Archive Interview: Jack Emerson / E Squared Records

Jack Emerson (center) with Jason & the Scorchers

Introduction: Jack Emerson’s influence on late ‘80s southern rock is immeasurable. He formed Praxis International, an indie label and artist management company, at the age of 22 with friend and partner Andy McLenon. Praxis started with just one band – Jason & the Nashville Scorchers – but soon steered the careers of bands like the Georgia Satellites, the Questionnaires, and Tim Krekel & the Sluggers. Emerson later worked with John Hiatt, Sonny Landreth, and Steve Forbert and his support of mid-’80s “college rock” bands like R.E.M. and the dB’s would lead them to greater successes.

After the Scorchers broke up, Emerson moved Praxis further into the alt-country field with important early ‘90s releases from Billy Joe Shaver and Webb Wilder. By 1995, however, Praxis had run its course and Emerson formed E Squared Records with friend Steve Earle. In 1999, Emerson brokered a deal between the label and Artemis Records that largely removed him from running the business side, freeing him up to pursue other projects. Sadly, Emerson died in November 2003 at the young age of 43. This interview with Emerson took place in 1996 and originally appeared in Nashville Business In Review.  
    
People who claim to know a lot about these sort of things use words like “dynamics” or “synergy” when describing the inner workings of a volatile industry like the music biz. Perhaps it’s time we added two new words to the industry lexicon – “experience” and “evolution,” or, if you will, E2.
    
It’s no coincidence that these two words pretty much sum up the careers of Jack Emerson and Steve Earle, the two “E’s” behind the newly formed E2 Records. Both are well-known in the local music community, Emerson as the former head of Praxis International and Earle as a critically-acclaimed performer and songwriter. Together they have created an indie label that may well rewrite the way that things are done on Music Row.        
    
Praxis was Nashville’s first independent rock ‘n’ roll record label, a vital part of the Music City’s early ‘80s non-country music scene. Home to Jason & the Nashville Scorchers, Praxis released the band’s early recordings and would act as their management through most of the decade. Along with friends and fellow Scorcher fans Andy McLenon and Kay Clary, Emerson would build a respected organization that was as professional as it was hard-working and creative.  
    
Although the Scorchers never received the kind of commercial acceptance that they deserved, another Praxis band, the Georgia Satellites, hit it big with their first album. The success of the Satellites gained Emerson and the gang at Praxis a reputation in the industry as ace talent scouts. A subsequent deal with BMG subsidiary Zoo Records led to Praxis developing artists like Webb Wilder, Mark Germino, Sonny Landreth, and Billy Joe Shaver.
    
Steve Earle came to Nashville in the early ‘70s at the age of nineteen, a talented but struggling songwriter. Influenced by writers like Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt, Earle developed a heady story-telling style that owed as much to rock as it did country music. Hits by several country artists with Earle-written songs led to a deal with MCA Records, Earle’s first album, Guitar Town, taking the industry by storm. Shooting to number one on the country charts, the album won critical acclaim from sources as diverse as Country Music magazine and Rolling Stone.
    
Subsequent releases would showcase Earle’s evolution as a songwriter, often drawing favorable comparisons with artists like Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen. As he incorporated heavier rock influences into his music, however, the country music establishment didn’t quite know what to do with an artist of Earle’s talents and vision. Earle moved to MCA’s Uni Records subsidiary in New York for the last albums of his contract, a move that weakened his local industry support. Problems with drugs and alcohol hastened the decline of his career, inevitably leading to an arrest and a prison sentence for possession.
    
The formation of E2 was to be part of a natural evolution for both Emerson and Earle. “After about 15 years of Praxis,” says Emerson, “when we ended our Bertelsman/Zoo agreement....things had gotten a little stale. Kay was real interested in starting her own company and working out of her house. I couldn’t imagine trying to run that place without her there. Andy was questioning what he wanted to do and I was questioning what I wanted to do. We were all a little burned out...so it was a natural time to close things down.”
    
