INTERVIEW: ENGLISH BLUES-ROCK GUITARIST JOANNE SHAW TAYLOR

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Joanne Shaw Taylor was discovered by Dave Stewart of The Eurythmics at the age of 16 and immediately invited her on the road with his group D.U.P. From there, her army of plaudits built and included Jimmy Cliff, Joe Bonamassa, Stevie Wonder and Annie Lennox. She’s become one of the most sought after guitarists in the world of blues rock. Over the past two decades, Joanne has proven herself as a prolific songwriter, releasing seven acclaimed albums with each one proving to be more successful than the previous. She has cemented herself as one of the most important exports in British blues-rock. We sat down with her recently for a fun talk where she opened up about her beginnings and much more.

You only have a few more dates left in this tour. How has this run been?

Joanne Shaw Taylor: Things have been going great! As you said we don’t have long to go. We have been out a couple of months, we started the beginning of September, so we’re rolling down towards the end of the year and the holidays. I’ve got a great crew, great people, great fans and the theaters that we have been playing have been lovely so I’m a very happy and lucky woman.

I can hear that happiness coming through the phone. I could actually hear you smiling as you said it.

I definitely was!

You’re coming through North Carolina soon on November 28 to The Carolina Theater of Durham which is an absolutely gorgeous theater. It has a very cool vibe, a great atmosphere, very cool acoustics and I love going there. I know you’ve been to thousands of places in your travels but do you know if you have ever played there?

I don’t think I’ve ever been to Durham before. I may have but I don’t think so, but as you said with all the dates that I do and the advancing years you start forgetting some of these things (laughs).

We have a pretty large fan base in the UK and I do some work with UK publicists. We actually just got a press release from one of them this week about your UK dates that start February.

Yeah, there’s no getting away from me at the moment; I’m everywhere.

That’s a good thing to be in demand and have people wanting to talk to you.

Very true; it’s better than the opposite.

So you’ve released a couple of new singles so far and I am hearing rumblings of a new album next year.

Yes we do, but I don’t think we have a release date just yet. We recorded one and we keep feeding out singles. We have some other songs coming out pretty soon.

Is there a difference in the U.S. and UK audiences?

The UK crowds, more specifically the English crowds, tend to be not quite as rowdy as you lovely Americans. When you get up near Scotland, they tend to be pretty vocal about looking forward to the shows which I love. In mainland Europe there are language barriers and in Spain everything shuts down in the middle of the day. In America there’s always a Walmart or something open or somewhere to get a late night bite to eat. In England, it’s similar because you can walk everywhere and everything’s small so they’re convenient companies to tour.

When you’re getting ready to go over and tour the UK, what’s something that you miss about over there that you look forward to getting?

The Sunday roast, the Guinness over there is far better. I guess it just doesn’t travel well but mostly I’m looking forward to seeing my Dad there and my brother and some very dear friends. The main thing is looking forward to seeing the people that you love.

How about we flip the script and when you’re over there what’s something you can’t wait to get back over here to the US to get?

I always joke that when I’m in America I miss pubs and when I’m in England I miss bars. You guys do bars really well, but we do pubs with the big fireplaces and there’s always a dog in there for you to pet. You guys do the late night dive bar with a good burger and stuff. I consider myself very much an English American (laughs).

When did you move to the U.S.?

2009, so it’s been about 14 years.

Did you move straight to Detroit when you moved over here?

I did, I was in Detroit for 14 years and then I moved last year to Nashville.

Was there a reason that the initial move was to Detroit?

It was just a faithful thing; I had always wanted to live in America maybe not forever but I wanted to experience it. Predominantly all of my influences were Americans and I was so invested in this music. So it made sense to go see the country where it all originated. I grew up on a pretty small island and you could tour it in a month. If I wanted to become a professionally touring musician I would have to move to mainland Europe or move to America. Then, it just so happened that I met someone who opened up for me in the UK that was from Detroit. I had just done my first album and I became friends with them. I talked to them about moving to Detroit and I asked him if he could help me with a place to stay and then logistical stuff that you need help with when traveling to a foreign country. Then we got an agent and we started touring out of Detroit. I was kind of the right age to go traveling myself.

