John Doe Folk Trio (Photo by Todd V. Wolfson)
John Doe, famed bass player for punk band X, released his new solo album, Fables in a Foreign Land, last month via Fat Possum Records. He’s now on tour and he performs at Jammin’ Java on Tuesday, June 14!
Said John, “These songs take place alone, wandering, searching and hungry accompanied by horses not machines. Ultimately, I hope to send the listener to an unknown place with unpredictable characters and let them all live in that foreign land.”
Of the first single, “Never Coming Back,” Doe added, “This song starts the record for a reason, it embodies the spirit and events of what’s to come. It begins a journey that will be without comfort, where you are running from something dark, that is approaching fast. You can’t go back because there’s nothing to go back to. The entire record is set during the end of the 1890s. Thanks to Terry Allen for the extra words.”
Watch the official music video for “Never Coming Back” by John Doe on YouTube:
“All of these songs take place in the 1890s. There’s a lot of sleeping on the ground, a lot of being hungry, a lot of isolation,” John said of the concept album. “All of that fits into the kind of isolation and lack of modern stimuli that I think people started rediscovering during the pandemic lockdown: realizing that as parts of your life start getting taken away, what’s important and what you live for becomes paramount.”
Joining Doe on the album are Kevin Smith (Willie Nelson) on bass and Conrad Choucroun on drums. And though most of the 13 songs were written over the last three years, the sound was born during weekly, acoustic backyard jams on Smith’s patio.
John Doe Folk Trio
w/ Mink’s Miracle Medicine
Jammin’ Java
Tuesday, June 14
Doors @ 6pm
$35/$30
All ages