JON PALMER talks to Folking

Jon Palmer

The Jon Palmer Acoustic Band is based in Otley. They have a loyal following across the region and four albums to their name, the most recent of which, The Silences In Between, was released earlier this year. Although based now in West Yorkshire the musical story of the man who gave the band their name began much earlier and further south.

“I was a drummer when I was in my teens but I had this thing about wanting to write songs so I taught myself guitar. By the time I was eighteen or nineteen I started to join bands with more established musicians and gravitated towards bringing my own songs along and picking up some of the vocals. By my early twenties I was fronting my own band down in Southend on a full-time hobby basis.

“It was a good time to be doing music in Southend. It would have been towards the late 70s so you had all the punk and new wave stuff and Dr Feelgood so it was a nice scene. You could pretty much do what you wanted. It was a pretty eclectic mix of stuff going on and lots of places to play.”

It’s a long way from Southend to West Yorkshire. “I moved north in about 1990, first to Newcastle and three years later to Yorkshire. I’ve been here since 1994 and I’m here to stay now, I love it here.” So where did the Jon Palmer Acoustic band appear from?

“I was in an electric band, sort of folky but more electric, playing pubs and that sort of gig but at the same time there was a bunch of us who would meet down the folk club and, on the spur of the moment, I put a bunch of mates together with a view to getting some really acoustic stuff going and doing a couple of nights down the folk club. It was just meant to be an occasional, part-time band but we did the folk club and we got booked for the folk festival and before we knew where we were it was a proper thing.

“This was about six or seven years ago and a few members have changed over the years but at least half the band were there on the very first day. There was no master plan but I realised that there was an audience for that sort of music and gave up everything else I was doing.”

That band was Big Fat Kill (not to be confused with the US band of the same name) and Jon released a solo album, Walk Into Your Dreams, while still with them. I’m distraught to say that I didn’t have a terribly high opinion of it back in 2010 although I’m comforted that I recognised the quality of his songwriting. When I first came across Jon’s Acoustic Band, I couldn’t help wondering about the Electric Band so why persist with a name that seems, in part, redundant?

“At the start it was to distinguish us from Big Fat Kill because people knew that was me and my band. Even now there are some festivals that will book us just as The Jon Palmer Band, by their own choice. The way I justify it nowadays is to say that, if you stuck us in a room or even a small hall with just our acoustic instruments, we would do you an unplugged gig. We can still do it unplugged and sometimes we do. We played at Moorcock Acoustic the other week – that’s just a big room but everybody’s quiet and it’s nice to be able to do that kind of thing.”

Jon Palmer Acoustic Band

Jon and the band seem happy at the moment to be big fish in their own regional pond and play some festivals but do they have ambitions for greater things?

“There are practical considerations. I have a full-time job so music is a hobby and it always has been – but a serious hobby – so I don’t really want to be travelling all round the country at weekends but a couple of hours around where I live is quite acceptable. It does mean that we’re pretty much a north of England band but we’ve reached the point now that, if you’re into acoustic folk music in the north of England there’s an outside chance you’ll have heard of us.

“We try to do as many festivals as we can – we’re designed to be a festival band, really – and sometimes we do stopovers. I think we’re doing three or four this year but it all depends on what’s going on in our private lives. My twins are studying for A-levels and even with gigs I’ll be coming home just to be here.”

As he says, Jon has been a songwriter since his late teens and has written some quite angry songs – ‘Working For The Gangmaster’ and ‘Eton Mess’ spring to mind – that will get an audience on its feet but it strikes me that his writing has become increasingly nuanced.

“I can understand why you say that in relation to The Silences In Between. I don’t want to be known as a political songwriter. I want to be known as a songwriter who can write about anything he likes, as a songwriter who sometimes writes political songs. For this album, I could have forced one or two more political-type songs in but I just went with the one that we’ve been playing as a band and there are songs about all sorts of things on there.

“I’ve just been looking at a possible listing for the next album because most of that’s written and about half of that is quasi-political songs so it just depends on when the songs come along what album they go on. Maybe I am a bit more nuanced but that’s just development in songwriting because I’ve been writing for quite a long time and I think I’ve written a few decent ones in the last few years because I’ve concentrated a lot more on it. I’ve got a Brexit song, I’ve got a Donald Trump song and I’ve got songs about one or two other modern subjects and they’re starting to feature in the live set list but I’ve got songs about other subjects, too.”

I suppose that we’ll have to wait patiently for the next album as the ink has hardly dried on The Silences In Between. “Three-quarters of the songs I’m looking at are already rehearsed up to a certain extent and I think four of them alternate in and out of the live set, so we’re well on the way. I’m not in a mad rush but I’m already in discussions with somebody who has expressed an interest in producing it and we might start the process sometime quite soon – we could potentially start it at the back end of the year.”

And with that tantalising glimpse into the future we’ll leave Jon to get back to work. If you haven’t encountered The Jon Palmer Acoustic Band yet have a listen to the video below and check out their festival bookings for the summer. You won’t regret it.

Dai Jeffries

Artist’s website: http://www.jonpalmeracousticband.com/

‘Where The Mountains Meet The Sea’ – live: