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JP Jones

"One of the best American singer-songwriters."- Kevin McCarthy - Kevin's Celtic & Folk Music CD Reviews

"One of the best songwriters in the indie world." - Jan Best - Independent Songwriter Web Magazine

“JP Jones may well be the best modern folk musician in the country, a man who in the past attracted the ears of giants yet today remains a virtual unknown. With his 12th CD on the way, it’s well past time the light shone on such riveting talent...extraordinarily rewarding fare, easily the best genuine modern folk music I’ve heard in the last 10 years.” -- Mark Tucker - OpEdNews.com

“When all is said and done, there are maybe a score of singer-songwriters today who combine deep insight into the human psyche with a broad grasp of history, religion, literature, American mythology and landscape - plus a real genius for writing both words and melodies. JP Jones ought to be counted among them.”     -- Hugh Blumenfeld -  Sing Out!

“JP Jones writes with an intensity and vision that transcends the sound...Jones has a way with words, and he nails them, hammers them, and stretches them, but never minces them.” -- Rich Warren - Sing Out!

“Jones creates songs of world-weary grace and beauty. The vision is dark and diaphanous with disappointment, failed love, put off dreams and atmospherically brilliant evocation. He’s a staccato stiletto to your heart.” -- Mark Gresser - Music Matters Review

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Magical Thinking

JP Jones, Folk Rock, and Magical Thinking 

John Paul Jones, saddled with the same name as Led Zeppelin's bassist and thus operating under "JP Jones", is a Rhode Island folk musician and rocker who almost caught the fast track to fame in the 70's. He was signed to the Windfall label, a subsidiary of Columbia Records and home to hard rockers Mountain, but at exactly the wrong time, when Clive Davis & Co. decided they didn't like the upstart venture and buried it, Jones going down with the ship. 

But now, it's 30 years later and the troubadour is one of America's best-kept secrets, a condition hopefully soon to change. He's been issuing CDs regularly and has just now put out his twelfth, Magical Thinking, and not a moment too soon. At a time when damn near every dial position of commercial radio is as gawdawful as ever, this disc is a shining star. Jones is head-shotted on the disc's cover, the weathered countenance of a guy who's seen life and the industry, standing firm without losing his balance, while both took their best shots. There's a hard edge there, just beneath the tentative smile, evincing a musician who's become a bit weary and a lot wiser, imbued with the rough and tumble of making it day to day in a world hostile to loners. 

"A Man Stands Up" opens the CD and gives a broad hint of the soul and 
integrity of the musician-poet's position. A soporific synthesizer floats above Jones' voice and lulls the listener while the lyrics take on an anthemic proportion. The cut's a re-working of a selection from his last CD, Thugs and Lovers, longer and more engaging. In fact, on this release, the composer has chosen to revivify three works from a long catalog, something many Big Time musicians might want to take a cue from. He re-crafts "Prophet in His Prime" as well, from the elder "Jeremiah", newly cutting in zydeco accordion and sounding very Dylan-ish. 

Though Jones wrestles with life, he remains ever the streetwise sage, 
simultaneously the gift and curse heir to the folk tradition. This, however, isn't limited to the painful ruminations standard to the genre, but takes on rather ribald tones whenever it can. "Wreck the Bed", for instance, is an unusually erotic piece, almost nasty here and there while good-natured, playfully lusty: 

I miss your big-girl legs 
I miss your cinnamon grin 
I miss my little fish's kisses 
Down where the waves roll in 

You got somewhere to get to 
You got somethin' to do 
You got somethin' that you got comin' 
And I got somethin' for you 

It proceeds in a shuffling beat, lazy and thick, with airy guitar glances glazing starry borders to the tune's atmosphere. Once or twice, Jones approaches Tin Pan Alley from the Paul Williams sidestreet (think "Old Souls"), penning laments to pain and pleasure in thoughtful drawing-room memories. His voice holds the savor of many antecedents: Dylan foremost but also Mark Knopfler, a tang of Warren Zevon, and a distant growl of Waits, nonetheless his own man through it all. Those vocal chords show they've been through the mill and traveled many nights, but this only lends an expressive uniqueness while displaying emotional vulnerabilities and strengths, the sort of thing folk music thrives on. 