With Praxis a part of the past, Emerson was open to new opportunities. “We’d all kept in touch with Steve, because we were all really big fans.” In the latter years, there “wasn’t that much to keep in touch with, musically,” says Emerson of Earle, “because he was going through the whole period of sobriety, working through the prison system.” After Earle’s release, says Emerson, “he knew that he had to stay busy...and he’s always been interested in the business side, always been a producer as well as a songwriter. The more that I talked with him, the more it made sense for us to try and do something together.”
    
After recording a well-received acoustic album for Nashville’s Winter Harvest label, Earle was ready to return to his former rocking style of playing for his next album. Clean and sober for almost two years, he had stared into the abyss and emerged a stronger artist than ever. “He was looking for a solid compadre who could represent his talent at the major label side,” says Emerson. “After investigating all of our possible alliances, Warner Brothers seemed to make the most sense.”
    
The newly formed E2 label signed a deal providing Warner Brothers the opportunity for worldwide distribution of their releases, with the exception of England, where they hooked up with Transatlantic/Castle. In return, Warner provided start-up funding for the label. Non-Warner releases will be distributed through the Alternative Distribution Alliance, a group of indie labels that works to place product in non-traditional, non-mainstream retail outlets.
    
E2 has received a lot of moral support from their major label sponsors. “In essence, we’ve got a deal that’s spread between the New York office, the L.A. office and the Nashville office,” Emerson explains, citing Warner executives like Joe McKuen, Bob Merlis and Nancy Stein as being advocates of the young label. “Jim Ed Norman deserves a lot of credit,” says Emerson, referring to the local label chief’s recognition of Nashville’s potential. “Warner Brothers understood what we wanted to do,” says Emerson, “not only with Steve’s records, but with the records that we wanted to make, whether Steve was producing or whatever.”
    
The pairing of Emerson and Earle has proven to be a marriage made in heaven. “We were able to sit down and work out a complex but functional situation where Steve could help make and produce records and I’d be in the office on a daily basis to kind of glue the thing together,” says Emerson. The first E2 release was Earle’s rocking I’m Alright, a wonderful return to form for this talented artist. The label has also signed two new acts, Knoxville’s V-Roys and Ross Rice, former member of the popular Memphis band Human Radio. Both have albums planned for August release.  
    
E2 has retained control over the entire A & R process. “We have total autonomy, creatively,” says Emerson, E2 shouldering the responsibility of discovering and signing new artists, and producing their recorded efforts. “Our attitude is that if Steve and I are both over the top about something, we’ll do it. If one of us is not thrilled, ready to climb over broken glass, then we won’t do it.” There’s no pressure on the pair from anybody to crank out product, so E2 will release fewer records than a lot of indie labels, but they’ll be  hand-picked by the combination management/creative team at the top of the label.
    
There are three things, says Emerson, that the label is looking for in an artist. “A lot of originality, which doesn’t mean they don’t have a good sense of the past,” he says, “but rather a good sense of what they want to do, a unique sound. The second element would be songs, and not necessarily in a classic sense. With Steve, he can he detect and help young writers with what they want to do, answer their questions. The third thing would be a certain timeless element. Most of the records that I listen to and that Steve listens to have been things that we enjoy as much now as when they were released.”
     
After a record is made, says Emerson, “we get Warner Brothers and the act together, sit down and decide whether or not something is better served going out through the independent system or going out through the Warner Brothers system. What this means is that sometimes a young band that we think has a great record may spend the first six months on ADA without Warner Brothers, the machine, getting involved. If everybody agrees that’s the best way to go, we may do it for two records, we may do it for three records, or we may go straight to Warner Brothers.”
    
“We’re trying to make productive use out of a strong multi-national company and still give the artist as much control as possible in terms of their own destiny,” concludes Emerson. For Steve Earle and Jack Emerson, the two sides of E2 Records, their own destinies will be built on both the sum of their previous experience and the result of their personal evolutions, a formula for success than may well become known in the future as simply E2.

Vintage Review: Steve Earle & the Dukes’ The Hard Way (1990)

With Springsteen on hiatus, Seger over the hill, and Mellencamp off making movies, Steve Earle seems to have taken up the mantle of the “working man’s” champion with a vengeance. Earle’s songwriting skills have never been sharper than here on The Hard Way, his brilliant follow-up to the impressive Copperhead Road album.

Earle’s lyrics are tougher and leaner and sharper than ever before, his music tight, dark, and rocking. Earle has peopled this album with characters as disturbing, troubled, and real as Springsteen’s Nebraska, documenting their trials and tears on record with a skill and grace the equal of any songwriter. If John Hiatt is the South’s poet laureate of song, then Earle must surely be his darker counterpart, the troubled troubadour, romantic at heart, forever destined to walk down the other side of the tracks and chronicle the life he sees there. (MCA Records, released July 1st, 1990)

Review originally published by The Metro, September 1990

Vintage Review: Justin Townes Earle's The Good Life (2008)

When you’re the son of a bona fide Americana music legend, and named after one of greatest songwriters of the genre (Townes Van Zandt), expectations are high. With his full-length debut, The Good Life, Justin Townes Earle delivers everything expected of him in spades. Not content to merely mimic his dad’s work, the younger Earle takes his impressive songwriting skills in a number of diverse directions. Whereas his pappy’s music tends to draw more from both rock and folk worlds, the younger Earle instead goes in the other direction, pulling the best from the Tennessee and Texas hillbilly traditions.

Growing up in a musical household, Earle had the opportunity to soak in all sorts of influences, and it shows in his work. An eerily-mature songwriter that is skilled beyond his years, Earle easily weaves together story-songs in his dad’s image, but with his own voice and a widely differing soundtrack. The title track from The Good Life is a delicious ‘60s-styled country throwback that sounds like a classic Faron Young tune, while the heartbreaking “Who Am I To Say” is reminiscent of namesake Van Zandt’s stark folk poetry.

Other songs on The Good Life showcase Earle’s mastery of a diverse range of country styles. “Lone Pine Hill” is a haunting Western dirge and “What Do You Do When You’re Lonesome” is a weepy Texas dancehall ballad. “South Georgia Sugar Babe” is a bluesy, Southern rock/R&B hybrid with gumbo-funk rhythms while “Lonesome And You,” with its mournful steel guitar and slow shuffle, is the sort of honky-tonk country that Ernest Tubb could crank out in his sleep. “Turn Out My Lights” is a delicate, finely-crafted folk ballad…and about as close as Justin gets to sounding like his famous father.

The vocals on The Good Life are warm, certain, and soulful throughout, and producer R.S. “Bobby” Field’s deft hand and extensive roots-music knowledge allowed him to bring out the best in Earle, perfectly capturing the artist’s eclectic sound. With boundless ambition and loads of talent, Earle easily ties together strains of roots-rock, folk-blues, Tex-Mex, Western Swing, and traditional country in the creation of an amazing, remarkable debut album. (Bloodshot Records, released 2008)

Review originally published by the Trademark of Quality (TMQ) blog

Vintage Review: Steve Earle's Just An American Boy (2003)

Just a year after the release of his controversial album Jerusalem, alt-country giant Steve Earle has followed it up with the live set Just An American Boy. An audio companion to an upcoming concert DVD, this 2-CD set offers as complete a look at Earle’s talents as has been released. Your live-music-loving columnist has heard a half-dozen live Steve Earle albums through the years, most of ‘em bootlegs, and none stand up to the performances and song selection found on Just An American Boy.

