Acclaimed singer-songwriter Lincoln Barr to perform in March at SPACE in Evanston

Photo by Anna Hoychuk

 

 

By ERIC SCHELKOPF

The Land of Lincoln will welcome Lincoln Barr to SPACE in Evanston on March 4.

Barr will open for Chicago-based The Flat Five  at SPACE, 1245 Chicago Avenue, Evanston. The show starts at 8 p.m. and tickets are available at evanstonspace.com.

I had the chance to talk to Barr about the upcoming show and his latest solo album, the emotionally rich "Forfeit the Prize."

 

Q – Of course you are playing March 4 at SPACE in Evanston. You should get a warm reception because after all, this is the Land of Lincoln.

I grew up in large part in Missouri and I never lived in Illinois. My wife is from Belleville in downstate Illinois, so I’ve spent a little bit of time in the Land of Lincoln.

Q – When you first heard someone say Land of Lincoln, did that sound strange to you?

Probably, yeah.

Q – You will be opening up for The Flat Five at SPACE, a Chicago band, and Kelly Hogan, Nora O’Connor and Casey McDonough from The Flat Five are featured on “Forfeit the Prize.”

We were just finishing up the record and we were looking for a female voice to round out some of the songs. And I thought of Kelly and I asked my producer, Johnny Sangster, if he thought she would be up for it.

So we got on the phone with Kelly one day. She’s just a really collaborative, generous person.

She not only was willing to sing on the record, but she also brought some of her friends along and helped us organize the whole thing. So Johnny and I flew to Chicago in January 2022.

It was very, very cold and we did a day of singing at Reliable Recorders in Chicago. Nora, Kelly and Casey from The Flat Five sang on a few tracks. And Alex Hall from The Flat Five was the engineer that day.

It was a great time.

Q – I had the honor interviewing Nora a few months ago and I saw Nora and Casey perform last summer. They harmonize great together.

They are just amazing singers, just total naturals. And the joke about Casey is that he can sing higher than Kelly or Nora.

It was an honor to have them on the record. When I told Kelly I was looking to set up some Midwest dates, she offered this opportunity to open for The Flat Five at SPACE and I just couldn’t say no.

We are really excited about that. I’m really excited to play in Evanston.

I would like it if we could get Kelly and Nora and Casey up to sing on a couple of numbers.

Q – In making “Forfeit the Prize,” did you have any specific goals and do you think you achieved them?

I think more than anything, I wanted to make something that felt honest and true to where I was as a person at the time when I wrote the songs and when I recorded them.

We were all coming off of a good year and a half minimum of not playing music with any other people because of the pandemic. I wanted to try and make sure that there was humor and that sort of joyful energy in the performances.

I can hear it and I hope other people can as well.

Q – I know that you welcome people comparing you to Burt Bacharach. Of course, he passed away recently at the age of 94. Did that hit you hard when you heard the news?

Believe it or not, I was actually doing an interview for a podcast when the person I was doing the interview with told me the news in the middle of the interview.

It was pretty shocking. I think I’m still sort of processing it.

On the one hand, it’s hard to be too sad at a life so well lived and someone who all gave us so much. He certainly gave a lot to me in terms of inspiration.

I’m definitely sad for his family and all the people that were close to him. For those folks, life is never long enough.

But I’m so grateful that we got to share this time on the planet.

Q – I heard you mention on a podcast interview that you’ve always been drawn to more sophisticated song forms.

That’s definitely true. Unusual or more sophisticated song forms have always tugged at my ear.

I hope to just become more and more fluent in my expression and my ability to kind of utilize that full range of musical tools to get across the feeling that you’re trying to express.

Q – What would you like people to get out of the album?

I think hope and comfort. I personally find a lot of hope in the songs.

The songs sort of came from a place of rest and reflection after a very kind of turbulent time in my life. I just hope it resonates with people and makes them feel something.

Q – It seems like there is a meaning behind the album’s title.

What “Forfeit the Prize” means to me is surrendering your preconceived outcome, of what you think your life is going to be or what the results of your efforts are going to be and realizing that’s probably not going to be what you imagined and hopefully it’s going to be so much more.

Q – On your solo albums, you show a different musical side than you had with your band Red Jacket Mine. Were people surprised that you had a whole different musical side?

I think so. In particular, maybe the more casual observers.

Red Jacket Mine was influenced by artists like certainly Elvis Costello and the Attractions or Rockpile but also NRBQ. NRBQ is still my favorite rock ’n’ roll band of all time and a huge inspiration to Red Jacket Mine.