You can’t say Jamie Perry, aka Bocephus lacks a sense of humour or ambition.
“You were one of the few people who were there last time,” he laughed to begin the interview.
The free-spirited, Vancouver based Perry, will be returning to Lethbridge to play the Slice on Saturday, Jan. 19.
He is in the middle of another tour with a relatively newer band which includes Charlie Hase on pedal steel guitar, Paul Townsend on drums, Wynston Minckler on bass and vocalist/ percussionist Skye Wallace.
He is also working on a new double album “Love Songs to Nina Simone,” which he expects will be out in April.
It will be the follow-up his has critically acclaimed 2011 CD “Willie Dixon God Damn!”
“ We began it around the same time we were finishing “Willie Dixon God Damn! and I enjoyed working with Chon (the producer) so I wanted to keep doing stuff with him, but I didn’t have any new songs written,” he said adding he went back to the Nina Simone records he was listening to and decided to rework songs she either covered, sang or wrote plus several instrumentals.
“ So whenever we had time over the past two years, we went in and recorded with whoever we could get,” he said adding he has also been jamming with several Persian musicians at their regular Friday night jam session whenever they are in Vancouver. They are on the new CD as well.
Their tour has gone well so far and they are excited about coming to Lethbridge.
“It will be a variety of music, some from ”Willie Dixon God Damn!”, some from the Nina Simone CD,” he said.
“ It will be a great night of psychedelic orchestral music,” he described adding because his song “St. Hallelujah” from his 2004 CD “All Children Believe in Heaven,” is pretty popular in Lethbridge, they are learning it for this tour. His is sharing lead vocal duties with Skye Wallace and the band members are multi-instrumentalists.
“ Come to the show, you soul depends on it,” he laughed.
Bocephus King is expected to begin their set at 9 p.m., Jan. 19.