It’s amazing how much Nashville has changed over the years. It was the country capital and now it’s this huge melting pot of music.

It’s pretty much the music industry capital of America now. L.A. got to be too expensive so I think you see a lot of people gravitating towards Nashville.

How did the connection with Joe Bonamassa happen?

We both got booked on a blues festival and I think we played in Norway. I opened it up just before him and he asked me to get up and jam with him. It was one of those where they put all of the artists in one hotel to keep them isolated, so we had a lot of drunken Norwegians all together (laughs). We met in the hotel and got to chatting and we ended up staying the full night and having great conversation. I started so young like a lot of kids did but by the time I was 16 I was playing with Dave Stewart, Jimmy Cliff and all these big names. I had not met anyone else who had done that until I met Joe. When he was 14 or 15 he was playing with BB King, so there was a mutual bonding there. I’d never gotten with another adult who had started at the same age as me so it became a big bond. He was always a few steps ahead of me on successful levels so it was kind of like having this big, older brother to coach me through stuff and give me tips. Also I think because we’re such different artists. I think it comes from me writing from the female perspective and he writing from the male perspective that we never really felt like we were in competition with each other.

You met him and now you’re on his label! His label’s a bit different and I think it’s really cool in the way that they handle their artists as opposed to other labels.

Yeah, he and Roy have really kind of changed the music industry. Their approach of doing everything themselves has been hugely successful for Joe. He’s my neighbor now; I live one street away from him in Nashville so I get to bug him on a regular basis (laughs).

You mentioned gigging at such an early age at 15. It’s amazing that you were high school age and instead of teenage drama, you’re out there gigging. How did Dave Stewart of The Eurythmics find you?

It was in my hometown of Wednesbury which is a small town about 15 miles from Birmingham. My mom had just recovered from breast cancer and we were asked by a support group called Breastest Friends to do a charity event. A friend of Dave’s happened to be there and passed on a demo CD to him which again is one of those sliding doors that if my mom had never had breast cancer then I would have never met Dave Stewart.

In life, you have to try your best to find a positive in a negative.

Yes, you have to try and find them where you can.

Is there anything else coming up on your radar that you’d like to mention?

I’m looking forward to the new album coming out and I’m probably going to do some more recording next year. Covid kept me locked up in the house for two years so I have plenty of energy right now and creativity rolling. I’m looking forward to Christmas because it’s my favorite time of year. I’m looking forward to touring and getting back out in the New Year and seeing the supporters.

We like to end these with something called Three For The Road. We loosened you up and let you stretch with those easy questions. Now, we hit you with the tough ones. Who was your first celebrity crush?

I don’t know if anyone at home would remember him. It was Bret The Hitman Heart. He was a wrestler who wore a pink leotard I guess I loved a man in Lycra back then. I had a big poster of him on my wall.

I loved him! The best is, the best there was and the best there ever will be! He was so awesome!

Both he and the whole Hart family were fabulous.

If you could have anyone be your inner voice, who would it be?

That’s a good one; it would probably be Phoebe Buffay from Friends. She was slightly mad, slightly hippy but generally quite positive with a hint of street smarts. Phoebe has that kind of street you know because she was homeless for a bit.

I am sure you know of that classic film Crossroads. Which role would you play Steve Vai’s role or Ralph Macchio’s? Who would you cast as the other role?

I would definitely be the devil and Joe (Bonamassa) would be the other one or maybe Samantha Fish. Those are my two favorites in contemporary blues. No, actually Sam would make a better devil because she is so confident in what she wears. She wears some awesome outfits so that might be more fun. I’m sure she should have more fun dressing in like a red for fur coat as the devil and I would wear a white one.