Rebellion is a dominant theme in all of folk and rock, and "That's All 
Right" steps in with a bounce-step, attractive backing vocals bolstering its unusual acceptance of the lone wolf's role: 

They will poke you with an elbow 
They'll punch you with a fist 
And if no label sticks to you 
They'll swear you don't exist 

That's all right 
That's all right 
It's just the way it should be 
That's all right 

The music of all of Magical Thinking is tight while relaxed, showing the easy grace of a professional who very well knows where the pocket is, falling into it every time. Jones continually lets down borders, exposing his heart, ushering listeners into the forgotten realms of life, reflecting on the kaleidoscope we behold from day to day. "Ezmerelda" features what appears to be strings but could be adept synthesizers, a moody tune delivered late at night, pondering the shallow rewards of promiscuity, the bright lights of the fast life. The blunt exposure of a slide to disappointment and pain is tempered by the kindredness the listener him- or herself may have had to the condition at one time or another, the setting sun a metaphor for an approaching wisdom dipped in regret. 

"Sufficient" pulls tempo and spirits back up, a bopping spell of admiration for a woman sitting in the center of the singer's warm regard. The title sabotages society's glamour sickness and invokes the sentiment that we're just what we are and that all of it is quite sufficient. The 15-minute "The Fire and the Rose" closes out the entire disc, trad folk stretched out to Homeric lengths, dropping the fire and thunder that often accompany such opuses, organ propping up the backspaces of a small novel. It signals a return to Dylan and the height of the folk movement, where the psyche of the brazen rock world is reminded of its roots. Appropriate to all Jones' tunes, we're left with wistfulness. 

This is an affecting disc. It carries such a myriad of flavors, scents, 
ideas, laments, and ruefully gentle smiles, calling back across the 
musician's many long years of craft to produce his crowning statement in a field of excellences. Magical Thinking is indeed magical listening, wrought by a vet who never lost the spark that drove him to take up the crucible in the first place. Of all the die-hards who have impressed us with their devotions to the Muse, there is perhaps no one more tried and true than Rhode Island's JP Jones, a man who may well be America's most talented yet hidden lion of independent music. This disc at long last should prove to be his shining moment. 
© Steven Francis, OpEdNews.com

Other On-Line Reviews:
Folk & Acoustic Music Exchange

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 Thugs and Lovers

This review is written by Kevin McCarthy
(Used by permission)

Love the title, don't you?

Like with his previous release "Jeremiah," JP Jones is back with another stripped-down, all-acoustic, a man, his guitar, telling-stories-in-his-head release. But there is one differerence. As enjoyable as "Jeremiah" was, "Thugs and Lovers" is even better So good, that it should be on many "Best of 2005" lists. It will be on mine.

The most apt comparison I can come up with for Jones is Greg Brown. In the writing and, at times, in the singing, he certainly could be mistaken for Brown. Sometimes the music is even early Dylan-esque. Yes, we're talking some mighty high company here.

A folk release, with elements of the blues, Jones' CD musically travels the path from contemptuous anger and scornful cynicism to greater self-awareness and finally, with the last cut, a degree of transformation. All is displayed through the prism of relationships.

One offering here, the anthem-like "a man stands up," is so good it will make you positively giddy. Worth the price of the CD alone, this inspirational and empowering song-guide simplifies all human interaction. Jones sings:

"when a sister's lost
when she's left behind
when a brother falls
on the hardest times
when a child's life
is on the line
a man stands up

with a tender heart
with an open mind
with a will to heal
where the world is blind
in the face of greed
and the party line
a man stands up..."

This one will remind listeners of Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down."

