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Chuck Prophet - The Hurting Business (2000)

Name a recent worthy folk, country or roots rock record, and chances are you'll find Chuck adding his indelible guitar licks in there somewhere. Chuck's star continues to rise, and not only through session work, as he carves out a solo career of note. After albums of low key folk and infectious guitar rock, Chuck builds on his unmistakable immediacy with a dab of soul. Backing singers, slinky organ fills, and tasty turntable scratching make for some ass-shaking tunes. Not that Chuck's completely left his roots behind, but like a wily pitcher who needs to make adjustments in mid-career, he's just mixing things up a little. The Hurting Business is easily his best work to date, and considering his stellar solo and Green on Red work, that is saying something.

John Sekerka

Tracks:

01. Rise

02. The Hurting Business

03. Apology

04. Diamond Jim

05. It Won't Be Long

06. Lucky

07. God's Arms

08. I Couldn't Be Happier

09. Shore Patrol

10. Dyin' All Young

11. Statehouse (Burning In The Rain)

12. La Paloma

The Hurting Business

Track By Track

Rise

At first it was called 'A Change Is Gonna Come', but you haven't been able to call a song that for several hundred years. That's Stephie Finch cast in the role of the wayward child. It's a little like Tony Joe White piggybacked over a Turtles breakbeat or a trip from San Francisco to San Antonio in less than three minutes.

The Hurting Business

Mike Tyson said it first. Presumably, he meant it literally. Biting off years and breaking hearts is all in day's work for some showfolk. I think I was under the influence of? and the Mysterians and Sir Douglas Quintet at the time. Maybe Jerry Springer will pick up on it as a theme song. It's all in there.

Apology

Randy Newman meets Glen Campbell in a wine bar and they start arguing about the south. In comes El Vez, who neither one has ever heard of; a young lady on each arm and a spare bringing up the rear. All of them seem to know exactly who he is. He introduces himself and Randy opines, "You're not even the king of bottled beers where I come from." Things get unprofessional. Before it's all over, everybody wants an apology. Sensitive to insensitive and back again. Conn organ metronome "count off' preserved on cassette and reproduced by Jacquire King.

It Won't Be Long

Trailer park trash, carpetbaggers with high Arbitron ratings. The sad beauty of freak encounters recollected, last chances cheerfully blown, Waterloo sunsets digitally altered by faceless electromagnetic collectives. Put your Business in the street and the heartland takes a bow. Jenny Jones nightmare appearance hangover recounted in three verses.

Shore Patrol

Old movies. Anti-heroes. A tribute to Jack, Hal and the generation who took Hollywood by the balls and held firm for a while. Not nearly long enough. Before the French reclaimed it and Auteur became nothing more than another post modern band moniker. And by the way, that's the pride of Daly City, DJ Rise on turntable. Rise and I have been chipping away at our own record for a while. Stay tuned.

God's Arms

A story within a story, based on a line from a romance magazine. Reincarnation, shape-shifting, Bobby Gentry strings blowing in from the east. Buddy Holly on opium. Resurfacing on a rehab collection plate.

Diamond Jim

Who the hell is Diamond Jim? There's a finders fee, but not a big one. I found a stack of 45's at a flea market. Watt's One Hundred and Tenth Street Rhythm Band, James Brown, Lowell Fulsom, Inez Foxx, Bull and the Matadors and the like. I added them to my swelling collection. I lived with them till they got under my skin and stayed there. I would've loved to have come up with a new post millennial dance step, but this is what came out the other end of the Cuisinart. Without Diamond Jim, the BBQ is just row after row of sizzling meat and the announcer wont say "play ball." Diamond Jim is the patron saint of the Apocalypse. Until he comes back, traffic lights will blink incoherently. Fowls will fill the air, rivers will change directions, my laptop will go up in digital dust.

Bring it on.

I Couldn't Be Happier

Here Comes the Bride? Having recently gotten hitched, I got to thinking someone should write a song for the grooms. Where lovers sway in the key of A minor. I never got around to finishing this song. The first time I ever sang it is the version you hear.

Lucky

Revenge is a dish best served cold. This guy steals your band and marries your girl and you end up running his sound board and taking her dog to the vet. We wrote it thinking it might be perfect for Johnny Cash. It turned into this, which might not be so perfect for Johnny Cash after all. Who wouldn't like to get lucky?

Dyin' All Young

Major 7th chords and a towel over the snare. Who's gonna count the song off now?

