Joyner’s music conjures windswept expanses of the Midwest.
Simon Joyner doesn’t feel comfortable playing music in the sterile environment of a windowless studio or stuffy radio booth; he’s more creative in places where he can breathe fresh air and hear raindrops falling through leaves. The Nebraska-based songwriter recorded an album — 2006’s Skeleton Blues — in an abandoned train station in Omaha. With the help of longtime collaborator and producer Michael Krassner, he set up a mobile recording studio in an empty room with big windows framing a busy street.
“It always feels easier when you’re at least a little connected to what’s going on outside,” Joyner says.
Joyner’s music conjures windswept expanses of the Midwest. He writes what he sees.
“By virtue of being in a certain place, things in my environment end up in the songs,” he says. “I’ll write about certain kinds of birds and plants and insects based on where I am. I’m sure if I were spending a year in France, or something, there would be other elements that work their way into the songs. The conflicts and characters deal with universal themes, but the details have to do with where these people are. I need to draw on what’s around me to come up with imagery that’s valid and rich.”
Joyner is often compared to similarly prolific and poetic songwriters Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan; like Dylan, he uses a harmonica neck holder when he’s performing. And his lyrics convey a sort of weather-worn wisdom. On one of his most beloved songs, “The Only Living Boy in Omaha,” he sings in a crusty baritone: “This is where the insects go to expire, fire/ This is where the children go to weep, sleep/ This is where the gypsies go when they retire/ Now they’re counting on you kid and your famous cold feet.”
Joyner and his regular band, the Ghosts, will play Communication on Milwaukee Street on Aug. 27. He’ll draw from all eras of his vast catalog, which encompasses some 20 studio albums, live albums and compilations dating back to 1992. The setlist also will include a handful of tracks from a forthcoming album, Pocket Moon (due out in October).
In creating Pocket Moon, Joyner drew inspiration from a drastically different landscape while surrounded by an unfamiliar cast of players. After writing several songs in a flurry last winter, Joyner flew out to Phoenix, Arizona, to flesh out his ideas at Krassner’s home studio, the Seven Track Shack. “He put together a band of players from Los Angeles and Phoenix that he’s worked with a lot,” Joyner says. “That was an interesting experience, because I wasn’t playing with my usual band on this new record.”
Getting out of his comfort zone added an exciting, improvisational element to the sessions, he says. “Nobody knew the songs as well as my band would have after practicing for six months, so everybody had to figure it out quickly. That can lead to some really inspired playing and interesting chemistry.”
Some of Joyner’s records lean toward noisy rock ‘n’ roll, while others drift more into subdued folk. Pocket Moon leans in the folk direction, though the full band lends body and texture to the arrangements. As a whole, the collection of songs isn’t quite what Joyner had imagined before recording in Arizona. “It always ends up different from what’s in your head, because of course, everybody brings their own thing, and that’s what I want,” he says. “I don’t want anybody just punching the clock or following orders. You want them to bring their own creativity to the songs.”
A distinct sense of place crept into the music, as well. It was an unusually chilly and rainy week when Joyner was in Phoenix, which fits the somber mood of the record. One time, they were recording in the Seven Track Shack during a rainstorm. They left the door open “to see if the sound of the rain would get picked up by the microphones,” he says. “Even if it didn’t, it influenced how we were playing. The environment always makes a difference.”