"Revelation" comes very close to matching the power and intensity of "a man stands up." Dramatically detailing the arc of a relationship, Jones takes the listener from the earliest beginning to the concluding torment of  recurring guilt. The song ends with:

"...now all your days are haunted
by the ghosts
the ghosts you couldn't kill
the ones you never really wanted
the one you always will
the revelation of her soul
exploding in your path
she gave you everything except
the faith you never had."

The first half of the release contains the bitter and 'bluesey' focus. A verse from "not your business now" serves as a prime example: "we used to roll together, a couple of puppies in bed, tell each other our secrets, all the dreams in our head, sleep with who you want to, make love if you know how, who I'm wakin up with, it's not your business now..."

The Dylan-like tunes are "crawlin out of wakefield," "nothin like" and somebody who will." These could easily be included in Dylan's early songbook.

In "nothin like," Jones provides these evocative lines: "nothin like the beauty in my true love's eyes, nothin like the shining in the blue, blue sky, nothin like the feelin of her hand in mine, nothin like the shadow that she left behind..."

"somebody who will" starts with: "it's as clear as night and day baby, we just can't connect, I got too much to unload here, you got too much too protect..."

By the final cut, a degree of personal evolution or resolution has taken place:

"gotta second chance
got some work to do
gotta second chance
you can get one too
gotta second chance
more 'n I deserve
got my mind made up
I'm here to serve..."

So if you are seeking imagination, poetry and insight, then frolic in the continued unveiling of one of the best American singer-songwriters, JP Jones. He is a masterful songwriter.

Okay, I lied in my second paragraph, but just a bit. Jones accompanies himself on acoustic guitar AND rack harp.

Track List:

• temporary blues - (3:36)
• pink flamingos - (3:41)
• not your business now - (3:32)
• crawlin out of wakefield - (5:23)
• handbasket - (1:53
• long haul - (3:41)
• a man stands up - (2:37)
• nothin like - (2:30)
• buildin on your case - (3:36)
• somebody who will - (3:57)
• revelation - (5:20)
• here to serve - (2:37)

Other On-Line Reviews:
http://www.adequacy.net/review.php?reviewID=5183
http://www.minor7th.com/shorttakes6_05.html

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Jeremiah

Y’know, it’s hard to decide what’s bolder, ending this recording with “Abu,” a 19 min, 20 seconds spoken word piece (dating back to 1987), with no text supplied for the story – we’ll get back to it later – or donning a neck-scarf of the kind some people associate with one side in the current troubles in the Middle East and staring past the potential buyer with large, gloomy eyes, looking at something ‘way beyond sales figures. Who is this guy, a first-time visitor to the world of JP Jones might well ask.

The first cut, “Prophet in his Prime,” a growling, wailing first-person meditation on the Old Testament prophet Jeremiah, twisting and turning along in this could be first draft from “my emerging material/taken from a back page of my mind,” announcing itself as “one episode in a serial/a document of love/in our time,” telling you to “take it from a prophet in his prime,” begins to answer the question.  It also turns directly to the hearer: “the only mortal flaw/I ever heard of/when did your heart turn to ice?” and sharing the mortal chill, “when did mine?” – but pleading “don’t give up on us but/take the word of/a poet who has paid and/made it rhyme.”

The internal alliterations and half-rhymes in the verse complicate and release the address to a maybe-unheeding listener, the unheard participant – or heedless bystander? - in the drama. Give that powerful, rising and falling voice and that insinuating solo guitar half a chance, and he’ll sweep you on in. The apparent exultation of “there’s a new world a-comin/and it won’t be long,” opening the next song immediately gives way to, “where will you stand/when the old one is gone?” The Old Testament prophet for whom the whole collection of “emerging material” is named now rises to full pitch – “the sun will be blindin/the oceans will rise/and it won’t do no good/to be blamin the skies” – colloquial and towering at the same time. The only partial escape from the doom-filled vision in which we are all swept up – “will we wake up in time/to find what it’s about?” – given that “the changes this time/must come from inside out” – seems to be to “lay down your heartache/and pick up a song.” But what kind of song? And he goes on, in the next song on the CD, “With Open Eyes,” to take the part of the refugee, “from a modern war,” who “lost my family/you’ve seen my face before/with open eyes/with open eyes,” and you turn over the recording in your hands to look into those large, mournful eyes. Oh yeah. I’m betting by this time you’ve got it, and he’s gotcha. Not for nothing is JP Jones’ single-artist record company called “Vision Company.”

