"James in Flames" rides again
James Houlahan and I go way back. Well, we actually met in late 2001, but it feels like we’ve been friends and musical confidantes for much longer.
To make a long story short, we met at Guitar Center. I had just moved to Boston and had been working on the guitar floor for about a month. “James in flames” was a new hire who had just returned home after getting his Masters at the University of Chicago. Having a similar love for the blues and lead guitar, we clicked right away and formed a band.
We quickly realized that two lead guitarists were not enough to put on a proper show, so we began scouring the local blues jams for a rhythm section, and we networked our way into a few gigs.
Having different yet complimentary styles, James and I quickly developed a reputation among our fans (all 3 of them, including our moms and the fat guy at the Blue Plate) for having a great musical chemistry. Among other things, we were often compared to salt and pepper, yin and yang, ketchup and mustard.. you get the idea.
The band began heading in a different musical direction, and I began taking on other projects, so my role in the band became short lived. We parted on good terms, and though we ran into each other occasionally, we didn’t really talk much after that, until last year.
At the time were both going through breakups, and we began to hang out again. James had come a long way in his songwriting, and I was in the middle of cutting my teeth as a producer. We agreed that upon the completion of Kelsey’s album, we would give it another go.
After playing out together for a show or two, we decided to take it into the studio. To view the rest of this show, click here.
After weeks of preproduction meetings, we started the initial tracking today with Tom Eaton, (Tom really knows how to get great sounds coming into the board, and it is an absolute pleasure to work with him again!) who is going to engineer and co-produce! So far (and I say that because ya never really know what you’re going to end up with), the album is a collection of melancholy introspective solo tracks.
The tunes are stripped down, acoustic, organic and breathing. I love James’ writing because it’s so bare bones. I am going have a ton of fun arranging these tunes! I see mandolin, accordian, cello, organ, piano, backup singers and a lot of late nights in my future!
We’re going in again next week. Stay tuned!
