Portland’s Michael Dean Damron began exorcising his demons about 12 years ago, and lucky for us, it’s still a work in progress. Both as a solo artist and with an assembled band of crazy local hotshots dubbed I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch In The House, Damron continually succeeds, however, in enveloping his inner turmoils and outspoken observations in compelling, important music. Raw, haunting, drunkenly wild, innocently gentle; a Damron creation can possess any of these tags, or all of them.
Damron’s new record, Plea From A Ghost (Suburban Home Records), finds the singer-songwriter-hellraiser in top form, both lyrically and musically. Tucked amongst self-penned songs of life and death are some tasty cover choices: Alejandro Escovedo’s “Broken Bottle,” AntiSeen’s “The Devil And The Longhaired Weirdo” and Warren Zevon’s tear-jerking “Keep Me In Your Heart.” The album features some stellar contributions by Portland luminaries Skip Von Kuske (Vagabond Opera) and Damron’s SOB bandmate, harmonica firebrand David Lipkind.
Recovered from a coast-to-coast spring tour with Portland bassist Allen Hunter, Damron is currently preparing for a summer jaunt to support Plea From A Ghost.
Interviewing Mike D. (as he’s known to all those who favor him) is an experience not unlike listening to his albums. Topics can range from politics and folklore to childhood traumas and favorite dive bars, all under the umbrella of music. The resulting journey is always a careening, laugh-inducing, thought-provoking one, with a heavily tattooed poet-laureate as a guide. A recent chat with Mike, one of the nicest, no-BS fellows one could hope to meet, began with sharing our forty-something mortality anxieties… but we soon moved on to slightly lighter fare:
EPB: If you could get just one more tattoo, what would it be?
Damron: Oh, they’re spur-of-the-moment, I don’t plan ’em out… because of that, I’ve gotten some pretty bad ones, but I’ve also got some really good ones because of that, too.
However, I have been thinking about some knuckle tattoos… there’s two bands on this planet right now that I’ve been in love with for a long time; they’re friends of mine, as well. One set of knuckles I might get the word, “Two,” for the band Two Cow Garage, and on the other set of knuckles I would get the word, “Drag,” for Drag The River.
I was just in Colorado Springs, and my friends J.J. and Steve from Drag The River… J.J. owns a bar there called the Triple Nickel, and Steve’s a tattoo artist in town. The day of my show with them, all during the day anyone who wanted to could go get three “5’s” tattooed on their arm for free. Free tattoos! So a bunch of us spent all day drinkin’, and then got tattoos — I’ve got three “5’s” running down my forearm.
I just got pulled over in Kansas City, and the cop wanted to know what the three “5’s” were for. When I told him, “Oh, I don’t even want to tell you,” he said, “Oh, now I really want to know.” So I wound up tellin’ him the story, how I wasn’t in a gang or anything, and how everybody loves J.J.’s bar.
EPB: You get a ticket?
Damron: Nah, he gave us a warning. Allen was driving, and he came up too close behind a truck, and we had out-of-state plates and all. I’m kinda glad we got pulled over, though, because we got to stop and take a break, get some air. That stretch of road through Kansas is a boring nightmare.
EPB: I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch In The House gained some notoriety with a song about Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church some years ago, and it’s still around…
Damron: It’s still relevant, because Phelps is still around. I don’t know how or why. Phelps and his bunch are pure evil.
EPB: What’s the number one target of your ire these days?
Damron: The number one enemies of every good American are the banks, Wall Street.
EPB: It’s amazing to consider how powerful this culture of not having the slightest conscience actually is.
Damron: These families and corporations that own everything – the Saudis, the Koch brothers, whomever – they’d destroy this planet before they’d give an inch… they’re complete sociopaths, with no regard for life. You think Exxon gives a fuck about the planet? They’d burn the house down for another dollar.
EPB: Are you going to write a song on the subject?
Damron: Oh, I already did. Haven’t recorded it yet. (Sings) “All the flags that we fly are made in China, there aint’ nothing done here in this country any more… so let’s go shopping and swell up with pride on the day that America dies.” It’s called “The Day America dies.” It’s about shippin’ jobs overseas, and people gettin’ fucked over by the banks… about all the horrible things that we still tolerate.
EPB: Your new song, “The Day Brian Piccolo Died.” It’s obviously about more than just football.
Damron: Well, it’s about my childhood. Interestingly enough, we recently played a gig in Canton, Ohio. I’d never been to the Football Hall of Fame. As you walk in, there’s a tribute to Brian Piccolo. And next to that is a mannequin of Jim Thorpe, with the Carlisle blanket he wore. It was amazing.
Back to the song… I watched the movie when I was a kid, it really touched me. “Brian’s Song” was big, kinda intense, (later) they played it at my brother’s funeral. Football of the 60s and 70s was much different than today, and you could see that walking through the Hall of Fame. The players were different, looked different – too many players today have a kind of “thug life” image.
So the song is about football heroes, and my childhood and the old Chicago Bears.
I admired Dick Butkus, wanted him to be my father – I lived in a very insecure, introverted, fearful world as a little kid. I imagined the whole team around to protect me.
The song also touches on what Piccolo accomplished as a man, and what he and Gale Sayers and George Halas did, in regards to truly integrating black and white in the NFL.
My biggest football hero, though, was Johnny Unitas. A friend of mine wrote a poem about him, and I’m working it into a song.
(an in-depth discussion of Unitas, the 70s Pittsburgh Steelers and The Rocky Bleier Story ensues.)
EPB: “Plea From A Ghost” has this Americana, folk-lament element to some of it… but it’s not cowboy music, not country & western. Obviously, its roots lie in the hills. Where did this come from?
Damron: Well, it’s in my blood, my dad’s people are from West Virginia and Kentucky. I heard all these stories from my dad growing up… he had an outhouse until he moved to Louisville when he was nine. All my uncles were coal miners. Something has always resonated about hill country, the coal mines.
EPB: Where did you pick up this great cover art of a house in a hollow?
Damron: Paul Resnick, the graphic designer for my sponsor, Hot Leathers, in East Providence, R.I. It’s a biker company who makes jackets, boots… they make my t-shirts for free. They sponsor The Supersuckers, Two Car Garage, SOB.
The story behind the picture is that Resnick’s parents were bikers, and they took this photo of this old broken-down house in West Virginia during some biker trip they took in the Sixties. He listened to the new CD, got inspired and then painted a picture from the photograph.
EPB: You’ve devoted a song on your new album to your dog. Now, many would guess your breed of choice to be a mastiff, or a pit bull. Does the pug, “L’il Mike,” reflect the inner you?
Damron: L’il Mike is me… in the sense that I don’t have a biological child. He’s my son, he’s all that’s good in the world.
EPB: Someone can describe Plea From A Ghost as being many things, but above all, it seems to be another chapter in your life.
Damron: Absolutely. And it’s a chapter that will hopefully bring some joy, or something positive, to someone. And then I’ll make another one… that’s what I love about this shit, there’s always another one coming. I’m a lifer. Eight, nine albums in ten years, between Sonofabitch and solo? That’s quite a body of work for anybody, let alone a dumb hillbilly like me… I was always impressed with Ani DiFranco’s work ethic; she put out a record every year, for better or worse. I’ll try to do the same thing, until the day I die.
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For more information – http://www.mikedamron.com/
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