There is some relief from the intensity, in the shout-out which follows, calling on “every boy, every girl/everybody in the/whole wide world” to get together and let it out. At this point, maybe you’ll miss JP’s rockin’ bar-band, Rite Tite, which has appeared on a number of his previous outings on Vision Company, the solo guitar taking the instrumental weight that otherwise might have been shared with the guys in the band: “play to win and be kind/have a little peace of mind/stand up tall and be free” – JP’s been known to kick his jams out.

But the song which follows, “Still Life” – “a black bird from the mountains/and the morning just begun/he was either lost or he was/searchin for the sun” winds slowly into “standin in the door and I don’t/know what I’m waitin for/there’s no tellin where or why she’s gone,” just takes you on into the territory of a heart broken in love. The haiku-like juxtaposition – “the wind is from the mountains/and I know more snow is due/I tried and tried to reach her/but there’s just no getting through,” leads on into the lament, “holdin on the line/I will try another one more time/nothin but the silence ringing true,” and you can hear that phone at the other end, just not getting picked up. The sorrows of Jeremiah have more than merely political origins.

OK, as Richard Thompson has reminded us, songwriting is theatre. If you find yourself playing the part of the bereft lover here, it’s working.

And we’re back to the retelling of the Old Testament story and the title song, “Jeremiah,” with Isaiah “who say to Jerry/’son, wha do you intendin to? /makin all of them predictions,” and voicing the prophet’s second-worst fear, “what if one of em should come true?” Just imagine – “all them people dead/all them things you said.” Worst of all, “out of the darkness comes a Christ/who fails to heed it pays a price.” Dire warning, indeed – what if? And the story of Jeremiah unwinds in the tight verses that follow, the tale of the prophet whose visions fail to come true, lost and deserted, “underneath the midday sun/lookin out across the valley/thinking how far he had come.” Vision enough for you?

So back to a lovesong – “Without You” – and a story about someone “playin solitaire” – “The Man Upstairs” – and a simple song about separate lives – “So Far So Good” – even an old Scottish song – “So Early in the Spring” – which lands a sailor back in Glasgow town before he goes a-roaming once again without his lost love, and then finally – not finally – a sweet love song, “To Sleep With You” – a collection which seems by now to have drifted a little from its original visionary intention.

Seems to have. But finally, here’s the story of King Abu, the life of someone who, reared to be a “Solitary Walker,” passes thro the rituals of initiation with seeming failure, but then – somehow – ascends to the throne, with a lover by his side, and drifts on thro a long life of serene rulership, to a slow and gentle death, finally passing quietly from the scene, as his lover draws the curtain on his reign. It’s a life of understated drama, the gods and monsters largely offstage, breaking thro at the necessary critical moment – whose meaning remains obscure, as is a final evaluation of the king. Was he really a failure at the hour of testing? Was his long and serene life an answer to that question? Did he really deserve his throne, and did the peaceful calm of his reign lay that question to rest? Unanswered questions, of course, probably calling for repeated listenings to his quiet, regal and non-regal story, and maybe even then not yielding up all of its answers. You come up from immersion in the story strangely refreshed, made calm and peaceful yourself. In the term of the mystic, this king has “a good ending.”

