Canadian alt-country troubadour Fred Eaglesmith is going more rock and roll.
Eaglesmith, who is known more for old style country music with well known songs like “ 49 Tons,” “Time To Get A Gun,” “Freight Train” and other train related songs, brings his Traveling Steam Show to the Slice, July 17.
“There’s three acts. (Texas songwriter) Bill Poss Passalacqua plays a set then Tif Ginn (Poss’s wife) plays some rock and roll. Then it’s my show. She plays accordion now and she plays it in a really cool way. It’s one of the best bands I’ve ever had,” Eaglesmith enthused from the road on the way to a gig in Red Deer.
Eaglesmith’s music usually ends up being a reaction to everything else going on.
His last CD “6 Volts” was a return to his country -rock roots.
“The next one will be different again. But people really love the songs from ‘6 Volts.’
“The show is getting more rock and roll all the time. 1966 is the year this time. A lot was happening in 1966,” he said.
A new album is in the process of being mixed. He estimated it should be released by Christmas.
“I was very inspired by the year 1966. So much was going on then. I’m always writing, But I find as I get older, I’m starting to write simpler,” he said adding the new music is somewhere between Beatles style pop and Motown.
They have been slowly working some of the new songs into the set.
“We haven’t done a lot because the band is still figuring out how the new music should be played. It’s a lot more complicated than I thought,” he said.
He noted two of the new songs are already starting to resonate with the audience — ‘Nobody Gets What They Want to Get,’ and ‘ Don’t Tell.”
“They are a couple of really upbeat numbers,” he said.
“ I started looking at ’60s pop because I couldn’t stand what was happening now,” he continued.
“ That what I do, I fixate on one thing and write a lot of songs based around it. But it leads to a more cohesive album,” he said.
Eaglesmith always does things his way — even fundraisers — so he is also doing a unique fundraiser for the victims of Alberta’s floods at the end of June — he’s auctioning off pies.
“We just did a benefit for them in Nanton and didn’t auction off any pies then, because it turned into something else. But last night in Olds at Tracks we auctioned off three pies and raised $2,400 for those guys,” Eaglesmith enthused.
“ But it’s not really about the pies. We auctioned off one pie three times,” he said.
“Sometimes the audience brings them, other times we have to rush out and buy one,” he said.
He began the pie fundraiser several months ago to raise money for Operation Smile — an organization which helps fix cleft palates for children in third world countries.
“It costs $240 per kid to fix their faces, so we’ve been able to help like three kids each night. We’ve raised $14,000 for them so far,” he said adding they changed focus after the flood.
Eaglesmith’s music has inspired thousands of country and folk musicians. His songs have been covered by Mary Gauthier, Chris Knight and modern country stars like Alan Jackson, Toby Keith, Miranda Lambert and the Cowboy Junkies.
But lately, one fan wrote a musical “Dear Johnny Deere” which is running in theatres across Canada including Charlottetown, Blythe and his hometown of Port Dover, Ontario.
“ He’s a pretty well known playwright (Ken Cameron). He lives in Calgary now. He wrote a musical based on a family trying to keep their farm afloat. So he used some of my farming songs. Five or six theatres have already picked it up. I haven’t seen it yet. I will at the end of the summer,” he enthused.