Exposed Vocals just caught an exclusive interview with ‘Songdog’
According to one Native American myth the last thing humankind will hear at the end of the world is the cry of the Songdog (the coyote), so I picked that name.
Our new album — Joy Street — came out in August but right now we’re preparing arrangements for the songs that’ll be on the next album, we hope to record it next year.
Yes, I think anyone can make a mistake in the thick of a live performance. With me it’s forgetting the words, I just mumble till I get to the next line, or step back off the mic and mumble so the audience thinks the mic just didn’t pick up that bit.
I don’t really think in terms of genre, but I suppose we’d be classified as folk, mainly because our stuff is based on the acoustic guitar and we use instruments like the mandolin. Sometimes we get called folk-noir because the songs are dark.
What the future mostly means to me right now is getting another album recorded. All the tunes are written, it’s a question of learning to play them.
Once I discovered music around the age of nine or so it’s all I ever wanted to do.
I guess the internet is a good thing for music, it means you don’t need to sign to a major record-company to get your stuff heard anymore. But it also means people can shove any old crap up there.
My first love was the Beatles. I suppose the biggest influence on what I do with Songdog though was the mid-sixties folk-rock, baroque pop of 1966 to 1970 and the singer-songwriter movement of the late 60s/early 70s. I love great songwriters — Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Jim Webb.
