Page 12 - BiTS_12_DECEMBER_2020
P. 12

BiTS: I'm not going to take up much more of your time because one of the things that I've learned
    over the years of doing these interviews is that the longer I talk to people, the longer it takes me to
    transcribe it all.

    EH: Well anyway, the album has ‘One Fine Day’ and also ‘When I Lay My Burden Down’. Those two

    songs kind of show you where I was coming from for the last couple of years where I had several
    family members that passed on. ‘When I Lay My Burden Down’, I got from Mississippi John Hurt,
    and I've played that song since I was young as well, but I kinda pulled it back out for a funeral and I
    just thought it really fits with the times because so many people have lost someone. Then there's
    ‘One Fine Day’ that I wrote and that was just thinking of all that we've lost and everything, but then
    I wanted to put some fun stuff on the album because I didn't want it to be completely depressing. I
                                                                   like to have a balance of different types of

                                                                   songs.

                                                                   BiTS:  Well, you've certainly achieved that.
                                                                   I think it's absolutely wonderful and ‘When
                                                                   I Lay My Burden Down’ will be included
                                                                   before very long in my gospel slot in my big
                                                                   show which I'm glad to see you discovered

                                                                   on Facebook just before we went on air.

                                                                   EH: Cool.

                                                                   BiTS: Let's talk very quickly about a couple
                                                                   of other things. You've been at this business
                                                                   for a long, long time, you must have played

                                                                   in dozens of interesting places. Have you
                                                                   ever been anywhere where you've just said
                                                                   to yourself, I just can't believe I'm here and
                                                                   doing this now?

                                                                   EH: [Laughing] I'm trying to think. Yes,
                                                                   yes, well here's the thing, I was asked to

                                                                   open for ZZ Top, and I've actually got video
                                                                   of me behind the scenes kind of freaking
                                                                   out. What happened was they asked us to
                                                                   play at a local outdoor venue and it's not
               Erin with The  The Reverend Billy F. Gibbons        huge this place, it's 3,000 or 4,000 people
                                                                   and they said okay, we want you to open,
                                                                   but you can't have anybody else on stage

    with you. It has to be only you. I have to play solo. Huh, what pressure, huh. I had to go out there
    on my own and face that crowd with just me and my acoustic guitar and knowing that I cannot
    mess up because if I mess up there's nobody covering it, it's just me. It was so nerve-racking.

    BiTS: That's one of the things about playing acoustic, if you make a mistake, everybody hears it.

    EH: Oh yeah, but the other thing that I realised because at the time I'd been doing a lot of electric

    blues and I hadn't been getting back to doing the acoustic stuff as much as I'd like, what I realised
    is it's also freeing because I can turn on a dime, I can speed up, I can slow down. I can change the
   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17