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| JR Hendry, frontman of Primal Giants |
The minute you see JR Hendry, the frontman and songwriter of
Southern rock jam band, Primal Giants, he draws all of the attention in the
room. It’s not just his imposing height; after all, he is a big bear of a
man. And it’s not just his uproarious laughter, although it is very
contagious. There is a special magnetism and charisma to him that draws
people around him. He immediately puts you at ease, makes you comfortable
in a way that makes you feel good about yourself. His eyes look at you
intently when you speak, and he makes you feel as if you are the most
interesting person in the world, when, in truth, he is definitely more
interesting than you ever will be. His lifetime of experiences is a
bottomless well from which he draws inspiration for his songs.
I have had the good fortune of knowing JR for a while, and I can
tell you that he’s a go-getter. My wife says about him, “Whatever JR sets
his mind to, he accomplishes.” And that’s exactly what he’s done.
Not long ago, JR left a career in business to focus on making music – a move
that would make many hesitate. But JR viewed the crafting of music as a
higher calling and something that he felt driven to. He went to the music
mecca of Austin, Texas where he assembled a kickass band that they named Primal Giants, poured out his vision at Orb Studios, a studio known for its
association with fellow Texans, Blue October, and made a dazzling behemoth of
an album with producer Matt Meli, known for his work with such incredible acts
as Meat Puppets.
JR and the band dropped a single called “Junkie” last Friday,
and they are anticipating the release of their first album, “Untethered”, on
March 6th – just a handful of days away.
The other day, my luck was such that I got to listen to a sneak
peak of the entire album. Blown away. That’s the simplest
elucidation I can give this record. I don’t know how to describe
it. There is an indelible country twang to it, but it also rocks.
Hard. These songs thresh out the harvest from the American tradition that
vibrates in our DNA from coast to coast. But it weaves in a colored
tapestry of psychedelia and funk. Earthy and driving drumbeats and
basslines. Fluttering and aerial guitar solos. Tremulous and groovy
keyboards. And JR’s gravely and potent voice reaching high above
everything yet cementing it all together. The effect is
awe-inspiring. “Primal” is the operative word. This is what rock
and roll was meant to be from the beginning – something going back to the days
when our ancestors imbibed mind-altering concoctions and danced wildly and
naked around fires to pulsating rhythms echoing into the night sky. It’s
the first time you stood in a dark crowd and saw rockstars illuminated onstage
like smoking gods, coaxing ululating ecstasy from the serpentine and phallic
necks of their guitars. This is what music was meant to be, like it has
not been in a longtime – an archetypal experience. And Primal Giants
succeeds in bringing that magic back.
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| Primal Giants |
“Junkie” is a pulse-elevating jam, but its equal partners are
found in other rousing anthems like “Gone” and “Stand Up”. Based on these
two songs, the album would already be sufficient. But there are other
gems like “Queen Bee”, the mournful and contemplative “Needles”, and “More
Lies”. Every song will cuff you. Equal parts hospitable Southern
comfort, kaleidoscopic California cool, and outlaw Texas rascal, every part of
every song is memorable. I can’t wait to see them live.
I recently spoke to JR Hendry from his home in Austin:
Moroni Lopez Jessop: You and I have known each other for a while. I
know that you weren’t in music for a while, and then you got back into
music. Tell me about your journey of getting back into it.
JR Hendry: I started playing music really young. I was really
blessed that way. Where I grew up in the Ozarks, there was a lot of
bluegrass music still being played the traditional way on people’s back porches
on Friday and Saturday nights and at revivals on Sunday. My first
instrument was the fiddle, and then this old guy started taking me around to
other people’s jam sessions. I started picking up other instruments, and
eventually that turned into songwriting when I was about fourteen. At
first like any songwriter, it’s super-cheesy, horrible shit when you first
start writing, but it feels really good because you’re learning to find a
couple of different things – you’re learning to find the voice inside of you
and also learning to hear the music that’s around us already in
stillness. So, I’ve always kind of been a songwriter, and I had a time in
my life when I sold songs, and did things that way, and I’ve had different
bands over the years. But it’s been a long time. Shit, like fifteen
years, or something. For me, getting back into it wasn’t necessarily a
logical choice. I was at a place in my life in 2018 where a lot of things
were shifting for me, and I could feel that I wasn’t on the path that I needed
to be on, so I went On a journey, seeking out and discovering what that path
was, or hearing my own drum. I ended up having a very powerful spiritual
experience where it was very clear “go to Austin and make a record”.
MLJ: Tell me a little bit about how the album and the band
came together.
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| Primal Giants' debut album "Untethered" out in March 6th |
JR: Basically, that guidance was to go to Austin and make a
record, and i started poking around where to make a record, and eventually
landed with Matt Meli, head engineer at Orb Studios, and he ended producing our
album as well. He kind of picked his favorite folks to work with to make
the record, and one of those guys was Chris Doege, who plays drums. We
quickly bonded, and there was this powerful, brotherly and higher connection
that we both recognized, and we started having serious conversations, him
explaining his history in music, challenges, hopes, dreams, all of those different
things. Next thing you know, we were like, let’s do this, let’s get a
band together. His first call was to Steve Littleton. They had
played in a few different bands together. Steve is just an absolute
monster keyboard player. Steve was the next one to come in. Then we
were playing around with a handful of different bass players, steel players,
guitar players, looking for the right fit, and Doege was on a session with Josh
Motlong. I remember the phone call distinctly.
