The plotline came from an idea for a novel that Parr eventually abandoned and mined for song ideas. “Cheap Wine” is a new recording of a longtime audience favorite, a sinister narrative sung from the point of view of a liquor storeowner with a dark secret who’s starting to crack. “On Stealing a Sailboat” is a new song, a “cautionary tale about choosing your friends wisely,” he deadpans. “In a way, I’ve been re-writing them over and over again for the past two decades.” “I recorded some of those songs almost 20 years ago and, when I think about what my mind was like at that time, it’s not what it is now,” he explains. “Songs are a different kind of history though, they’re not subject to the rules of time, they never died and they never will, and they grow and evolve right along with the rest of me.” He wanted a chance to record them again to capture what they had become. I can grieve all over again my Dad’s passing I can feel my stomach turn at the mountains of regret that I’ve amassed and the people I’ve hurt when I’ve been too self-absorbed to take better care of my actions, but I can’t change it. “I can relive all the joyful times I had with my friends and family. “I can revisit any of them I want and meditate on what it was like to be seven years old again, curious about the guitar, obsessed with music and hoarding bike parts,” he says. He started digging out songs from early in his career. That’s what counts the most - having pure motives and loving intention.”īy the time Parr hit the road again, he was reinvigorated to play music in a way he had not been for some time. That’s not a music career, it’s just making music. “Part of the effect of the accident was a reaffirming of what’s really important to me. “I’m not really that interested in careerism,” Parr says. I’m the guy that plays guitar.’ So what happens when that gets stripped out? If there’s any way you can keep doing it, you’re going to keep on.”īut not everything returned to the way it was his outlook had been altered. “When you think about yourself, you think, ‘That’s what I am. “It’s the defining thing in my life,” Parr says. Three weeks later he made a pain-filled return to the stage with an appearance on the Live from Big Top Chautauqua radio show. Within days, as soon as he could tabletop his guitar across his lap, Parr was playing again. He underwent surgery that left him with a metal plate and eight pins holding his reconstructed shoulder together. But, when playing the guitar is intertwined with who you are, not playing really isn’t an option. His right shoulder was busted into pieces and his ability to play guitar on stage again was suddenly in question. Then, while skateboarding with his daughter along Lake Superior, he hit pavement.
Only a month earlier he had made his first appearance at the Newport Folk Festival, bookending a summer of touring and career highpoints.
The accident on Augcould have put an end to Parr’s career.
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The songs represent a musical reckoning that came after a freak accident less than a year ago that forced him to relearn how to play guitar, causing him to take stock of the songs he’s written over his lifetime. The album features Charlie’s trademark resonator guitar and 12-string with co-producer Liz Draper on bass, longtime collaborator Mikkel Beckmen on percussion, Jeff Mitchell on electric guitar, accordion, organ, backing vocals, and Dave Hundrieser on harmonica. Recorded at the legendary Pachyderm Studio in Canon Falls, MN, CHARLIE PARR is an honest and raw recording of Parr reflecting on himself and his career up to this point. The album is a collection of new songs and new studio versions of classics/audience favorites from throughout Parr’s career and will be released September 27 on Red House Records. CHARLIE PARR is the new album by the Minnesota-based folk blues artist of the same name.
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