Featuring a number of songs from Jerusalem, including “Ashes To Ashes” and “Amerika v. 6.0 (The Best We Can Do),” the album also includes musical snapshots from across Earle’s storied career, from “Guitar Town” and “Copperhead Road” to the classic “Christmas In Washington.” Earle rounds out the affair with a joyful rendition of Nick Lowe’s “What’s So Funny About Peace, Love & Understanding.” Earle’s effortless blend of traditional country, roots rock, bluegrass, and blues has been a major influence on the entire alt-country movement.

His championing of progressive politics and causes has shown Earle to be an intelligent and informed spokesperson for a leftist view of politics shunned by the major media. Ten years after many pundits declared his career dead, Just An American Boy proves that Earle keeps getting better as a songwriter and performer, with lots of life left in a career that has already achieved greatness. (E Squared/Artemis Records, released 2003)

Review originally published by View From The Hill community newspaper, Signal Hill CA

Vintage Review: Steve Earle’s Jerusalem (2002)

A month or so before the release of Jerusalem, Steve Earle’s 10th album, some shrill jackass of an alleged journalist took the artist to task over his song “John Walker’s Blues.” Seems that Earle’s use of the creative process in an attempt to figure out exactly how the “American Taliban” had gotten into the predicament that he found himself in was tantamount to treason in the eyes of the New York Post. The unrepentant reporter dialed up Nashville radio talk show hosts Steve “Love It Or Leave It” Gill and Phil “Corporate Shill” Valentine for their two cents worth, quoting the two right-wing gasbag’s observations on Earle’s song, his career, and his unpatriotic insolence.

Valentine carried his crusade against Earle onto the airwaves with his daily radio gabfest, ignorantly misunderstanding both the song’s intent and Earle’s (successful) career path. Only Grant Alden, editor of the alt-country journal No Depression, stood as the voice of reason, calmly and intelligently explaining the song’s purpose and relevance in both the original New York Post article and on local Nashville television. “John Walker’s Blues” is not, in my mind, one of Earle’s best songs, but it is one of his most heartfelt. Earle obviously looked at his own teenage son and wondered what it is about American culture that would drive an otherwise “normal” kid like John Walker Lindh to embrace radical Islamic thought.

Steve Earle’s Jerusalem

The song is part of the theme that runs throughout Jerusalem, the idea that America is broken in more ways than we care to count and that it is up to us to demand change. Jerusalem is Earle’s most political collection yet, a poetic overview of American society on the brink of disaster. Unlike Bruce Springsteen’s over-hyped and much lauded The Rising album, which also looks at a post-September 11th country, Earle doesn’t focus on feel-good stories of heroism or memories of bitter losses on that fateful day. Rather, Jerusalem offers the cold slap of reason, a stark reminder of what we’ve got to lose as a country. The songs here paint a bleak picture and ask some hard questions.

Jerusalem opens with the rocking “Ashes To Ashes,” a Biblically apocalyptic story of life and death, rebirth and retribution that reminds us that nothing lasts forever. The growing economic and cultural chasm between the rich and the rest of us is handled with great insight on “Amerika v. 6.0 (The Best We Can Do).” “Conspiracy Theory” touches upon the Kennedy and King assassinations and the Viet Nam war, comparing the turbulent ‘60s to the current storm clouds on the horizon while “The Truth” boils down the complex issue of crime and punishment to a single prisoner’s haunting perspective. The Mexican dance hall vibe of “What’s A Simple Man To Do” belies the sad nature of the tale, that of a Maquiladora factory worker forced by desperation to smuggle drugs across the border with tragic results. The gentle memories of “I Remember You” are bolstered by the presence of the angelic Emmylou Harris; her trembling vocals perfectly matched with Earle’s gruff baritone. “Shadowland” rocks like Guitar Town-era Earle while the title track closes Jerusalem, the song serving as a beacon of hope and renewal, offering up the promise of peace in a troubled world.

