Can you talk about the inspiration behind the latest single you put out, “Red, White, and Blue Blues”, in the process/what it was like working with that group.

I had written a slide guitar progression but didn’t have any words for it. At the time of the Covid lockdown, we lost a really close friend and a great guitar player–who played with me more than once at the Buttonwood Tree–Homeboy Steve Antonoakos. The sad news put me in touch with a lot of far flung friends and we all started cowriting in fits and starts. I sent that piece to my friend Neil Thomas who sent back a really long rant about the then current situation. I knew where he was coming from, but I felt it needed shortening and I was afraid that the lyric might lose oomph over time because it was too much of the moment. I took my time paring it down and rewriting it and trying to make it something I could sing. It’s Neil’s title and some of the form; the music and most of the lyric is mine. 

I assembled the group for the recording just because they’re all friends and we hadn’t seen or played together for a long time. In fact, we had never played together in that particular configuration all at once. Jim Weider, the guitar player in the later incarnation of The Band and now the leader of The Weight Band, lives right down the street from my friend Mark Dann’s studio, but they had never met! I love that kind of stuff–bringing together mutual friends and making music. They are all total pros. We had no rehearsal–we just ran it down until we had a take. I think it was take 5 that we used. And it was great to be together with all those old friends for an afternoon of playing music.

What was the moment in your life you knew you had to become a touring musician?

I never really became a “touring” musician–I was a busker. I first became interested in buskers seeing a “Human Jukebox” playing on the Boston Common when I was maybe 11 or 12. After that, I read about Woody Guthrie and other musical heroes who were also buskers, and I was taken with this romantic idea of traveling around and playing music on the street. From the street I would get gigs, and it was playing a terrace in the south of France that I met the fellow who suggested I should come back to the States. He was the guy who first introduced me to The Band and other musicians who were living in Woodstock at the time. I also met my wife-to-be not long after that and stayed in New York City. I was busy playing clubs and sessions in New York and only occasionally went on the road. Nowadays I write for myself and others, do the occasional session, and play around New England and New York state, but I never really “tour.” In any case, blame it on the Human Jukebox.

Are there any acts that you think people should know about that you enjoy? 

Where to begin? I think in general people ought to go back and check out the music of the past, the music from the earliest days of recording when people didn’t have any preconceived notions about what a recording was supposed to be because that gives a much more comprehensive idea of what MUSIC can be than a lot of what you hear nowadays–or see nowadays, because a lot of people seem to think that a “song” means a video, as if the pictures were more important than the words or the music. If you mean acts that are out performing live right now, I really like Tuba Skinny from New Orleans, though someone told me they actually spend more time in Maine or someplace these days. I recently heard this Irish singer living in New York City named Donie Carroll who I think is really good. And a couple of years ago I met a songwriter from Upstate New York named Stephen Clair who I think is a really interesting songwriter and guitar player. I’ll be doing a songwriter-in-the-round show with him in Beacon, NY, the Wednesday before our show in Middletown.

Is there something you’d like to see change in the music world? 

I wish that people would stop talking about “the music industry.” It was depressing enough to think of it as a “business,” but an “industry”? If it’s an industry, that makes me something like a machinist, but I don’t get to hang it up at five or call my Union rep if I get stiffed on a gig, etc, etc., etc. Yes. I wish people would stop talking about “the music industry” and just start listening to the music people are making. 

Joe Flood is performing at The Buttonwood Tree on Saturday, November 23rd at 7 PM. He will be joined by Mark Horn on drums and banjo and Andres Villamil on bass. Reserve here: https://buttonwood.networkforgood.com/events/77214-joe-flood