Steve is speaking from his New York apartment, having being based in the city for nearly nine years. “Well I was a Texan in Tennessee for 33 years,” he says on acclimatising to being a Texan in New York. “I left Texas when I was 19 and left for Nashville. You’re always a Texan, there’s no cure for that. I was part of a group of Texans in Tennessee, and we were very loud and proud of being from Texas. It became a part of my identity.”
Life presents challenges, big and small, at any stage, but spending the past 19 years sober has enabled Steve to be better positioned to tackle such challenges.
“Hopefully you get smarter as you get older,” he assesses. “It doesn’t always work out that way. I think I’m a lot smarter than I was. I’m 59, and I’m alive. That’s because I had to change the way I did things, pretty radically. It’s been a long time – 19-and-a-half years – since I made that change. That doesn’t mean I do everything perfect. I still have a hard time coexisting with people under the same roof. Kids I do fine with, adults I have trouble sharing a space with sometimes.
“Overall, I seem to get more things done. I’ve done a lot of stuff over the past 19 years, writing a couple of books, working on another one now, writing this memoir. I’m hoping to finish it this summer and publish it next year. It didn’t feel like it was going to happen a month ago, but it feels like it’s going to happen now. If you’re a songwriter – and I am, it’s still my day job – you get spoiled by how quickly songs can come together. Sometimes they take a while, but it’s a matter of them sitting there waiting for you to finish them. After I hang up on this phone call I’m gonna get to work because I have a plane on Monday to go to Hong Kong, just to hang out there for a day and eat wiggly things for the hell of it, on my way to Australia.
“That’s another thing, I have that luxury in my life where I can do things like that now. The first time I came to Australia I barely saw a fucking kangaroo. My touring this summer is based on lifestyle. I really wanted to bring the band to Australia because I haven’t done it in a while – and I’m excited about Cairns, I’ve never been north of Brisbane before. I’m gonna do one run with the band in Europe for festivals. But before that, I’m gonna go over with a guitar and mandolin and tour on trains, do some shows in London and make some money, then go to Italy and make not that much money – nobody makes money there – but I’ll be in fuckin’ Italy. I’m not ready to let those territories out of my life.”
The memoir will see Steve apply his deft prose talent, which has already produced his story-heavy discography, short story collection Doghouse Roses, novel I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive, and his annual New Year reflective poetry recited at St Marks.
“It’s a literary memoir, not an autobiography, in three acts. It’s largely about mentors. I didn’t realise this when I started, but it’s about recovery. It doesn’t surprise me; it’s a big part of who I am. Being a person in recovery is a bigger part of me than being a person who took drugs, it’s been a long time now – almost as long as when I took drugs.
“The first part’s about Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark, the songwriters I was lucky enough to know when I was growing up. The second part is about two guys who happen to be first cousins who sorta had my back at the darkest point in my life, on the street and in jail. But not because they loved me, but because I was a commodity – they were drug dealers. But without them, I wouldn’t be here.
“The third part is about my grandfather – my mother’s stepfather – who died in 1966 when I was 11-years-old. When I got clean, I got clean because I went to jail. I didn’t go voluntarily, I just decided I didn’t want to die. I had a minor moment of clarity, I just got a piece of the puzzle, and that piece was, ‘I don’t want to die’. I knew I was going to die. But at that point, it became apparent to me who all these guys were sleeping on my grandfather’s couch were when I was growing up.
“He started all the original 12-step programs in north-east Texas in the late ‘40s and early ‘50s. He got sober in New York City after World War II, which meant he knew [Alcoholics Anonymous co-founders] Bill W. and Dr. Bob. The book’s going to be called I Can’t Remember If We Said Goodbye,” he reveals.
Steve has long been an active proselytiser of his friend and mentor Townes Van Zandt, as displayed in the 2009 covers album Townes. “I would talk about Townes to anybody who would listen. After I started making records and became semi-famous myself, I would talk about Townes constantly. Then I got outta jail and discovered that people like Jay Farrar and Jeff Tweedy, that generation of Americana musicians that came about while I was gone – they all knew Townes Van Zandt chapter and verse, and maybe I had something to do with that because those guys also have my records.
“By the time I made my Townes record, there was an interest in it because of Townes, not me. Some people came to it because it was the next Steve Earle record, but there were people who hadn’t heard of me and came to it because they were Townes Van Zandt songs. Pancho And Lefty was the beginning of it. He was making what could have been a really great record if he was in better shape with the Two Dollar Pistols guys when he died.
“I realised working on the book the other day, I just finished this mini-thesis within the whole thing that explains I belong to a cult, the cult of Townes Van Zandt. The word ‘cult’ gets misused, like ‘awesome’ and ‘genius’, that people don’t really know what they mean anymore. A cult is a belief system a group of people who adhere to a belief based on the teachings of one person. Transcendental Meditation is a cult based around Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Tibetan Buddhism is a cult, Christianity is a cult, so is Islam. Certain sects of Judaism are. All those things are cults. But what we think of cults now is Jim Jones and the Kool-Aid. That’s a cult too, but that’s become the meaning of the word when it isn’t the meaning of the word.
“Like ‘genius’ isn’t someone who is really smart, ‘genius’ is someone who does something so well that they basically create something that didn’t exist before. Bob Dylan is a genius. Jimi Hendrix was a genius. Charlie Parker was a genius. There’s a jillion other saxophone players and guitar players and songwriters that people have called ‘genius’ that aren’t. I don’t think Townes was a genius, he was a really great songwriter. The Beatles collectively are a genius, but I’m not sure that any of them are individually. The idea in the book is that I belong to a cult. Lucinda Williams belongs to it, Guy Clark belongs to it too. we directly picked up this thing that set us apart from Townes.”
With the conclusion of Treme, one could assume that Steve is looking to David Simon’s next project for a possible outlet for his next thespian outing. “Treme is wrapped. The project I’m talking to David about now is the possibility of a musical based on Sparrow’s Point, which is a steel plant in Baltimore during World War II, with black and white culture coming together to make Baltimore what it is. There’ll be something to come along from David. But I’m keeping busy. I’ve just done some shows as a duo with Shawn Colvin; we may make a record together. My next record will be a blues record, basically, with The Dukes. First we’ll head to Australia, I can’t wait to get out there. Bluesfest is one of my favourite festivals in the world, Byron is one of my favourite towns in the world.”
BY LACHLAN KANONIUK