Where did it come from, this non-Jeremiad placed so strangely – yes – at the end of an absorbing musical journey? It’s a blessing, of course, a gift from the well of JP’s visions. It may not get much airplay, given its length, its spoken-word status. I’m glad it’s there, however. Don’t pass it over when you listen to “Jeremiah,” a CD whose music might otherwise tempt you to let go this long, mildly dramatic conclusion. It’s a revelation of depths beyond the prophetic, beyond the love songs, beyond the quirky celebrations, a slowly moving glimpse into mysteries of the heart and of the soul. It deserves respect.

  Copyright John McLaughlin

Other On-Line Reviews:
http://www.icogitate.com/~celticfolkmusic/fr-JPJones.htm http://www.indie-music.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2873 http://www.adequacy.net/review.php?reviewID=3996

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Life and Death

Every time JP Jones releases a new CD he sends me a copy with a note saying that he hopes I'll play it on my radio show ... but supposes it's too rock 'n' roll.  I always concur. Life and Death is no less rock than his previous releases, yet I find myself playing it on my radio show.  That's because it is one very compelling CD.  There's nothing "beautiful" about this recording.  I don't grow misty-eyed over Jones's voice or want to wax eloquent about his guitar playing, although he possesses a fine voice and knows his way around a guitar.  Rather, JP Jones writes with an intensity and vision that transcends the sound. Don't misunderstand, this is a first rate production.  The songs live up to the CD's title, they revolve around the two fundamental poles of our existence, even the oblique love songs.  Jones certainly has a way with words, and he nails them, hammers them, and stretches them, but never minces them.  His songs question our values and reject war. Whether the opening song "Cum a Live" or "What in God's Name" he resentfully questions our wars in the name of God and sums up everything nicely in the concluding "When the Change Finally Comes."  The intensity never lets up, even on the quieter songs such as "The King Is Dead," or "In the Beginning."  The latter cleverly connects the here and now and the eternal.  However, Jones does have a wry sense of humor and can laugh at himself, or at least his trade, as he does in "The Last Song."  This is probably the last rock CD I'll review, but I felt compelled to announce even an acoustic folkie can be stirred and shaken by a forceful trip into life and death. Rich Warren – Sing Out!

Other On-Line Reviews:
http://www.indie-music.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article sid=2212
http://www.adequacy.net/review.php?reviewID=1955
http://www.swaves.com/Back_Issues/July03/JP_JONES.html

Other On-Line Reviews:
http://www.minor7th.com/m7_4_02.html
http://www.adequacy.net/review.php?reviewID=1956
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:iz4uak6k0m3l

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Ashes

John Paul Jones recorded his first album in 1972 at the age of 23. Released on CBS' Columbia/Windfall label, it sold only 8000 copies. He waited eighteen years to release his next self-produced album, and has, over the past 10 years, released three more. This[Ashes] is his latest. Jones has a gravelly voice and some 300 songs stored up to sing. He feels that maturity has given him something worth writing about. He does indeed have a variety of styles to go with a variety of messages. At one point he says: "now don't you worry, if you're a loner / your spirit can be wounded but it never can be killed / some how I know it deep down inside me / every longing of the human heart / shall one day be fulfilled."

There is a bit of the rocker in Jones, along with a Dylan sound, and some Jack Hardy. All in all, it is an unusual collection of songs performed well. In an age of silly lyrics and indistinguishable voices, JP Jones indeed has something different to offer. He is worth serious attention. Victor K. Heyman, Sing Out!

Other On-Line Reviews:
http://balladtree.com/reviews/jonesjp.htm
http://www.mmreview.com/reviews/2000/jpjones.htm
http://rambles.net/jones_ashes.html
http://www.indie-music.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=299

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© Jan Best - Independent Songwriter Web Magazine
Used by Permission

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Like Springsteen at his best, Jones is able to write songs that seem to dwell on loneliness, despair and disappointment, yet somehow evoke a feeling of hopefulness.

Jones recorded Broken Open over a year in a studio donated by friend and colleague, Lloyd Salisbury, using all local musicians.  The depth of instrumentation, purity of sound, and polish of production is remarkable for an independently produced record.