He said, “I think we found our guy.”
I said, “Well, tell me about it.”
He said, “All I need to tell you,
bro, is that as soon as I walked in, I felt the love pouring out of
him.”
And sure enough, I had the same
experience when I met Josh. There’s just this huge heart beaming out of
this dude, and his music is the same way. The last piece of the puzzle
was finding Takahiro Shimada. From our very first jam with Taka – at that
point we had been rehearsing with four or five guitar players – from that first
moment, the first note, I remember my jaw just hit the floor, and, after that
first twenty-minute jam, I just hit the couch like, “What the fuck just
happened?” It was this complete, magical match of all of us destined to
be a guy in this project, this band. All of that came together, and since
then, we immediately went in after one rehearsal with Taka and started tracking
over at Yellow Dog Studios with Dave Percefull producing and engineering. That
really helped us come together as a band. We got in a couple of sessions
out there, rehearsed a bunch, and now it’s time to take the show on the road.
The music is starting to be released - It’s time to step out and introduce
the world to Primal Giants.
MLJ: So, what does the name Primal Giants signify?
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| JR Hendry with Primal Giants |
JR: (laughs) Well, that’s an interesting story
actually. We struggled for months and months with a band name. One
of the best things of that process was that it taught us how to communicate
with one another as a band. There were a whole lot of different ideas and
directions flying around. We ended up with a top-ten list, and we took
some votes. We narrowed it down to a top-five list and took some votes.
Then Steve and I got really fucking stoned as some votes were getting tallied,
we came back in and kind of forgot what the names were. He said, “I really
liked that one ‘Primal Giants’.”
We all started laughing, because it
wasn’t on the list. I think there was like “Primal Roses” and “Something
Giants”, and he just mixed them up and mashed them together. As soon as we
heard it, we were laughing and then “Oh shit, that’s it!”
That’s the gist of where it came
from it on one level. On another level, there’s a whole lot of symbolic
meaning. I’ll leave it to the experiencer to digest for themselves, but
there’s definitely, I feel, a very large symbolic meaning in that name.
MLJ: Your music has kind of a spiritual aspect in a
way. I was wondering if you could share a little bit about that.
JR: Absolutely, man. I hold a firm belief that the
world doesn’t need any more noise. We have plenty of noise, and noise
isn’t necessarily beneficial to the human process of our evolution. When
the first music was made by some human being long, long ago, it wasn’t for
distraction. There was spiritual intention behind it. When that
first skin was stretched over a piece of wood, it was to focus energy in
directions so that we could quiet our minds and experience something bigger
that we normally do in our everyday perceptions. Our music has very much
the same intention. Depending on where you walk in and hear it, you may
not necessarily see that, because the guidance and idea behind the ride is to
first bring us to a place of experiencing all of the normal human emotions –
sadness, joy, grief, carnal pleasures – all of these things that make up these
the normal 3-D human experience. But the music mirroring life,
eventually, if we’re only focusing on those 3-D things, it will lead ourselves
to a whole lot of suffering, and we need to get to this wall of life. And
we realize that we need to sit down against that wall of suffering, we can go
through it and really understand what freedom is, and who we really are, and
what we’re really doing here, just how magic this entire place really is.
So, the music is really inspired by that very thing, making us arrive to our
human emotions, and then inviting us to something bigger. That’s the
whole intention behind it; that’s our goal and prayer behind it. That’s
what the music is to us.
MLJ: The music is also very raw and personal. How do
your own personal experiences tie in with this spiritual component?
JR: Well, it’s huge, right? Each of only know life
experientially. So, anything that I’m aware of, any grip that I think I
have on reality can only be based on my own experiences and by processing
things that I experience. All of our spirituality is seen, experienced,
and known through the lens of self until we learn to transcend that. I’m
no Ascended Master, so I’m still learning from that lens. I’ve learned
myself that challenges, grievances, suffering - things that once upon a time I
would have turn my head from or not looked at, I’ve learned are out our most
powerful teachers here. So, I guess that comes out in the music because
of that. I don’t like songwriting that’s impersonal. I want to hear
something real. In order to move someone or touch them in their heart, we
have to share. I can’t possibly tell you a story that I heard someone
else tell me and have that affect you in a deep way. If I’m going to sit
down with you as a brother and we’re going to feel one another on a deep level,
then I have to be able to put myself out there in a real and raw way. And
so to me, songwriting inspires that.
MLJ: How would you describe your music? It’s kind of
hard to classify. Psychedelic Southern rock? Tripped-out country
music? How to you define or describe it?
"What kind of music do we play? I don’t know, boxes are really good for shipping something. That’s about it.... we're a rock and fucking roll band."
