Michael Hurley | |
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Background information | |
Born | Bucks County, Pennsylvania, U.S. | December 20, 1941
Genres | Traditional folk, outsider |
Occupation(s) | Musician |
Instrument(s) | Vocals, guitar, fiddle, banjo |
Years active | 1963–present |
Michael Hurley (born December 20, 1941) [1] is an American folk singer-songwriter who was a part of the Greenwich Village folk music scene of the 1960s and 1970s. In addition to playing a wide variety of instruments, Hurley is also a cartoonist and a painter.
Hurley's music has been described as "outsider folk". [2] [3]
He was born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States. [1] Before starting his recording career Hurley contracted mononucleosis and needed to wait several years until he could sign to a record label. [1] Hurley's debut album, First Songs, was recorded for Folkways Records in 1963, [4] on the same reel-to-reel machine that taped Lead Belly's Last Sessions. He was discovered by blues and jazz historian Frederick Ramsey III, and subsequently championed by boyhood friend Jesse Colin Young, who released his second and third albums on The Youngbloods' Warner Bros. imprint, Raccoon. [5]
In the late 1970s, Hurley made three albums for Rounder, all of which have since been reissued on CD. His 1976 LP Have Moicy! , a collaboration with the Unholy Modal Rounders (a spin-off of the Holy Modal Rounders) and Jeffrey Frederick & The Clamtones, received much critical praise. Music critic Robert Christgau ranked it as his favorite album of the year. [6]
In 1996, Koch Records released Wolfways with Hurley backed by Mickey Bones on drums. Tours with Son Volt and high praise from younger performers like Lucinda Williams, Vic Chesnutt, Woods, Calexico, Cat Power, Julian Lynch, [7] and Robin Holcomb followed.
In 2001, Locust Music reissued Hurley's debut under the new title Blueberry Wine, with new artwork contributed by Hurley.
Gnomonsong released a new Michael Hurley album titled Ancestral Swamp on September 18, 2007. Backing was provided by longtime Hurley associate David Reisch of the Holy Modal Rounders and new friends Tara Jane O'Neil and Lewi Longmire.
In 2010, Secret Seven Records (San Francisco) and Mississippi Records (Portland) teamed up to reissue 100 copies of Hurley's rarest album, Blue Navigator, on 8-track tape. (Hurley is a long-time collector of music on 8-track tapes.)
In 2011, Hurley's first book of lyrics was released by the Quebec book publisher L'Oie de Cravan. It contains the original English lyrics to 19 of his songs calligraphed by the author, a foreword by critic Byron Coley and a French version by Marie Frankland, winner of the 2007 John-Glassco prize for translation.
Hurley performed at the annual Nelsonville Music Festival in 2008 and 2010–2019, and again in 2022. [8] [9] [10] [11]
His song, "Hog of the Forsaken", was used in the closing credits for the pilot episode of the series and the closing of Deadwood: The Movie .
Hurley appears in the Oregon-set family drama film Leave No Trace (2018), where he performs "O My Stars" at a bonfire alongside fellow Oregon-based musician Marisa Anderson. [12] [13]
He currently lives in rural northwest Oregon and performs frequently in and around Portland.
In 2021 Hurley released a new album titled The Time of the Foxgloves. The New Yorker 's Amanda Petrusich included it in her 10 best albums of the year list. [14] [15]
Michael Hurley grew up in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and began playing and writing songs at the age of 13. He recorded his first album, First Songs at the age of 22. [1] He also lived in New Jersey, Massachusetts, California, Vermont, Ohio, Florida, and most recently in Oregon.
Hurley self-published at least three magazines. The Underground Monthly, The Outcry, and The Morning Tea. He also created several comic books featuring Jocko and Boone, Greenbriar Kornbread, and Mama Molasses, among other characters. [16]
Hurley likes to call himself Elwood Snock, Doc Snock, Snockman, The Snock, or Snock. Hurley has done much of the artwork for his own albums. Two oft-featured cartoon werewolves, Jocko and Boone, have been something of a theme across Hurley's musical career, even appearing in their own comics. Both are based on dogs that Hurley's family owned when he was a child.
Michael Hurley has three children with his former wife, Marjorie, whom he called "Pasta", [17] two sons, Jacob and Colorado, and a daughter, Daffodil. He has a son, Rollin, with a girlfriend, Kim, and a daughter, Wilder Mountain Honey, with another girlfriend, Bethany.
Edward James "Son" House Jr. was an American Delta blues singer and guitarist, noted for his highly emotional style of singing and slide guitar playing.
Anthology of American Folk Music is a three-album compilation, released in 1952 by Folkways Records, of eighty-four recordings of American folk, blues and country music made and issued from 1926 to 1933 by a variety of performers. The album was compiled from experimental film maker Harry Smith's own personal collection of 78 rpm records.
