Hawaii Tribune-Herald Island Beat Thursday, September 29, 2016 5 Fired up Shimabukuro reflects on eruption of creative energy recording ‘Nashville Sessions’ When ukulele virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro plays his annual Palace Theater concert, it’s one of Hilo’s hottest tickets and invariably a sellout. His newly released album, “Nashville Sessions,” generates its own kind of heat, so much so the album cover photo is a lavascape by renowned Hilo photographer Bruce Omori. And the music itself burns up the speakers with a prog-rock, jam-band vibe between Shimabukuro, bassist Nolan Verner — who’s also a Nashville session musician — and drummer Evan Hutchings, a friend of Verner’s and fellow sessionman. “We rented a studio for six days and the idea was to go in and jam and try to write and come up with new material,” Shimabukuro told the Tribune-Herald last week. “The three of us got together and we wrote and arranged and recorded tunes without the expectations of putting out a full record. But surprisingly, after six days, we had 12 or 13 tracks, all original material and things we wrote together. It’s my first all-original record. And I think, being in Nashville, that’s the city of songwriters, so I think that inspired me to write and be creative and come up with different things. “I experimented a lot with different sounds and different gear. We recorded a lot with vintage tube amps and things like that to really bring out the warmth of the ukulele. And I also did some things where I incorporated multiple ukuleles. I incorporated the baritone uke and the standard, or soprano uke. Of course, the tenor is my main instrument, so I used the tenor for most of it. But I ran the baritone through some distortion and put some slight overdrive on the tenor and ran it through a Leslie cabinet (speakers). We were able to get some really cool sounds. I think I was able to get something different from my previous albums and I’m really happy with it.” The album, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard World Music Chart, has 11 tracks, all instrumentals, including the stunning “Kilauea,” which Shimabukuro said was inspired by Eddie Van Halen’s sizzling guitar solo on “Eruption.” “I remember the first time I head the song ‘Eruption,’ my jaw just hit the floor because I wondered, ‘How is he making all these sounds on the guitar? How’s he doing that?’ And I wanted to do something in that vein. I wanted to see how I could stretch myself and see how many sounds I could make with the instrument,” he said. An official video of the song is already on YouTube. The video was shot at Ronnie’s Place — which sounds like a friendly neighborhood watering hole, but is actually the studio where the album was recorded. “I went online to check out the place and it has some amazing equipment,” Shimabukuro said. “You know who went there to record after we left? Phish. This album was really like a jam-band record, so it was really cool to hear that Phish was coming in to do their next record there because they were a big influence for me.” Shimabukuro said he loves being home but loved recording in Nashville, where he didn’t have the distractions of everyday life. “I felt I could just immerse myself in the recording,” he said. “In those six days that we were in the studio, I probably only got about 12 hours of sleep in those entire six days because we were so inspired. We’d go into the studio at about 10 in the morning and we’d record and write and arrange and play and we’d stay until about 11 at night. And I’d be up all night, just writing and coming up with ideas. Then we’d go back to the studio. I’d get only about two hours of sleep a night but I wasn’t tired at all because I was so excited and so inspired and I had all this energy and momentum. I felt like, for those six days, I could be in 100 percent creative mode. And I never had to break that mode.” Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune- herald.com. A side of Aloha with every meal. Mon-Sat 9:30am-9pm Sun 9:30am-8pm KEAAU SHOPPING CENTER By JOHN BURNETT Hawaii Tribune-Herald
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