At first glance such ensembles as SANTANA and SPOCK’S BEARD have nothing in common, except for accessing various aspects of rock idiom and apart from their names starting with the same letter – however, there’s another link between the two: the skin-hitter and vocalist Jimmy Keegan whose CV includes records by many more seemingly incongruous, in stylistic terms, artists. Only recently, the veteran not only appeared on Chuck Wright’s heavy platter "Sheltering Sky" and Robert Berry‘s live album, all the while serving as a fulltime member of PATTERN-SEEKING ANIMALS. And now he’s finally decided it was time to finally release a solo offering.
Keegan’s eponymous ten-tracker is scheduled to see the light on March 1st and will feature some interesting pieces. But how did the repertoire come about?
“Nine years in the making, my first solo release finally comes out,” says Jimmy. “Over the course of my career, I’ve been fortunate to record with a number of brilliant songwriters. My original plan was to collaborate with a few of them and write material when I realized I already had a wealth material that had been demoed and never released or released to very limited audiences. So I looked back on this library of material I had played on and chose some songs I thought I could interpret and then augmented them with a few covers. I may have a reputation of being a prog drummer but I have played all types of music in my career, so this record represents that. With the help of some friends who happen to be some of the finest musicians on the planet, I made a record that is a bit of a snapshot of my musical life.”
Jimmy Keegan
Among his aforementioned friends are Michael Sadler and former and present colleagues Ted Leonard and Ryo Okumoto who shine on both new cuts and numbers by SPLIT ENZ and TALKING HEADS, the tracklist running like this:
1. The Fishermen 3
2. Where Settlers Go
3. Kiss You Slow
4. 7:00 A.M.
5. Crosseyed And Painless
6. Platinum
7. Chaos In The U.S.A.
8. Minor Seconds
9. Comfort Girl
10. Six Months In A Leaky Boat