Not since “Little Steven” Van Zandt challenged the status quo with a pair of excellent mid-80s albums that questioned the “Reagan revolution” has a major American musician delivered such scorching political and social commentary on record. Unlike Rage Against The Machine, Corporate Avenger, or dozens of like-minded and politically oriented artists (mostly coming from a punk background), Earle doesn’t trade in over-amped hyperbole, tired rhetoric and mindless sloganeering on Jerusalem. Earle’s lyrics are complex in their simplicity, hewing closer to Woody Guthrie or Bruce Springsteen in their ability to put a human face on tragedy, alienation and frustration.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Jerusalem has been praised by some critics and whitewashed by many more who are unwilling to embrace it as a major work, the first great protest album of the new century. Earle sums it up best in his own liner notes to Jerusalem, written on the 4th of July, when he states that “we are a people perpetually balanced on a tightrope stretched between our history and our potential.” Luckily, we have artists such as Steve Earle to keep us focused on the prize. (E Squared/Artemis Records, released September 24th, 2002)

Review originally published by Alt.Culture.Guide™

Vintage Review: Steve Earle’s Sidetracks (2002)

As explained by Steve Earle’s excellent liner notes, the songs on Sidetracks aren’t outtakes, but rather “stray tracks” that were previously unreleased or saw the light of day only on soundtrack or tribute albums. Much like Bill Lloyd’s All In One Place album, Earle’s Sidetracks confines these stray songs to a single package, providing extensive musician credits and song-by-song commentary. The resulting album is every bit as remarkable as any title in Earle’s impressive catalog, a vital collection of original songs and inspired covers that illustrates Earle’s talents as a songwriter, performer and bandleader.

Steve Earle’s career has always been plagued by misconceptions, his early Nashville albums dismissed by ignorant Music Row hacks for being “too rock ‘n’ roll,” while mainstream rock audiences failed to embrace Earle as “too country.” The truth lies somewhere in between, perhaps, but I believe that Earle is too enormous a talent to be confined by one style or genre, a fact illustrated by Sidetracks. A roots-music traditionalist who has had a tremendous influence on the alt-country scene, Earle has nonetheless flirted with hard rock, reggae and Celtic music as well as country, folk and bluegrass throughout the span of his nearly twenty-five year career.

“Johnny Too Bad,” recorded with Knoxville, Tennessee roots rockers the V-Roys, redefines the Jamaican classic with a harder edge while the Irish-flavored instrumental “Dominick St,” recorded with the Woodchoppers in Dublin, extends Earle’s love affair with Celtic music. A powerful cover of Nirvana’s “Breed” showcases Earle’s rowdy rock side, tho’ maybe not as well as “Creepy Jackelope Eye,” a lively collaboration with Eddie Spaghetti and the Supersuckers. An alternative version of “Ellis Unit One” performed with the Fairfield Four achieves an eerie spiritual edge lacking in the solo version used in the film Dead Man Walking. The folkish “Me and the Eagle” stands in stark contrast to much of the material on Sidetracks, while a twangy, bluegrass-tinged reading of Lowell George’s “Willin’” captures the spirit of the oft-covered original.     

Not everything on Sidetracks clicks, most notably a cover of the Chambers Brothers’ classic “Time Has Come Today.” A technologically crafted duet with Sheryl Crow that was recorded in Nashville with Crow in LA, the performance may have seemed a good idea at its conception, but it suffers in execution. Crow’s vocal contribution is lackluster and the band fails to achieve the manic (drug-fueled?) energy of the original, although the Abbie Hoffman vocal samples are pretty neat. This minor cavil aside, Sidetracks is an extremely worthwhile addition to your CD collection, a significant compilation and a revealing look “backstage” at the multi-faceted talents of Steve Earle. It’s telling that by collecting his various cast-offs and rarities, Earle has cobbled together an album that still stands head and shoulders above most of the country and rock music that will be released this year. Though other artists should probably hang their heads in shame, Earle fans can rejoice in Sidetracks. (E-Squared/Artemis Records, released 2002)