If the blues is your genre of choice or even if it’s something you’re curious about, do I have a performer for you: Selwyn Birchwood. This young man has been called a visionary for his unique approach to the venerable genre, which is fueled by his fiery guitar and lap steel playing. His skills are coupled with an extremely talented band made up of Regi Oliver on saxophones and flute, bassist Huff Wright and drummer Courtney “Big Love” Girlie. He will perform four sets at the American Folk Festival up in Bangor Aug. 25-2; then he’ll head to Rockland’s Time Out Pub for a 6 p.m. show on Aug. 28. In a recent telephone interview that found him in Florida, he talked about his music as well as his upcoming mini-Maine tour.

Q: How’s it going?

Birchwood: Well, I can’t complain. We’ve got a few more days in Florida here before we head back on the road. We’ve been doing shows here for the past week and a half after getting off a six-and-a-half-week tour about two weeks ago, and then we head back out for another four and a half weeks on Tuesday. So, we’ve got two more shows in Florida before we head back out on the road.

Q: Are you doing all of those shows in one venue down there?

Birchwood: No, we live in Florida so there are a lot of venues (there) that we play at while we’re home.

Q: Have you played in Maine before?

Birchwood: We have, we played the North Atlantic Blues Festival in 2013.

Q: Was that right after you got signed to Alligator Records or just before?

Birchwood: That was actually just after we won the International Blues Challenge and just before we got signed.

Q: Well, speaking of your recordings, “Pick Your Poison” was the first CD of yours that I’ve heard and it was surprising to me because I got some funk and jazz elements in those 13 tracks. It is not your typical blues album. Am I hearing it correctly or am I way off base?

Birchwood: No, that’s what we’re striving to do. We’re really trying to find what we can more closely call our own sound. I feel like a lot of times people want to pigeon-hole this music and latch on to a certain sound and decide that that’s the only sound that you can have in blues music, and I tend to disagree on that. I think what was cool about the guys like B.B. King and Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker and all these guys, they were telling their own story in their own voice, and that’s what I want to do as well. I think this record is the best attempt so far of taking those older blues sounds that I love so much and trying to put my own personality into it. There’s so many different styles, even within the blues genre, that I really wanted to make a record that had a bunch of different colors to it so that you don’t feel like you’re kind of listening to the same song for 45 minutes at different tempos. I think we were able to accomplish that on this record and that’s what people seem to be digging off of this record … they seem to dig the fresh sound of it saying that they haven’t really heard anything exactly like it before.

Q: Now is this pretty much what you’ve done throughout your career?

Birchwood: Yeah, I’ve never really been a person who just tried to emulate and imitate, I’ve always wanted to kind of do my own thing. I really pride myself in writing songs. This is actually my fourth record of all-original music. When I listen to music that’s what I latch onto the most: when you hear an artist telling their own story in their own words, that’s when you get such an emotional attachment to the music. I feel that’s lost to some degree when you have someone doing a cover or even sometimes a cover of a cover. That’s when the emotional aspect is watered down and is not the same once you get to that point. So, that’s what I want to shoot for is to tell my own story.

Q: Does this album fairly represent what you’re like live?

Birchwood: Yeah, absolutely. You see, the band I tour with live is actually the same band that recorded this record; so literally you hear the same band.

Q: Is there anything, Selwyn, that you’d like me to pass on to the folks reading this article about your four days here in Maine?

Birchwood: Just that we’re looking forward to seeing everybody out there and putting on some good performances for everybody. If they want to know anything else about the band or keep up with us, they can find out everything they need to know on selwynbirchwood.com or follow us on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram — all that good stuff.

Q: Is there anything we haven’t discussed that you think we should? This is, after all, your forum.

Birchwood: Maybe that this is our second album for Alligator Records and we’re just out touring in support of the record. The record debuted at No. 6 on the Billboard Blues Chart and we’ve had a huge reception with it so far and we’re just taking the music to the people on the road touring.

Q: What has been the response so far seeing you’ve been out since the album came out?

Birchwood: It’s been great. People have been really enjoying the live shows and picking up the album itself. I couldn’t ask for much more.

Lucky Clark has spent 48 years writing about good music and the people who make it. He can be reached at luckyc@myfairpoint.net if you have any questions, comments or suggestions.

Copy the Story Link