By F. Daniel Kent
Americana music pioneer David Olney proved everything old is new again with the single and music video release of "These Boots Are Made For Walkin'" (written by Lee Hazlewood) in July. Contemporary and artistic, the clip is a re-creation of the original song and video released by Nancy Sinatra 45 years ago this year. Both Olney and Sinatra versions share a focus on the performer and the song is supported by visual simplicity, mod colors and fun dance moves.
Director Brian Smith witnessed his first David Olney indelible live show in Los Angeles several years ago and made it his mission to expose him to a wider audience. Although the song is not part of Olney's repertoire, Smith envisioned David belting it out with new meaning and set out to assemble an all-star supporting cast to create a visually and technically stunning presentation.
Meanwhile, ever the consummate performer, Olney has been on the road supporting his new CD, David Olney Presents: Film Noir. A five-song thematic mini-album, Film Noir is by turns ferocious and tender, dry-witted and dead serious, with a foot placed in Townes Van Zandt and another in Hoagy Carmichael, David Olney is a showman, a spoken-word artist, a walking songbook full of characters he inhabits with zeal, and the only man who has ever written a song about the Titanic from the perspective of the iceberg. David Olney recently took time from a beautiful summer day at his home in Nashville, TN to catch up with me.
How did Film Noir begin as a project ?
Years ago I wrote the song “Sunset on Sunset Blvd” and recorded it on an album. Among the other songs it didn’t seem to fit in. Musically, the chord structure on it is more than I usually do. It really stretched me. I really liked the whole lyric attitude that it had, the kind of world weary detective viewing life. I think it’s a great point of view. I kind of filed it away and I think the last year or so I stumbled onto that lick on “Frank is Gone”. So, I wrote the whole song around it and it took on a sort of Beat poet kind of lyric. Once I had those two I wrote the other songs to bring it all together.
You already kind of evoke a poetic sort of theatricality in your delivery and many people enjoyed your poetry recitations on YouTube.
I like spoken word work and I would get these recordings of people reading poems and they always sounded so pompous. They were being true to the words on the page but I wanted to take them as if they were words in a script and I would create a character that was saying the words. They are really fun to do but I need to get back into doing them again. Two years ago it seemed like every week I was doing one.
Most people I know are most fond of “Kubla Khan” and for good reason. However, my personal favorite is the Robert Browning “My Last Duchess” recitation.
I read that poem in high school and I didn’t understand at first. When I finally realized what was going on I went “Holy Smokes!” That poem really influenced my songwriting later on. I saw what you could do with a really short lyric. I saw you could cover a lot of emotional ground and tell an intense story.
Part 2 tomorrow.
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