Traditional, Hank Williams-type instrumentation of lap steel, pedal steel,dobro, acoustic guitar, snare and bass, along with some banjo, mandolin and accordion, provide the backdrop for Seattle's Terhune.
The lyrics are purely American stories.
If you like: John Prine, Steve Forbert, Elliott Murphy, Ryan Adams, Whiskeytown, Son Volt, Wilco, Jayhawks, America, The Eagles, Hank Williams, Hank Snow, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, or anyone sounding like anyone just listed, you'll love Terhune.
Note: This is a DIY CD made by the band. Each CD is digitally copied directly from the hard drive from which it is recorded onto using Pro Tools.
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Check out Terhune's other releases:
Southern Breeze
Corn
Fairmount
Kentucky Pearls
Forward Motion
Jacob's Ladder
Fairmount Quakers
High Ground/Buckeye
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Interview with Al Terhune by Peter Willis of Nu Music Express, Seattle, WA.
Peter: Well, I've heard "Drives You," and I must agree with you that it goes a couple of places your other albums didn't go. I really like the mixture of songs here, although you've always got a nice mixture of tunes. Some of these are quite different, though.
Al: Well, you might remember that I said I wanted to make a whole CD of songs like the two simple, lap-steel songs on "Kentucky Pearls" - "For The Fields" and "Country Style." We started off that way with "Can't Celebrate," but we just went where the songs took us after that.
P: "Can't Celebrate" is a nice, simple song, and yet another example of bad love. Do you ever get tired of writing about love gone wrong?
A: How can you? That's what everything's about, isn't it? Love will always get good, and love will always get or go bad. Sometimes it's the final thing in a relationship, and sometimes it's just a temporary souring.
P: You write: "Down by the school yard, you held to me tight. I said 'I love you,' and you said 'all right.'" On paper, it's such a simple, almost childish way to say something, yet when you sing it, it comes off.
A: It's all John Prine. I don't do it on purpose, but those who influenced me come out every so often, and sometimes it's very blatant.
P: This is the second time in our interviews that you've mentioned John Prine as an influence. Has he influenced you the most?
A: I don't think so. I used to be a Steve Forbert junkie, and you can hear some of his vocal influences in mine. Not as much as it used to be. I'm just being honest.
P: Elvis Costello -
A: You mentioned him in one of the last interviews.
P: -- said he blatantly tried to sound like Randy Newman, but I never thought it was that obvious.
A: I agree. Elvis has always sounded like Elvis - Costello, that is.
P: I was looking at the copyright on these songs, and two of these are pretty old. "So Hard To Find" was written, I take it, in 1987, and "Crazy" was written in 1989?
A: "So Hard To Find" is a song I wrote when I was in between Nashville and Los Angeles. I was back in Indiana, and I wrote this for my ex-wife. She really didn't know what she wanted to do with her life, and I felt so bad for her. She was going through some major depression, among other problems, and it's a song I've always felt close to. I've recorded it many times, starting on a four-track cassette, to a four-track mini disk, and finally on our 16-track studio. I don't know if it's the best version I've ever done - and it's changed keys and some stylings along the way, but since we recorded "Drives You" after I lost my job, I thought it was appropriate to bring it back here. We even did this live with Cotton Bend, too, and it sounded great with the band. Just a good-flowing song. "Crazy" actually comes with a great story. It's absolutely true, every single bit of it. I had just moved to Los Angeles in 1989, and was living in the Hotel Ancell - converted into an apartment building - in Koreatown. You know, cop helicopters flying around the neighborhood every night. Anyway, there was this unfortunately-insane man who lived in our complex, and he did yell out obscenities one night, and I was scared. It's really also a bit of a rehash of the Steve Forbert song "Big City Cat" where he talks about some strange person following him around. I remember one particular day, I saw him going up the stairs, and he had a tray from McDonalds, but all that was in it were all the different size drink cups, each one filled with water, and a package of French fries, and he was putting a French fry down on every step as he walked up.
