The majority of acts we feature here at Lonesome Highway are American or Canadian, but we’re constantly on the lookout for artists and bands that fit our template from other countries and continents. Australia has provided us with quite a number of interesting acts in the roots, Americana and country genres with James Ellis and The Jealous Guys the most recent. Their striking second album released last year, COUNTRY LION, is a fusion of traditional and contemporary country music by an artist who sticks close to first principals in both the song writing and musicianship. We spoke recently with James about his country music origins and the album.
Tell me how James Ellis and The Jealous Guys came about?
In 2016, my old band, The Bitter Sweethearts, a country-rock group, came to an end. I went to the US for the first time and spent a few weeks in Austin going between the honky tonks (White Horse, Donn’s Depot, Continental Club etc) and decided I wanted to go back to Melbourne and put together a band to play classic country and honky tonk.
What was your musical background prior to forming the band?
I’ve played guitar and sung since high school. Mostly, though, I’ve focused on writing songs over the past 20 years or so.
What drew you towards classic country?
I love the emotion of the songs (heartbreak songs are my favourite). When I was in Austin, I also understood for the first time the important connection between honky tonk and country partner dancing. I love that and we’ve got a pretty good two-step scene in Melbourne.
New South Wales is considered to be the capital of country music in Australia. Has the genre a large following in Melbourne?
Tamworth (NSW) is usually listed as the country capital of Australia but what we’ve seen is a bunch of bands playing good classic country and honky tonk in Melbourne. Melbourne is unquestionably the live music capital of Australia so it’s no surprise lots of people are interested in it.
We’re loving COUNTRY LION at Lonesome Highway. How do you think your sound has evolved since IT AIN’T TEXAS (BUT IT AIN’T BAD) that came out in 2018?
There are two main differences in the development of the band’s sound between the records. The first is that we’ve been playing so many gigs since that first record. We got a honky tonk residency at a bar in inner Melbourne in 2018 so we play classic country all the time. Secondly, we organised to have two Nashville-based producers (Micah Hulscher and Alex Munoz) involved with COUNTRY LION. They brought sounds, ideas and styles which we would never have developed on our own.
The latest album features some East Nashville royalty with appearances from Lillie Mae, her brother Frank Rische and Erin Rae. How did those connections come about?
In 2017, we played a festival in Melbourne called Out on the Weekend. Lillie Mae was playing with her brother, Frank and guitarist, Craig Smith. We became friends, played some gigs together, continued to hang out in Melbourne and Nashville and I really wanted to have them involved in COUNTRY LION because I felt like the development of the band was linked really strongly to meeting them, learning from them and hanging out. At Craig’s recommendation, we organised a honky tonk residency for the band at the start of 2018. Playing a regular gig and focusing on classic country has been one of the most important aspects of this band’s life and development.
I understand that Lillie Mae introduced you to Micah Hulscher and Alex Munoz who co-produced the album?
It was actually Craig Smith, Lillie’s guitarist at the time, who made the introduction to Micah when Micah was touring Australia with Margo Price in 2018. We hit it off when we hung out the first time, talking about classic country and I invited him to produce. He recommended having Alex involved as well. They’re a killer team.
What did they bring to the project?
They brought an incredibly deep knowledge of classic country and other American roots styles. Micah is also an incredibly talented pianist and helped with some of the piano on the record. Alex provided a lot of the tasty overdubbing (baritone, dobro, other guitars). Alex also engineered the record in Melbourne.
The vocal arrangements on the album are wonderful with Kelly Day, Lillie Mae and Erin Rae all adding support vocals. Was it your intention from the outset to put so much emphasis on backing vocals?
I’ve sung with Kelly Day for years and she has an incredible talent for arranging and layering vocals (the outro on I’m A Fool, Records with Our Friends on the new album; and Xmas Lights on our first record). Great backing vocals are an integral part of a classic country record so yes it was always our intention to have lots of backing vocals. We thought it was a good way to collaborate with our Nashville friends, too.
When and where did the recording take place and were the guest parts recorded remotely?
We did all the band tracking in Melbourne in March 2019 and then a few of the overdubs and backing vocals were completed in Nashville in April and May that year.
Was the process a challenge with the producers and some of the contributors working on a different continent?
The remote recording wasn’t really a challenge at all because Micah, Alex and I were all on the same wavelength and had the same vision for the tracks. I also trusted them to record great parts.
I understand that Chuck Meade can take credit for influencing the choice of the album’s title.
Ha yeah. I met Chuck briefly at a party in Nashville and ended up handing him a download card for our first record, It Ain’t Texas (But It Ain’t Bad). He looked at the picture and said, “You’re the Country Lion!” I thought it was a great title immediately and said I’d use that if he didn’t mind. He didn’t.
There’s no shortage of heartache and love lost on a number of the tracks. Was this a case of following the tried and trusted template for classic country songs or are some of the tales autobiographical?
All the songs come from my experience; some are embellished but they all reflect the essence of what I know. Most of my favourite country songs are heartache songs and it’s the type of expression I naturally write about.
Do you see the musical direction of your two albums as one that you are locked into or do you intend experimenting in different trajectories?
I think we’re refining the sound but my intention is to continue to play more and more classic country. I’m not interested in other styles. While Country Lion contains a few songs which I wouldn’t call classic country, I think they fit within the broad banner of country music. The next record (which I’ll finish in the coming months) will be much more traditional.
With the current restrictions, have you had the opportunity to perform the material to a live audience yet?
No, that’s been one of the main challenges of releasing an album recently. We’ll have our first band show when our honky tonk residency starts again this week and we’ll play a few of the tunes.
With hopes and expectations that the world will be back to some degree of normality later this year, have you got tentative plans to tour locally and / or outside Australia?
We’ve been lucky in Melbourne to have very hard restrictions in place for many months since March 2020. Those restrictions have so far brought COVID transmission under control but it’s also meant there’s real uncertainty about the ability to play gigs and travel (from a safety perspective of course, but also from a travel and logistical perspective). We’ll be playing shows around Melbourne for the foreseeable future but we probably won’t play many shows outside of Victoria until the vaccine is completely rolled out and there’s greater certainty around our ability to travel freely. I’d love to travel outside Australia to play the songs as well but our ability to do that is even more difficult to predict. Hopefully I’ll be able to come to Ireland soonish.
You played at Americana Fest in 2018. Have you hopes of a return to perform at the festival?
We played at Americana Fest in 2018 and when I was in Nashville in 2019, I did some shows around town (5-Spot, American Legion). I’d love to get back to the festival sometime and play more shows.
Interview by Declan Culliton