<copy><![CDATA[Howe Gelb knows the burden of being a family man, especially now as his daughter Patsy is tapping him for money to buy a pair of Diesel jeans. “But I’ve only got £80 to last me the rest of the trip,” he protests. It’s no use. She pouts and looks at him with pleading eyes. Paternal feelings override Gelb’s better judgement and he hands over the cash, telling her mother: “She’s not allowed to buy anything unless it’s drastically reduced – or used.” Then he turns to me and asks, rather optimistically, “Do they have Diesels in thrift stores over here?” I say it’s unlikely, Gelb sighs and orders a whisky from the hotel bar. He is used to bearing the brunt of being a father figure, both personally and professionally, although it has taken him 20 years to earn his “honcho” status. Once he was one of the most overlooked artists of the past two decades; now he is revered as the “godfather of alt-country”, while his band Giant Sand have been described as the “founding fathers of contemporary Americana”. Whether Giant Sand inspired the roots resurgence of recent years remains to be seen; the inventiveness of their music eludes convenient categorisation. However, it is fair to say Gelb’s desert rock collective (from Tucson, Arizona) has influenced a generation of musicians eager to push the boundaries of country music. Despite the tiresome music-as-landscape analogies, the barren beauty of the desert is crucial to the group’s sound: the heat, the space and the overwhelming sense of freedom from structure and rules. Does Gelb consider the desert to be his spiritual home? “Well, Tucson is where I’ve spent most time on this planet, but the happiest I’ve been was in Rimrock, beyond the Joshua Tree. Although cities are good to muster the gusto for a while, you gotta find yourself in the country.” Surely such self-imposed isolation couldn’t have been that rewarding? Gelb is unequivocal: “Everybody experiences their version of Camelot and that was mine. It was the centre of the universe.” For him maybe, but Tucson, Arizona, was way off the map for the 1980s underground movement. And yet, cut off from the punk scenes in New York, LA and Washington DC, Giant Sand were as pioneering as Black Flag, the Minutemen and Hüsker Dü. Perhaps the closest comparison lies with Phoenix, Arizona’s Meat Puppets, whose psychedelic country hardcore found a home at LA’s legendary SST label. Ultimately, the obscurity of Gelb’s band helped them forge their intuitive and inclusive approach. “We had no information in Tucson in the early days, so you were limited to making music that you wanted to buy but couldn’t because it wasn’t being made.” As a result, Giant Sand’s semi-improvised aesthetic is so wildly eclectic as to be impossible to categorise. Perhaps a better definition would be a contemporary updating of the term Gram Parsons used to describe his own brand of country rock: “cosmic American music”. Giant Sand are not entirely without reference points, though. Gelb’s three heroes, or “pathfinders”, as he refers to them, are Neil Young, Thelonious Monk and Clint Eastwood. An idiosyncratic trio, but is the meandering Neil Young still a pathfinder? “Yeah, when you look at the sonic life of an artist it becomes even more admirable when, 40 years later, they’re still valid. You feel that you’ve invested all of your energy in the right stock.” Such emotional investment is familiar to long-term Giant Sand fans. Although even the band’s most ardent followers concede some of the back catalogue is hit-and-miss, Gelb’s own sonic life has been remarkably consistent over the 30 albums he has released under various guises including the Band of Blacky Ranchette, OP8, and the Friends of Dean Martinez. “It’s hard to know what to do with that legacy. You don’t wanna expect anything from it because the moment you do it will probably dissipate. And the moment you don’t, the more it seems to stick around. It’s tethered in a tormenting reverse psychology cycle.” If you had difficulties deciphering that, don’t despair. “Howespeak,” he jokes, “requires you to be familiar with Webster’s book of Giant Sand terminology.” Gelb free associates like a Beat poet, incorporating alliteration and internal rhyme into his conversation, choosing words for their sound and rhythm rather than meaning. Indeed, his voice has the same dustbowl-dry delivery and relaxed spontaneity that informs his music. “I admire a lack of intelligence in art, so the sensation gets you instead,” he explains. “Before you even learn a language, when you’re in the womb just getting off on the rush of blood, the heat of the heart, the murmur of the outside masses seeping through. The pattern of heartbeats and how they mesh has an invisible role when musicians play together.” Gelb speaks of the telepathy he shares with his band. “We are tight in the same way a family is tight. You fall in and out of sorts with each other but you’re still family.” Indeed, Giant Sand is an extended family that over the years has embraced Lucinda Williams, Vic Chesnutt, Lambchop’s Kurt Wagner, Sparklehorse’s Mark Linkous, Evan Dando, PJ Harvey, Juliana Hatfield, Lisa Germano, John Parish and, most recently, Scout Niblett. The family vibe is still evident on the new record, Is All Over... the Map, in which Gelb enlists the help of his younger (and presumably less fashion conscious) daughters, Sofie and Indiosa. The Tucson tribe seems to have recovered from the departure of Joey Burns and John Convertino, its erstwhile rhythm section, now better known as Calexico. “I hoped that one day they would take over the family business. But the kids have run off to start their own business instead,” Gelb jokes. Does he not feel bitter about their sudden success when it took him over 20 years to receive his due? “That whole ‘due’ thing,” Gelb says shaking his head. “Y’know, Clint Eastwood’s greatest line is in Unforgiven. Before he blows away Gene Hackman’s sheriff, he says, ‘Deserve’s got nothing to do with it’. I don’t equate success with a scale of merit. I never had the ambitious qualities of trying to see how far up the top of the heap I could go, which, as you get older, can work against you. If I’m gonna keep doing this I’m gonna need a few of the perks of success to help me. It’s erosive effects are taking their toll on me as I get closer to 50.” However, despite Gelb’s claim that he approaches every record as if it were his last, there is no sign of him retiring. “I love the idea of a family working for their keep. It’s a good ethic: to float this boat everyone’s gotta kick in on occasion.” Is that still the Giant Sand work ethic? Gelb takes a sip of his whisky and says in what I can only describe as Dylan Thomas English: “Oh, yeah. We’re all lifers in this clotted little clump of crumble and cringe.”Click <a href="asfunction:Tardis.webPageOpen,http://www.thrilljockey.com/news.html#tour"><b>here</b></a> for details of Giant Sand on tour in October]]></copy>
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<headline><![CDATA[Enter Sandman]]></headline>
<quote><![CDATA[Howe Gelb is alt-countryΓÇÖs daddy cool. The Giant Sand frontman tells Dafydd Goff why his band has always been a family affair]]></quote>
<caption><![CDATA[Giant SandΓÇÖs live performances are semi-improvised: ΓÇ£The pattern of heartbeats and how they mesh has an invisible role when we play.ΓÇ¥]]></caption>
<caption><![CDATA[CalexicoΓÇÖs John Convertino and Joey Burns with Gelb: ΓÇ£I hoped they would take over the family business but the kids ran off to start their own.ΓÇ¥]]></caption>
