Jim White traveled many a junkyard road to get to Transnormal Skiperoo. Raised in Pensacola, Florida, a town crushed between the church and heroin, Jim’s songs reach deep into the underbelly of the South. One time Pentacostal, fashion model, New York taxi driver, drifter, pro-surfer, photographer, film-maker, his music is the conduit for all the stories he collected along the way. His previous albums ‘Wrong-Eyed Jesus’ [1997], ‘No Such Place’ [2001] and ‘Drill a Hole in That Substrate…’ [2004] were acclaimed as masterpieces of ‘outer space alt.country’ and established Jim as a phenomenal maverick talent. Jim also starred in the BBC4 film ‘Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus’, an award-winning road-movie exploring Southern culture through its music and stories. Now living in an old farmhouse in the backwoods of Georgia, Jim White may have finally reached a place called home, but his other search, for what he calls ‘the gold tooth in God’s crooked smile’ continues in this new set of backyard tales. Transnormal Skiperoo was produced by Joe Pernice and Michael Deming, recorded with the band Ollabelle, and also features tracks with Tucker Martine and Laura Veirs, local Georgia legend Don Chambers & Goat,
bluegrass duo Jeff & Vida and percussionist Mauro Refosco.
Jim White is a highly original voice in the immense Southern gothic tradition. When broken humanity aches for grace, music like his may give you a shot at redemption.
JIM WHITE on TRANSNORMAL SKIPEROO
A Town Called Amen is a song about growing old and settling into a sort of tender acceptance of life. There's a film by Ingmar Bergman called The Wild Strawberries that reminds me of what I was trying to get at in that song.
Blindly We Go is an unusual song for me musically, although the lyrics deal with a familiar preoccupation of mine----the (for lack of a better term) unknowability of God. It's something I find myself thinking about a lot. There's that old Zen saying, "If you meet God on the road, kill him." In the South everyone is always telling me about how God told them this and God told them that, and their recitations of divine contact always feel like constructs of hubris. I have little trust for people who tell me they talk to God and God replies in strangely anthropomorphic, culturally precise ways that exactly mirror the person's mindset.
Jailbird is an old song from the days when I had to run from my problems
Crash Into The Sun is my message song. Since it was so preachy I wanted it to be musically adventurous, so I talked my good friend Tucker Martine into producing it. I flew to Seattle, all excited at the prospect of finally getting to work with Tucker with his stable of incredible musicians - Karl Blau, Steve Moore, Laura Veirs, Eyvind Kang.
Fruit Of The Vine is a song that was prompted by thinking about that movie I did with BBC 4 [Searching for the Wrong Eyed Jesus] The images and characters in the film returned to me a lot, particularly the meth dealer who was doing life in prison. I thought about all my friends in similar situations and how their lives carried them to points of desperation and wanted to put some of those sad stories and cultural elements into a song.
Take Me Away is a story song, a hillbilly stomper, loosely based on the life and times of a friend of mine who's daddy was a preacher and who married a woman who's daddy was a preacher. He was surrounded by Jesus on every side and there was lots of pressure put on him to be a preacher as well. But he just didn't have it in him. In his heart of hearts he was a deeply creative, intuitive artistic person, but in the church he had no outlet for his profound talents (he was my musical inspiration when I was in my teens) so he slowly but surely lost his mind. I took him as a character and created a context with the train and the men from the asylum that I thought symbolically represented his plight.
Turquoise House is a corn ball homage to misfits. Every album I put out has some goofy song on there that seems to contradict my perceived personality--this sensitive, suffering lost soul.
Diamonds To Coal was a real challenge, both to write and produce. I've always relied on dramatic situations---crimes and murder and betrayal and terrible loss---to convey my feelings about life. This is sort of a juvenile mindset. Sooner or later you have to move on from those dramatic archetypes and talk about the meaning that can be found in the quotidian realm. This is my first attempt to do that. Musically I was shooting for Tony Joe White and never quite hit the target. It makes me appreciate all the more what he does.
Counting Numbers In The Air is a question song. It asks "how did we get in the mess of being grown up and disconnected from what is essential in life? Musically I've very proud of this song--I feel like I went to an exotic sonic club med on this song.
Plywood Superman started out as an observational song, (a song about imagined others), and slowly came around to being a song about an aspect of my personality that I used to struggle with, but that of late I've learned to disregard. For years that side of me held a lot of sway with my sensibilities and choices. I was always a fingertip away from something that I could never quite reach. I quit reaching a while back and what I craved found me, instead of the other way around.
Pieces Of Heaven is a song I wrote to my two daughters. It's my way of wishing them well on their way and hoping that they will remember me with the love that I daily feel for them.
Long Long Day - I collaborated on this with a buegrass outfit called Jeff & Vida. They're a husband and wife duo that have great musical skills and really understand how to compliment each other. Vida really nailed the wistful bucolic feeling that I was hoping for in the vocals. She a great singer and Jeff can play the hell out of anything with string on it (bathing suits excluded, so far as I know, anyway)