JR: You know, that’s definitely the hardest question we get
asked. What kind of music do we play? I don’t know, boxes are really good
for shipping something. That’s about it. I think you have to look
at the history of music and ask some basic questions. What is
blues? The blues are a kind of folk music that transpired. And in
that, we ask, what is country music? Country music was birthed from a
blend of blues and folk. And then we ask, what is rock and roll?
It’s when country music and blues and folk music met, right? So, like,
all of these things are kind of weird for me to classify. There are
definitely bands out there you can strictly say they fit in a box
plainly. I think generally speaking that’s hard to do. It’s
definitely a hard thing for us, and I’m happy about it. All of my favorite
bands have the same thing. I listen to The Grateful Dead. Is that
rock and roll? Is it country? Is it folk? You tell me.
There’s a funny saying: “The Grateful Dead is country music for people that
like psychedelics.” What does that mean? So, I don’t know what our
music is. I really enjoy hearing how other people hear it, because I find
it fascinating that the same song can be heard so entirely different by
different people. A lot of people who talk about our music talk about the
blues and funk and rock and roll. The other night, I even heard someone
say, “Man, ‘Junkie’ is pretty heavy. That’s almost metal!”
I’m like, “Really? I don’t
hear that. But that’s cool. Sure, right on!”
For me, I would say there’s an
Americana influence if you pay attention to what that whole term “Americana”
really sought to mean. Americana was used as a definition of things of
this very nature. But at the same time, how do you box it in?
Because on one hand, John Prine is an Americana artist. On the other
hand, so is Drive-by Truckers. And there’s a giant difference in those
sounds. I don’t know. I’m sure that it will always be hard for me
personally to hear melodies outside of the shape which my musical ear was
cultivated. Where I grew up, and the music I grew up playing was
bluegrass and folk music and the blues, and so I think in some sort of fashion
those things will always be a heavy influence. Because that’s how my
musical ear was developed in hearing those sounds, those structures, and those
cadences, and that sort of stuff. That’s part of what I love about it,
especially this first record, “Untethered”. There’s something in there
for everybody. That’s what I love about it – no matter where you like to
say that you sit in your enjoyment of music, there are going to be a couple of
tracks at least on “Untethered” that grab you and make you say, wow, this is
awesome. The thing about that is it’s going to open up your ears to the
others, because there is a relation.
In regard to what box or genre we
fit in, we can all discuss that until we are blue in the face… but there’s no
denying it once anyone sees us live. We are a rock and fucking roll band.
MLJ: You guys have a single – “Junkie” – dropping
today. What can you tell us about that song?
JR: (laughs) The cool thing about any artist making
the first record is that you get to draw on all of these songs from all of
these years. “Junkie” is a song that I wrote back in 2006. I’d been
seeing Widespread Panic play in Memphis for a couple of nights. In fact,
I think they were closing a venue there. I remember ceiling tiles falling off
during some hard rocking jam the second night of the show. Anyway, we
were all partying it up and having a good time, and we went back to the hotel
and partied afterwards like you do. Sometime the next morning, I woke up and
heard that riff in my head, and I didn’t have a guitar with me on that whole
stretch of tour, following Panic around. So, I drove down to Guitar
Center in Memphis and bought a guitar just so that I could get this riff out of
my head. Because it was really good, and I didn’t want to forget
it. That was the birth of “Junkie” back then. It definitely has
taken on new life both on record and what we did with it in the studio, and
then now, as a band when we do it live. It’s its own living, breathing
entity. That was the genesis of it.
There’s a lot of reflection in
there about the ties that can bind us when it comes to both the emotional
experience with someone else and the carnal experience. And it’s an
interesting exploration, a metaphor in that realm.
MLJ: You guys are going to be starting a tour soon?
What can we expect from that?
JR: Yeah, we’re heading up to Nashville here in early March
to hammer out the details on that with some of our people. I don’t have
anything there that I can speak about publicly at the moment, but I can say,
generally speaking, there’s not going to be many corners of North America that
we don’t get to in 2020. That’s our intent. We’ve been working really
hard to make sure that all of the right tools are in the toolbox to make that
happen. Records are great; records are fun. I love the permanence of
records. It’s there, it’s out, it’s permanent, and it’s there forever,
especially these days with digital music. That soundbyte is going to
exist forever. I love that. But there’s something really magical to
be said about the other end of the spectrum – live music. It’s there,
it’s played once, and then it floats off on the breeze. It’s gone.
I’m very much looking forward to getting out there. I’m a longtime road
dog, man. It’s hard for me to sit in one place. I’m a mover, and I
love traveling, meeting different people, experiencing all of the different
energies that exist across the different landscapes. There’s a whole,
big, beautiful, living world that has its own thing and energy that speaks to
us, and that’s definitely something that I crave.
We’ll have some dates posted soon,
I’d say check on our website this spring for dates. So, keep an eye out
for us.
You can keep up with news, songs,
and tour information at their website at:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/primalgiants/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/primalgiants/
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