Statehouse (Burning In the Rain)

Its bound to happen. Everything will. I play the patsy, the guy who just wandered by and took the fall. Farfisas provide the stabbing punctuation. Even the buildings built to last forever don't. In Havana as elsewhere, sometimes people cheer for all the wrong reasons.

La Paloma

On the road again. California is so close to Mexico that whenever we mention it someone is sure to remind us we stole it. J.J. Cale locked in the research department of Mattel Toys.

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Since founding the critically revered roots rock band Green on Red during the Eighties, guitarist and songwriter Chuck Prophet has been performing in near obscurity; bouncing from label to label, while making superb, mostly overlooked albums and building a solid, devoted cult following, especially in Europe. The Hurting Business, Prophet's fifth full-length album and first for the HighTone label, continues in the fashion of his past work: chock-full of songs that are rootsy, inventive, and well matched to finely drawn story lines. Musically, however, this is Prophet's most adventurous work. He continues to draw from a grab bag of American music styles that include rock, soul, country, blues, and folk, yet all are filtered through an electronic sieve and melded with DJs adding turntable tricks and an array of keyboards that include mellotron, different types of organs, and synthesizers. The results are an attractive, modern frame for a cast of oddball characters that populate Prophet's down-to-earth portrayal of life in today's America. "Dying All Young" shimmers and sways, conflicting with its aching tale of a mother and her feelings of loss after a child's death. The title track tips its hat to the Sir Douglas Quintet, while describing the pain of a broken love. At times, Prophet strides daringly close to the territory covered by Tom Waits, with his use of vocals through what sounds like a megaphone, clanking percussion, and angular guitar riffs. Jacquire King, who engineered Waits' Mule Variations, is listed as co-producer on The Hurting Business. Yet where Waits dares to conjure images of a hell on Earth with a clang and a shout, Prophet's vision is easier on the ears and much closer to Paradise.

AMG

Now five records into a solo career, the former guitarist for Green on Red leaves his stripped-down, bluesy past behind, adding a score of Mellotron, saxophone, synthesizer, and sampling for a more urban mosaic. The result is a soulful medley where Prophet continues to follow the Dylan book of songwriting, arming his characters with compelling story lines and clever wordplay. The title track's account of a broken relationship proves exultant thanks to a playful Farfisa organ and splendid backing vocals by Prophet's wife, Stephanie Finch. Prophet mimics Tom Waits over a fierce J.J. Cale riff on "La Paloma." And radio programmers looking for a hit should check out "Dyin' All Young," a mother's ode to her young son's death. It's an instantly catchy, though forever haunting

ballad that propels Chuck Prophet up another rung on the ladder of underappreciated songwriters. --Scott Holter

Biography by Denise Sullivan

Chuck Prophet is the least heralded guitar player of the '80s and '90s, with songwriting skills to match his prodigious instrumental talent. Born in the mid-'60s in Southern California, Prophet first made his mark as the young guitarist in L.A.'s Green on Red, a forerunner of the Paisley Underground movement; however, Green on Red's attack was inspired more by American apple pie than psychedelics. After disbanding finally in 1992, Prophet began to focus all attention on the solo career he started with 1990's Brother Aldo (Fire). Prophet's devotion to roots music is for its sources, but he also sounds inspired by Bob Dylan's lyrics and Keith Richards and Eric Clapton's guitars; his voice bears a resemblance to Tom Petty's. He followed with Balinese Dancer in 1993 and Feast of Hearts in 1995. Prophet earned positive critical attention on these shores, but his greatest success came overseas. Throughout his solo career, he's worked with legends and inspirations from Bob Neuwirth to Jim Dickinson to Billy Swan and beat poet Hubert Huncke and most recently with Austin guitarist Calvin Russell. He maintained a friendship with legendary Memphis sessionman and songwriter Jim Dickinson, with whom Prophet collaborated on a live recording A Thousand Footprints in the Sand. The band he's used most consistently is Anders Rundblad (bass), Paul Revelli (drums), Max Butler (guitar) and Stephanie Finch on keyboards. Finch is Prophet's partner, and they've worked together since Brother Aldo. In 1997, Prophet came through with Homemade Blood (Cooking Vinyl), a live-in-the-studio set that brings home the talents of a mature guitarist, songwriter and singer. Three years later, he followed up with a Hightone collection of new original material, The Hurting Business, which helped show that he was still going strong. The album was a huge critical success, and he followed it up with another praised effort, 2002's No Other Love.

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