When George Leach released his debut album in 2000, audiences expected great things from him — they just didn't know it was going to take more than a decade for a followup to Just Where I'm At.
Surrender is Leach's much awaited second album, due out Oct. 23. And even though it's been 12 years since his first album, Leach has managed to stay in the spotlight and even continue to build a fan base. How did he do it?
While you read about Leach's fan base below, along with details on his writing process and exactly why it took him 12 years to release a second album, you can listen to Surrender. CBC Music will be streaming it until Oct. 22.
LISTEN Surrender (streaming until Oct. 22)
George Leach
Tracklist
It's been 12 years since you released your debut album. How have you managed to maintain and even grow a fan base?
All that goes to the fans. They have been super dedicated, and patient with me. I gots me the bester-est fans out there. Twelve years is [a] long time. Let me restate that: 12 years is a very effin' long time to come out with a followup album. But yeah, I am amazed myself at how awesome the fans have been. It hasn't really slowed down.
Why has it taken you so long to release your second album?
Man, so many things to say. But to sum it up and put it bluntly, I wasn't ready for the success of the first record. I recorded the first record simply because it was something I wanted to do before I was 40.
I thought I was going to release it, and I'd be back working at the mill in a few weeks. That's what I thought my life was going to be, and I was fine with that. Then Just Where I'm At took off and started opening up doors I didn't even know existed. It literally felt, like, jumping on the back of a wild stallion, bareback, barrelling down a mountainside, full tilt with absolutely no riding experience whatsoever. All of a sudden I was a manager, a booking agent, a bandleader, a singer-songwriter, a performer, an accountant, a road manager, a role model, etc.
Just Where I'm At kept me on the road for six years. Then learning how to deal with "success," dealing with access to excess, the role model aspect of it, and the pressures that come with that. No boo hoos here at all, it was a big, wonderful learning curve that I felt I needed to take my time with.
I look at Surrender as a garden that I took the time to love and nurture through the different stages of growth. I wanted to feed the people a soul meal that was good for them. Not only for their minds and bodies, but good for the spirit as well. I didn't want my followup album to be like a fast food meal. Something that tasted good at the time but left you empty, and unfulfilled after you ate it because it had nothing for you nutritionally. But instead of going to the grocery store to get the ingredients I needed, I went and grew a garden instead. Bahahaha.
Can you say "control freak"? All in all, I am extremely proud of this album. My wish is for the peeps to have a good soul meal when they take it in.
What was the writing process like for you on this album? Did it take 12 years to write these 11 songs?
The process was intense, but always in motion. There wasn't a minute that went by where I wasn't writing in my head really, or thinking of some aspect of my musical career. I was almost ready to record, then Steven Spielberg came a knockin' for me to play a Lakota medicine man in the series Into the West.
Then, around the same time the riff for the song "Carry Me" came to me in a dream. I played the riff for producer Thomas Salter (also co-writer for some of the songs), and "Carry Me" was written in 18 hours.
I remember after it was done, I took it to a trusted, no BS friend of mine, and he said, "Cool. So are you going to put an album out with 'Carry Me' on it and have all his little buddies hanging off it (meaning all the other songs on an album)?" I was like f--- shit! So I went back for three years and studied producers, albums, songwriting, etc., to write songs that weren't going to leech off of "Carry Me."
The other songs had to stand on their own, and have their own unique strengths. Anyway, I was scared of "Carry Me," to sing it. It was at my peak range vocally at the time. I practised for years in the car, trying to sing it. I didn't have the confidence at the time. I was like — I can't put this out. I can't even sing it live and play the lead riff at the same time. How am I going to tour and sing this every night? I felt defeated, and not worthy of the song.
But, I saw a friend of a friend who was Tina Turner in a Tina Turner tribute act rock out, move and sing the hell out of the material. I asked her after the show, "Is it super hard to sing those songs night after night?" And she said, "No actually it gets easier every night." That was all I needed to hear. I started to think it was possible to grow into the song "Carry Me."
It's been years now since that song was written. Now, that's the process for just one of the songs on the album.
And to answer the 11 songs in 12 years question: no. It just took me 12 years to be ready spiritually, mentally and physically to get to this point. And there are over 100 songs, and strong song ideas in the bag of tricks for the next albums to come.
Which is your favourite song on the album and why?
"Magdalene." Man I love that song. That is the song where I can die a happy man. And for me, I believe I'm only grabbing songs that are already out there in the cosmos. I'm just like a radio antenna, tuning in, translating frequencies coming in.
"Magdalene" is paying homage to Pink Floyd's "Shine on You Crazy Diamond," the song that got me started playing the guitar and on my musical path. I loved how "Shine on You Crazy Diamond" took its time to be itself, no rush. It's not like "OK. Hurry up and feel in three minute or less. This is radio, baby."
I took six to seven years to write the intro to "Magdalene." Duris Maxwell (drums) plays the hell out of that song. The lyrics were mostly off the cuff in the studio. "Magdalene" has something in her that is a life of its own.
It's like that weathered, tall, strong mountain stance, ancient, no apologies for who it is, patient, fearless, storm weathering, changing any current that comes near her, kind of spirit about it. I like that.
The songs were already who they were before I met them. I just had to take my time to get to know them and create an inviting space for them to feel free to be themselves around me. Like getting to know a friend. It takes time.
What have you been doing between albums?
Writing, living, learning, writing, recording, standing, falling, eating, writing, destroying, laughing, crying, writing, crapping, writing, sharing, writing on the crapper, stumbling, loving, breaking up, travelling, performing, acting, writing, fathering, brothering, son-ing, nephewing, friending, writing, re-writing, f---ing upping, growing, changing, enemy-ing, fighting, writing and bwahaha-ing.
Are you going to make your fans wait another 12 years before a third album?
Not sure. Ask me in 12 years. Cheeky monkey, eh? No. I'm already on album three and four. This album was like a self-inflicted spiritual clot. Once it's cleared and delivered to the people, the rest will flow. It's already there. The music is fast, the business of music is slow. So, here's to the music. Lesson learned.
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