Jones to headline solo show

Glenn Jones’ first solo album, “This Is the Wind That Blows It Out,” features an old postcard image of a chicken.

“It gives the appearance that I don’t take myself seriously when, in fact, I do,” Jones said.

Recently featured on National Public Radio, the solo guitarist performed for two decades in Cul de Sac, a Boston-based psych band, and has collaborated with such greats as John Fahey and Jack Rose.

Along with local bands Circuit Des Yeux and Sitar Outreach Ministry, Jones will perform at 8 p.m. Wednesday at Russian Recording. Tickets are $6.

“He’s a bigger name than ever,” Nick McGill of Sitar Outreach Ministry said. “Glenn is up there.”

Since his first solo album, Jones has continued to use postcard artwork for his albums, from a beetle to a goldfish to a cat on his most recent, “The Wanting.” All of the creatures on the covers play the guitar.

“All the postcards are from around the turn of the last century — 1899, 1901,” Jones said. “The guitar was a new instrument, a novel instrument, at the time.”

While he said he’s received “gratifyingly good” reception to his latest album, with some people telling him it’s his best yet, Jones said he needs a few months to evaluate it and see if he agrees.

His music during the years has been an exploration with “a glacial kind of growth,” Jones said. Instrumental, acoustic, finger-style guitar is his primary sound.

However, he picked up the banjo not too long ago, and “The Wanting” features three banjo pieces. For live performances, the banjo serves to break up the set and make it more varied and dynamic, Jones said.

“I’ve always loved banjo, particularly the old-timey banjo, like the clawhammer,” Jones said.

He can’t play in that style but said he “plays in a way that makes sense to me.”
IU senior Haley Fohr of Circuit Des Yeux said she is enthused to play with Jones.

Circuit Des Yeux is her solo project, but as this performance will be a solo acoustic set, she said it will be a change of pace for her.

“I like to think I do psychedelic experimental folk,” Fohr said. “This show will be more folk because of the acoustic guitar, more traditional.”    

She said her music has varied during the years and was previously challenging, experimental lo-fi. Now, she said she’s moved toward “cleaner, more song-oriented music.”

She said she has received a warm reception to her most recent album, “Portrait.”

“I’m super excited to play with Glenn Jones,” Fohr said. “It will be a treat to meet and hear him. I’m also excited to hear Sitar Outreach Ministry.”

Since his fellow band member Sonny Blood of Apache Dropout is unavailable, McGill will also perform solo for the Sitar Outreach Ministry.

“In a small venue, it’s fun to keep it simple,” McGill said.

It was a sentiment all three musicians echoed — after all, “It’s nice not having to lug all those amplifiers,” Jones said.

Describing himself as a “kind of professional amateur,” McGill said his work is a musical collage of high and low, from symphonies to television shows.

“It’s a little bit of psychedelic, a little bit of medieval, a little bit of stone age,” McGill said.

With a sitar, some guitars and some banjo thrown in for good measure, the show has a mix of solo acts.

“It’s a good representation of different veins of acoustic music,” Fohr said.
Jones’ solo tour began this Sunday.

“If people are willing to go with the flow I create, I think they can find something beautiful and moving, something that feels like a voyage,” Jones said.