Toronto based bluesman Paul Reddick is hard at work on a new album with MonkeyJunk harmonica master Steve Marriner and producer Colin Cripps of Blue Rodeo. Reddick and Marriner will be taking a break from writing new songs to go on tour which includes a stop in Lethbridge to play the Slice, Jan. 12.
“Colin is with Blue Rodeo. He’s a busy man and so am I. So I’m taking my time with it,” said Reddick, a Maple Blues award winner and Juno nominee, while waiting for a VIA Rail train to take him from Ottawa to Toronto so he can begin his new tour. He has been working on his new album since July and hopes to release it this May.
“ It’s a slow process. I’m spending a lot of time on songwriting and lyrics,” he said.
“I’ve been here for three days working with Steve Marriner and we’ll be coming there to play,” he said adding he has worked with Marriner for many years.
“ I like to use MonkeyJunk as my band. When I first saw him he was 14 years old and at a festival in Fredericton playing with JW Jones. He’s a great harp player, an great guitarist, a great bass player and a great songwriter,” Reddick enthused. Marriner won a Juno award in 2012 with his band MonkeyJunk. They have won numerous other awards including multiple maple Blues Awards.
“ I like to play with people like that,” said Reddick, who is certainly no slouch on harmonica.
“I like to play harp, but I put my emphasis on songwriting and on the band. But we’re not really blues. I play the harp to add extra colours to the songs. There are solos of course, but I concentrate on the songs and the lyrics,” he said.
“ The whole band is my instrument,” he said.
“ We’re influenced by the blues, but we’re not a traditional blues band,” he described.
“ The new songs are all different. It’s an important continuation of my songwriting. I’ve put together a good collection of songs,” he said.
He awarded the first one last year to Toronto based roots/ blues band Digging Roots, followed by Samantha Martin, who fronts her band the Haggard and Montreal bluesman Rob Lutz.
“It’s a contemporary blues composition award,” he described adding it is meant to recognize blues music that pushes the boundaries of traditional 12 bar blues. Songwriters submit one song as a WAV or MP3 which will be judged on instrumentation, melodic invention, song structure, lyric and production possibilities.
The winner gets $1,000. More details can be found on Reddick’s website http://www.paulreddick.ca/site/
“ It’s an attempt to try to hear songs which explore blues with other genres. We don’t expect people to write just blues. It broadens the tent. I want to see if it can generate energy and interest in blues music,” he added.
He received 110 entries and trimmed them down to a short list of 30 before his panel of judges including Tom Wilson, Divine Brown and Brad Wheeler chose the winner.
“ A lot of people submitted songs they had around for years. This year I hope people will write for the contest. So you’ve got a year,” he said.
He plans to run the gamut of the blues for his Lethbridge show.
“This will be the first time experiencing the new songs on the road. The set will consist of some new tracks and tracks from all of my albums all the way back to Rattlebag (his 2001 CD). I have five different albums. So there will be a variety of rock, funky, hard and lots of groovy kind of vibey stuff,” he said.
They will be joined by a hot Edmonton based rhythm section Chris Brszyki and Peter Hendrickson who Cripps recommended.
There is only a five dollar cover for Paul Reddick’s Feb. 12 show at the Slice. It begins at 9 p.m.