P: And you wouldn't blame him if he "shot [you] dead?"
A: Well, what I mean - other than it being a good rhyme with "head," is that you can't blame insanity. I guess I'm a believer in insanity pleas in court. We could talk forever about insanity and temporary insanity.
P: We won't. But getting back to these two older songs, why now? Why include them now?
A: I already answered that about "So Hard To Find," but with "Crazy," I was just going through some old songs, and since we've been doing album releases on a DIY basis, why not pick out the old tunes, too, that we think people should hear? There will probably be some older tunes included on every CD we do now.
P: Should be interesting...I think.
A: Actually, most of the songs on "Drives You" are not part of the stack of new songs we've been writing this past year. It's almost getting out of hand what we're sitting on.
P: It sounds like a problem.
A: We're just getting way behind in recording.
P: Then why put on older songs?
A: Like I said, why let the old ones not be heard just because they were recorded/written before this great age of DIY CDs and internet access? And most of these are within the past few years. "Find Me" was one of several "desert" songs written a few years ago. Another lunatic song, and you really don't know that unless you clearly hear and understand the last lyric where he's bored, sees a mobile home, and decides it's time to "twist and shout."
P: "Thieves Sing" is sure to cause some controversy. It starts off as a religious song, and I'm not saying that it's not religious, but here we are with the first couple of verses and everything's fine with this person being close to God, getting guidance and all, and then he evidently murders someone, and you sing: "Knives cut and blood is spilled, I told the Lord I didn't mean to kill. Heads point up to the heavens. Thank God we're always forgiven..."
A: Again, my wife thinks I took a nice song and turned it mean. But it's just real life, isn't it? How many times do people do horrible things and then think it's okay because God always forgives? Anyway, another Cotton Bend era song that we never performed live.
P: "Coins From The Sky?"
A: Another warning to my wife about the type of person she's married to. I'm always reaching for things, and she's always keeping me grounded when it's a pie in the sky.
P: A pretty production - and different.
A: Thanks - but you know, we recorded it, and after we were done, I realized I left off a really important last verse.
P: That in the very least would have stretched it from the one minute, forty-two second song that it is. It would have cracked the two-minute barrier. What is the last verse?
A: I can't remember. I was trying, but I can't. Must not have been that good.
P: So how did the production of "Howard Street" evolve and come to be?
A: It's actually the way we recorded about five years ago. Background vocals with reverb that make them sound like a keyboard sound. Strong reverb on the lap that makes it more haunting. Definitely a stray from the traditional sound we've done in the past. You'll probably hear more of that in the future.
P: It's like a Raymond Carver story.
A: Thank you! It's a direct rip off of a Raymond Carver type story. That typical rural character that we all tend to think lives in poor America. White Trash. It's a song that took just a few minutes to write, yet is one of my favorites.
P: I'll say it again: They're all you're favorites.
A: This one more than some of the others.
P: "Lusty Lady" is another haunting song, and this time you know that the man is going to do this girl in.
A: Well, at least that's where he's heading. Who knows it actually happens? But his girl's a stripper, for heaven's sake.
P: And you're referring to the Lusty Lady here in Seattle.
A: That's where I got the idea, yeah, but there obviously is no "alley" next to the Lusty Lady, so there's a poetic license there.
P: You finish with the title track, "Drives You." Another rather dark song, yet with a positive message.
A: Yeah, the bottom line is that even though two people don't know what makes them tick - even after many years, it's still the person you want to spend the rest of you life with. It's a song I wrote for my wife and me prior to forming Cotton Bend. Just a message to her...and me.
P: Next album?
A: It's done.
P: Déjà vu. When do I get to hear it?
A: I brought you one, Peter!
P: Hey, there it is. "Forward Motion." What happened to your dog, Bodhi?
A: Let's save that for when and if you decide to give us exposure for this next album.
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