Moran Lee "Dock" Boggs was an American old-time singer, songwriter and banjo player. His style of banjo playing, as well as his singing, is considered a unique combination of Appalachian folk music and African-American blues. Contemporary folk musicians and performers consider him a seminal figure, at least in part because of the appearance of two of his recordings from the 1920s, "Sugar Baby" and "Country Blues", on Harry Smith's 1952 collection Anthology of American Folk Music. Boggs was first recorded in 1927 and again in 1929, although he worked primarily as a coal miner for most of his life.
Booker T. Washington "Bukka" White was an American Delta blues guitarist and singer.
Quill was a rock band that played extensively throughout New England, New York, and the mid-Atlantic states in the late 1960s, and gained national attention by performing at the original Woodstock Festival in 1969. The band was founded by two singer-songwriters and brothers from the Boston area, Jon and Dan Cole.
Joseph Spence was a Bahamian guitarist and singer. He is well known for his vocalizations and humming while playing the guitar. Several American musicians, including Taj Mahal, the Grateful Dead, Ry Cooder, Catfish Keith, Woody Mann, and Olu Dara, as well as the British guitarist John Renbourn, were influenced by and have recorded variations of his arrangements of gospel and Bahamian songs.
The Holy Modal Rounders was an American folk music group, originally the duo of Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber, who formed in 1963 on the Lower East Side of New York City. Although the band was not initially successful, they quickly earned a dedicated cult following and have been retrospectively praised for their pioneering innovation in several genres related to folk music. They also proved to be influential, both during their initial run and to a new generation of musicians like Yo La Tengo and Espers.
Samuel Barclay Charters IV was an American music historian, writer, record producer, musician, and poet. He was a widely published author on the subjects of blues and jazz. He also wrote fiction.
Clamtones was an American folk rock group, and Jeffrey Frederick's most notable band. The best-known incarnation of the band formed in 1975 when Frederick and Jill Gross moved to Portland, Oregon and began playing with the backing band of the Holy Modal Rounders. Although the Clamtones only recorded one studio album, they were a popular act in the Portland music scene. They were inducted into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame in 2011, with the organization noting that the Clamtones "developed a reputation for being 'one of the best bar bands in the country.'"
Jeffrey Sutton Frederick (1950–1997) was a songwriter, guitarist and performer specializing in good-time Americana music—an idiosyncratic blend of folk, country and rock and roll. He was a largely uncredited predecessor of today's alternative country music genre. Also notorious for his pranks, he was a prodigious songwriter, specializing in sly, hilarious and soulful pieces. Frederick's tightly crafted songs and intricate guitar work were praised by the likes of Willie Nelson, Eric Clapton, and Dan Hicks. His songs are being featured in a series of tribute albums, starting with St. Jeffrey's Day: The Songs of Jeffrey Frederick, Volume I (2008). Jeffrey Frederick and the Clamtones were inducted into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame on October 8, 2011.
Have Moicy! is a 1976 album released by Michael Hurley, The Unholy Modal Rounders, and Jeffrey Frederick & the Clamtones. In 2011, Light In The Attic Records reissued Have Moicy! on vinyl. Although nominally credited to three different groups, the music is performed by an overlapping cast of musicians, with Hurley, Frederick, and Peter Stampfel alternating lead vocals with one track sung by Paul Presti.
"I Wish I Was a Mole in the Ground" is a traditional American folk song. It was most famously recorded by Bascom Lamar Lunsford in 1928 for Brunswick Records in Ashland, Kentucky. Harry Smith included "I Wish I Was a Mole in the Ground" on his Anthology of American Folk Music released by Folkways Records in 1952. The notes for Smith's Anthology state that Lunsford learned this song from Fred Moody, a North Carolina neighbor, in 1901.
Peter Stampfel is an American fiddle player, old-time musician, and singer-songwriter.
Folkways Records was a record label founded by Moses Asch that documented folk, world, and children's music. It was acquired by the Smithsonian Institution in 1987 and is now part of Smithsonian Folkways.
Bernard Stollman was an American lawyer and the founder of the ESP-Disk record label.
Indian War Whoop is the third studio album by the Holy Modal Rounders, released in 1967 through ESP-Disk. The album is the band's first with contributions outside of the original members Peter Stampfel and Steve Weber. The title track is a cover of an obscure song featured on Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music.
The Moray Eels Eat the Holy Modal Rounders is the fourth studio album by the New York psychedelic folk band the Holy Modal Rounders, released in 1968 through Elektra Records. Although Peter Stampfel does not regard the album highly, it has received positive reviews and its opener, "Bird Song," was notably included in the 1969 film Easy Rider.
I Make a Wish for a Potato is a compilation album by psychedelic folk band The Holy Modal Rounders, released on April 10, 2001 through Rounder Records. The album draws from the band's three releases on Rounder Records and also includes songs by associated acts such as Michael Hurley as well as the Clamtones.
Bird Song: Live 1971 is a live album by the psychedelic folk band The Holy Modal Rounders, released on April 20, 2004, through Water Records.
Steven P. Weber was an American folk singer-songwriter and guitarist.