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Twin Town High (vol. 8) |
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Music Everywhere
Monday 25 June @ 11:56:36 |
 
Chris Shillock—show up for the integrity, stay for the brilliance
by DWIGHT HOBBES
Poets of Chris Shillock’s caliber don’t come along everyday. Hell, we’re lucky when they show up at all. Exhibit A, from “A Night Like This”—“Anything can happen when the moon is on the brink. You could meet your enemy; he’s buying you a drink. You could find your savior then betray him with a kiss, because anything could happen on a night like this.” Among his books are “The Revolutionary’s Creed,” “Testament of Fear” and “Irregular Conjugations.” And he has just finished an album vocalist-composer Tabatha Predovich titled Invisible Jazz. And “A Night Like This” is on it. After a June 23 listening party for the album, Chris Shillock spoke with www.pulsetc.com about his craft and a few other things.
PULSE: You’ve established a strong track record on your own. But you’ve had a band in mind for quite some time. Why?
CHRIS SHILLOCK: The nature of my poetry has often been epic or dramatic, so I’ve had to produce shows, like my “Streets of Minneapolis,” that require several performers. My last book, Invisible Jazz, had poems for a woman’s voice and songs. I have a deep male voice and no music, so I needed a collaborator. Originally I had envisioned her as just a female singer-songwriter. The last two singers I worked with did not accompany themselves, so we had to expand to a full band (with David Gullickson, drums, and Patterson, guitar/composer).
PULSE: Aside from the fact that where other singers quit, she stuck around, what’s rewarding for you about working with Tabatha?
SHILLOCK: Tabatha is the bravest person I’ve ever met. She is a cancer-survivor who is still getting over the effects of chemotherapy. Her spirit never flagged for one instant, during the sudden onset of her illness—so unexpected at her age—and during the long recovery afterwards. I don’t know how she does it. She’s convinced me that women, in most important ways, are braver than men.
PULSE: OK.
SHILLOCK: And her talent—her voice. She has such commanding stage presence with her beauty and her height: every man wants her and every woman wants to be her. And she’s such an incredible singer. What’s especially important to me is her articulation. When she sings, you can clearly understand every word I’ve written.
PULSE: Any other collaborations strike your fancy? I know you’ve opened for David Daniels. And the three of us came within a gnat’s ass-hair of doing a sports show on KFAI. Have you worked together with David?
SHILLOCK: I’ve worked in several of David Daniels’ shows and he has performed in a number of mine. There are a number of people in the community, such as David or Laura Winton, whom I’ve helped on their projects and who have helped me. I’m sure it will happen again.
PULSE: How satisfied are you with the Invisible Jazz?
SHILLOCK: It blows me away. I think it is the most extraordinary thing the world has ever heard—the ultimate concept album.
PULSE: You still writing new material or have you taken a break for a while?
SHILLOCK: I haven’t been writing much lately, due to illness and the stress of time on this current production.
PULSE: One last thing. Why’d you let Ed Felien put you in that jester’s cap and have you strike that titillating pose for the cover of Pulse a while back?
SHILLOCK: You and Emily Carter like to write about my integrity, but no woman has ever come up to me afterwards and whispered softly about integrity. So I thought I would try selling my soul to get on the cover of the Pulse. That didn’t work either. Oh well.
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