Dirty Linen #100

This is an excerpt from the print edition of Dirty Linen Magazine #100 (June/July 2002). the magazine is available on newsstands and by subscription.

Robert Earl Keen

Texas Rising
by Kerry Dexter

Through nine albums and thousands of performances over the years, Robert Earl Keen has shared stories ranging from intricate, closely observed, dusty ballads of loners and searchers to honky tonk rave-ups that get every drunk or semi-drunk in the crowd singing along with the chorus. Early in his career he shared bills with Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt and made the acquaintance of Lyle Lovett and Nanci Griffith. He's often spoken of in the same breath as renowned Texas tunesmith Jerry Jeff Walker, and claimed as a hero by breakout Texas country stars such as Pat Green. He was born in Houston, lives in Bandera, went to college at Texas A&M, and started his playing days with happy hour gigs at Jalapeno Charlie's (now Polvo's) in Austin. So he is steeped in Texas credentials, but the question that annoys Keen the most, and one he still gets quite often, is: Does he ever play outside Texas? "I've always strived to play outside Texas," he said, speaking from the road between sold-out shows in the Boston area. "Somebody says that to me, I say, you haven't been paying attention, 'cause I've been playing outside Texas since 1986." In the past year, those stops have included The House of Blues in New Orleans, Atlanta's Variety Playhouse, and The Fillmore in San Francisco.

Not that he thinks the current interest in Texas-based music is a bad thing. "I think it's real good for me, and real good for [the other musicians]. Most of 'em have been to 50 or more of my shows, and I saw 'em and met 'em, and kicked 'em out of backstage areas and stuff over the years. I think it's because of me that it even exists, I'm real proud of it, but did I set out to create a Texas movement in music? Nah. That's never what my interest was. I write songs about Texas because that's what I feel honest about."

It's also where he does most of his writing, in a small building he has fixed up behind his home in Bandera. "The road is so intense for me that I find myself not being able to write very well there. I kinda dabble in it, but you're not still long enough, you don't feel secure enough about what's goin' on to write. I feel like writing is a very lonely and a very needy process," Keen continued. "You have to feel very secure about where you are, that there's not going to be any interruptions. It's just always been that way for me."

"Always" goes back a while. "I started writin' songs — well, as far back as I can remember. I would sit down and make up some little song, and then, when I learned how to write, I could jot down the lyrics. I always had to have some little tune goin' on," he recalled, "and then for a while I just wrote straight rhyming poetry, all through school. I didn't learn how to play the guitar until I was 18 or 19 years old, but as far as writing songs, I started at maybe six or seven years old."

Keen's songs have been covered by such diverse artists as the Dixie Chicks, Joe Ely, Waylon Jennings, Lucy Kaplansky, Nanci Griffith, Lyle Lovett, Dar Williams, Kelly Willis, and Gillian Welch. At this point in his career, he mainly writes when he has a recording session coming up. "Part of getting ready for a record would be to set aside time to write songs previous to the recording," he said. He begins "from pictures in my head. I always play the guitar. I sit and write, and the words and music come at the same time. I feel like the music is kinda the engine that gets me going, that gets me started, so consequently I might sit for two hours just strummin' different little riffs and changes, tunings, doin' anything to try to get an idea," Keen explained. "Once I get something in my head, some kinda picture or memory or something — not necessarily what one would consider a real memorable memory, just something that I've seen that I was curious about, or that I thought was beautiful or horrific or something — then I try to describe it. In the process of tryin' to describe this picture, this snapshot in my mind, I develop a story around it and go from there. Then the story takes over, and I let my imagination run wild."

This is an excerpt from an article in Dirty Linen #100 (June/July '02). Read the full text in the magazine, available via subscription or on newsstands and in bookstores.