"It’s all about the soul, but having the technique in your pocket if you need it can really help the soul to say what needs saying."

Pistol Pete Wearn: Roots Stormer

On his new album, Blues, Ballads & Barnstormers (2023), Pistol Pete Wearn sets a table that stretches from the delta to Appalachian and the Smoky Mountains. Over the course of 13 songs, he tells stories that speak from personal experience but also echo the linear lyrical progression from Woody Guthrie to Johnny Cash to Bob Dylan. His acoustic finger playing style is rooted in pre-war blues but it's the flourishes outside those roots that bring new dimensions into play. Longtime collaborator Olly Parry, on fiddle, adds an array of spices to this musical gumbo that take it from cajun country to the hollers of West Virginia to the front door of the Ryman Auditorium, yet it all retains that familiar core blues feeling. "There's a load of music I enjoy that spans the roots of americana," Wearn notes. "It's all in there. And Olly brings this spark that helps open everything up for some exciting improvisations."       (Photo: Pistol Pete Wearn & Olly Parry)

Subtle bass work from Duncan Wilcox and pedal steel playing courtesy Nashville session heavyweight Phil Bronchtein bring technicolor depth and elevate the album beyond traditional all-acoustic expectations. It's been seven years since his last solo studio outing, but Wearn has not been idle. Blues, Ballads & Barnstormers not only weaves its own mythology, it also affirms his weight as songwriter and performer. It's not not just a return to form (he never really left!) but a significant move forward, for himself and his approach to the wide world of blues.

Interview by Michael Limnios            (Archive: Pistol Pete Wearn, 2016 interview)

How do you think that you have grown as an artist since you first started making music? What has remained the same about your music-making process?

I think I’m singing better than I ever have, and writing much better songs than I used to. I pull in ideas from a far wider range of influences than I once did. I used to focus so narrowly on hill country blues, and now I listen to pre-war string bands, and contemporary Americana, and zydeco, and gospel, and steal ideas from all of them - although two beers, and an R.L. Burnside record is still very much my happy place.

As for what’s the same – well it’s still often just me and a guitar and a stompbox on stage, although I my fiddle player Olly Parry comes to a lot of gigs with me these days. My writing process has never really changed – I always work in pencil in a notebook, because it’s easier to get started when you know you can rub it out and change it if it’s no good, and I usually come up with a first verse or a chorus when inspiration strikes and then come back to try and make it into a song when time allows, or just before I want to go into the studio.

Do you have any interesting stories about the making of the new album Blues, Ballads & Barnstormers?

I’d recently listened to a podcast about foley artists who produce sound effects for films, so we had a lot of fun making the train sounds you can hear on “The Clansman”. I made the producer, Matt, record the sound of a marble swirling in a plastic bucket, and the rattling of a drumstick in an empty baked bean tin. A friend of mine who works as a one-man-band had told me to take a look at the Acme whistles website, so I bought whistles from there to do the train horn sound and the trapeze “wheeeee” you can hear on “Not My Circus”.

The studio we recorded at – Inspire Music, outside of Stone in Staffordshire – is in a very rural setting and has lots of cats and dogs, and four alpacas that live there. When we recorded Pistol Pete Wearn & The Wildwood Flowers there in 2019 we got to feed the alpacas during a break – which isn’t something offered at every studio.

"I love the way blues & roots music focuses on the everyday stories of ordinary people & I hope that has filtered into my worldview in a way that means I remember that everyone is a human being with their own story, and not just a traffic warden, or a beggar, or a delivery man." (Photo: Pistol Pete Wearn)

What moment changed your music life the most? What´s been the highlights in your life and career so far?

Probably pulling a mouth organ and a book called “How To Play: The Pocket Harmonica” out of my Christmas stocking when I was around 15. I’d had piano lessons on and off for years, but never really got on with it that well, but the harmonica just clicked with me for some reason and set me on the path that led me to where I am now.

My career has taken me to some awesome places, playing in Belgium and Germany and Ireland, and meeting some musicians I really admire, like Stefan Grossman and The Stray Birds, but mostly I’m grateful that every day I spend playing music is a day I don’t have to get up at 5 am and open a coffee shop, which I did for ten years. As for the highlights of my life, I have to say my wedding and the birth of my son, don’t I?

How has the Blues and Roots music influenced your views of the world and the journeys you’ve taken?

I love the way blues & roots music focuses on the everyday stories of ordinary people & I hope that has filtered into my worldview in a way that means I remember that everyone is a human being with their own story, and not just a traffic warden, or a beggar, or a delivery man.

What are some of the most important lessons you have learned from your experience in the music paths?

At the end of the day, it’s all just music. 

I used to be very snobby about music I didn’t think was “authentic”, but there are only twelve notes and only so many ways to arrange them, and you can take a slick electro-pop hit and play it on an acoustic guitar, and it suddenly sounds like folk music. So, was it a good song all along, hiding underneath production I don’t like?  Too many music fans confuse “not to my taste” with “without value” and I don’t want to be one of those. If I get angry when people tell me all blues sounds the same, then I’d be a hypocrite to say that about death metal or dubstep, just because I haven’t invested the listening time to understand the language of the genre.

Also, you can get into almost anywhere by carrying a piece of equipment and striding purposefully like you know where you are going.                   (Photo: Pistol Pete Wearn)

"I think most young people are quite open-minded and like good music regardless of its genre. New media like TikTok and YouTube gives them the chance to discover a much more diverse range of music than I was exposed to when I was young, so yes, I really do think some of them are out there right now discovering blues and they will be the ones coming to shows and making festivals happen in ten years’ time."

What's the balance in music between technique and soul? Why is it important to we preserve and spread the blues?

It’s all about the soul, but having the technique in your pocket if you need it can really help the soul to say what needs saying.

I play music I would want to listen to, and hope it finds an audience, but I generally find ideas of “preservation” to be troublesome. Living traditions evolve and absorb new ideas without the need for any self-appointed gatekeepers, and historically those who have sought to “preserve” blues have not been the people whose fathers and grandfathers originated the music.

Do you think there is an audience for blues/roots music in its current state? or at least a potential for young people to become future audiences and fans?

I think most young people are quite open-minded and like good music regardless of its genre. New media like TikTok and YouTube gives them the chance to discover a much more diverse range of music than I was exposed to when I was young, so yes, I really do think some of them are out there right now discovering blues and they will be the ones coming to shows and making festivals happen in ten years’ time.

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(Photo: Pistol Pete Wearn)