Prine Time Singer/Songwriter Brings Individual Style To Spokane
On the heels of his best one-two punch of his career, John Prine returns Wednesday for a rare Spokane appearance.
A witty young newcomer, Heather Eatman, will open.
In 1991, Prine rescued himself from near-obscurity by releasing “The Missing Years.” It’s a typical piece of Prine whimsy highlighted by the irreverent “Jesus The Missing Years,” which purports to chronicle the 11-year gap in the Bible’s account of Jesus’ life.
Needless to say, Prine’s Jesus has not yet attained the spiritual status of the fellow we know from the Scriptures.
“The Missing Years” sold something like 400,000 copies, which is big stuff in the independent world of Prine’s Oh Boy Records, and won a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album. It also revitalized Prine’s career.
He’d been thinking about taking a long break from music, but the breakthrough success of “The Missing Years” convinced him to stick around for a while.
“I wanted to make one really good record,” he said, “then not make one for a while.”
Good thing he changed his mind, because last year he released “Lost Dogs and Mixed Blessings,” which may be even better than “The Missing Years.” It’s a gently rollicking record in which Prine’s leftfield point of view meshes beautifully with the first-rate production of Heartbreaker Howie Epstein.
“Lost Dogs” was two years in the making, and the effort shows in the faultless songs, shimmering arrangements and studied liveliness. After 25 years, Prine has finally got the hang of making records that sound good, in addition to merely being good.
“Lost Dogs” is packed with the kind of intelligent, adult pop that would be commonplace if programmers at radio stations and video channels were more progressive. As it is, Prine gets by with once-in-a-while play on VH1 and CMT and sporadic exposure on the nations’ adult album-oriented radio stations.
Not that he’s complaining: He seems to prefer a little fame to a lot. The success of “The Missing Years,” he said, meant “that we could play these places that were meant for music to be played in them. There are all these 800- to 4,000-seat theaters all across the country, and that’s the perfect place for me. No gymnasiums, no arenas. I don’t know what we’d do in an arena.”
Success also means being able to work with a first-rate band and by all accounts Prine has one. Early reviews say these guys can get pretty worked up on a straight-ahead rocker of the type Prine has always enjoyed.
Prine released his first record in 1971, a record with so many first-rate songs that even now it’s hard to think of another debut with such great promise; songs such as “Sam Stone,” “Illegal Smile,” “Paradise,” “Spanish Pipedream,” “Angel From Montgomery” and “Hello In There” still have the power to galvanize audiences.
Unfortunately, that record tagged him with a “New Dylan” reputation that his label couldn’t capitalize on. Instead, Prine developed a devoted cult following and a reputation among his musician peers as a songwriter’s songwriter.
Finally, the word seems to be getting out: John Prine’s one of the great ones.
Opening for Prine is Heather Eatman, one of only two artists other than Prine currently recording for Prine’s Oh Boy Records. The daughter of a drama professor, Eatman displays a playwright’s flair for characters and their lives on her debut CD, “Mascara Falls.”
Eatman sings in a little-girl voice but claims her best friends in high school were Tom Waits, Keith Richards and Lou Reed, which is a good hint at where her interests lie.
“I love it when a record just kicks you in the head,” she said in a phone interview. And it’s clear from “Mascara Falls” that Eatman wants to kick listeners in the head, too.
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Color photos
MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: CONCERT John Prine will perform at 8 p.m. Wednesday at the Masonic Temple. Tickets: $21 (you must be at least 21 to attend).