University of Richmond, lives in the Lexington area and came to see her son when he played Attitudes in October. She, too, is a published author, though her books are more scholarly and focused on Victorian life and fiction and understanding Shakespeare.

The younger McMurtry didn't want to write books, though. By the time he was 9, his step-father, Mike Evans, had introduced him to Kris Kristofferson's music and taken him to see Kristofferson perform at Richmond's Mosque (now the Landmark Theater).

He learned at least two things from those experiences: Music was something that people wrote; and musicians seemed to have a great time performing.

"And that's when I knew that that's what I wanted to do," he said.

No act of will

McMurtry has released 10 records since then, including some with a decidedly political bent. "We Can't Make It Here" (from "Childish Things") and "Cheney's Toy" became popular with war protesters.

"I didn't write those political songs as an act of will, really," he said. "They just kinda happened. I have a hard time picking a subject and just writing about it. I have to have a couple of lines that happen to fit into that topic."

Are more politically oriented lyrics coming to him these days? Not now, anyway, he said.

"It seems like the world and the country is just getting crazier, and I'm having a harder time gettin' my head around it," he said. "Everybody is just so polarized."

In fact, no new songs are taking shape. But given his creative arc, it's no surprise that it might take a while.

For example, a childhood car ride that included views of a snow-covered coal train inspired the opening lines -- many, many years later -- of McMurtry's 1995 number, "Rachel's Song."

"I just get a couple of lines and a melody and just keep messing with it," he said of his process. "If it's cool enough to keep me up at night, I finish the song."

(read full story on californiachronicle.com)





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