01.01.07 Carbondale Nightlife Stephen Simmons: Crossroads of Sin and Redemption Stephen Simmons is not your typical acoustic singer-songwriter. In a way, he is an everyman. He spends his nights crisscrossing the country, playing one-nighters on tiny stages where, depending on the gig, the joint is either serving up cold ones or hot cups of Joe. Back at his home base in Nashville, Tennessee, when he is not writing, recording, or preparing for another tour, he works at his straight job, substitute teaching to make ends meet. Carbondale audiences can journey with Simmons to his music's address, the corner of Mundane and Grace, when the singer/songwriter brings his solo acoustic sounds Friday, January 26 to the stage of the Longbranch Coffee House. While his look in photographs is a little Steve Earle and a little Foo Fighters, the candor with which he writes and sings is pure Johnny Cash. Many performers who tout themselves as singer/songwriters sugarcoat the travails and dark valleys in which both they and their audiences often find themselves, but Simmons lays it all on the line, leaving no stone of the soul unturned, until listeners have examined their own hearts in search of real truth. With a combination of both saint and sinner coursing through his Tennessee blood, he finds himself, in his music, often at the crossroads of sin and redemption, living somewhere in a place not so very different from where most people dwell. The only difference is that Simmons sings about it, and with honesty. Born the son of a factory worker and a school teacher in the small rural town of Woodbury, Tennessee, Simmons naturally came by the grace spectrum in his music, with a childhood highlighted by a strict Church of Christ upbringing. The stained-glass windows and weekly hymns, however, did not absolve the young Simmons from exposure to the often rowdy side of rural country life, as he states in his website's biography: "When you're raised in the Church of Christ and you're sensitive at all, it leaves you with a lot to struggle with. You grow up to see there are gaps and holes in what you've been taught. On the one hand I was exposed to small-community religious life. But on the other hand, I was exposed to my wild-ass relatives. My songs are an attempt to get all of those contradictions out." Contradiction is at the core of Simmons's creativity, with many of his songs being what he calls murder ballads, while others proclaim the cleansing power of Grace and its effect on a soul teetering on the brink of eternal oblivion. In an exclusive Nightlife interview, he says that he hopes Carbondale audiences will find nothing typical, but something very special in his upcoming live show. "What can they expect? As far as being the guy with guitar, I'm definitely more of a storyteller in every sense of the word," he says. "I'm not going to be jumping around and playing fifteen-minute instrumentals. I'm a songwriter, and I have a lot of songs. Some old, some brand-new, some I haven't played in forever. It kind of runs everything from spiritual themes to murder ballads to things on the lighter side." Simmons's latest collection of music, Drink Ring Jesus, is a lyrical study in redemption, both spiritual and physical. The standout track, a haunting rural portrait called "Next Stop, Redemption," finds the singer on a mythical train barreling down the tracks for an uncertain destination: "Just a train tryin’ to find its way home/Picking up people like a lost and found/Hitting every depot that's long been abandoned/Man, this train is going where we need to go." This and other folly-and-faith yarns spun with a deep, almost molasses-soaked voice and expert musicianship make Drink Ring Jesus a CD that will, if not change the listener's spiritual destination, at least make him or her think more deeply along the journey. Illuminating the more shadowy corners of the human soul has been a constant theme in Simmons's songwriting since his previous release, Last Call. With more unsettling honesty about the less shiny places of the heart, Last Call also points the way to the light that brightens those darkest reaches, in songs like "Sweet Salvation": "And I don't know how I found you/In the kind of places that I roam/It's always the fool that's the last to see/It was more like you that found me." "I think some of the themes in [my music] are pretty much the same wherever I go," Simmons says when asked if his Tennessee upbringing has been a key factor in his music. "Rural Tennessee doesn't look that different from Southern Illinois in some ways. I think there are things that can be anywhere, in small towns especially." As any good singer/songwriter's music tends to do from album to album, Simmons says that small changes, while remaining with his core theme of mankind's search for redemption in the midst of a sin-filled world, have been played a large part in the evolution and completion of his latest creation. "The Drink Ring Jesus record is an all-acoustic record. It is a pretty spiritual record, but not like in a contemporary-Christian kind of way. In fact, there are even a couple of songs on there that are told from the devil's perspective. Last Call, my first record, is kind of a rock ‘n’ roll record. There is some stripped-down stuff on there, but it's more character-driven. Drink Ring Jesus has characters in it, but most of the songs are like a guy sitting in a bar talking to himself or the devil talking to a crooked preacher. I even have one where the devil and God are fighting over lost souls." As a creator of music, Simmons has mixed feelings when asked which aspect of the writing, recording, or performing is his favorite. "I don't know," he says. "It's a copout to say a little of all three. I've been a songwriter longer than I've been a singer or a performer. Writing is something I knew even before I knew I needed to be writing them down. If I'm away from it for a while I go crazy, and people tell me, ‘You need to be writing.’ It's that voice that never stops; it always wants my attention. Recording is just a blast. It's a lot of fun. I love being in the studio; I wish I could do it every six months. As far as playing goes, I took December off, and now I'm itching to play again. I really miss playing live when I don't have that. Sometimes I get a little worn out when I'm out of town every weekend for three or four weeks in a row or when I'm gone more than a week. But you go more than a few weeks without playing a show, and I really miss it. On the flipside, shows are an experience that we are sharing with an audience. It's not just me or just me and my band. It may be splitting hairs to say that, but it's true." There are many songs on the current CD, Drink Ring Jesus, that will catch listeners’ ears or make them think, but Simmons himself confesses an inability to pick just one song that he feels is his favorite or is more special than the others. "You know, I don't know that I do," he says when asked if he has a favorite song on the record. "In that sense, I mean, there are definitely times when I listen to a particular song, and think I may have done something above and beyond, if something has a little extra ‘ooomph’ in it or you feel you have outdone yourself. Then again, there are times when I get so caught up in trying to get all of the songs finished and recorded that they kind of pile up to them and I don't get a chance to really go back and listen to them. Then I come back to certain ones later, and they catch a new life and they have new energy. I don't know that I have any particular song that I feel is better than others. If you're talking about your songs as your children, a parent loves all of his kids equally." Symbolism and imagery play major roles in Simmons's music, whether he is writing about a man contemplating the depths of his soul as he stares into the depths of a whiskey glass, or a type of purgatory train gathering lost souls as it winds its way toward eternity. The singer says that many types of places inspire his songs, and listeners can expect, when sampling his music, to find themselves "somewhere between a bar and a drive-in the country." "A lot of the songs on Drink Ring Jesus were born at my desk, songs where I was sitting at my desk at one in the morning, just writing," says Simmons. "Once everything going on in your life calms down and leaves your mind a little bit, sometimes the darnedest things slip out of your mouth while you're sitting around playing. I've always tried to be open, and try to catch it while it's there and then try to figure it out later. I love analogies and metaphors, and those are things that have always played very heavily in my writing. Everybody wants redemption. Everybody needs to feel that all is forgiven and everything is going to be okay in the end. We all want to be accepted no matter how much [like] outcasts we may act like sometimes. That's what the music is about." While Simmons is currently touring in support of Drink Ring Jesus, he is already looking to his musical future, which includes a newly completed album that has yet to be released. The singer will say little about the upcoming music, except to say that it is a departure from his current and previous releases. "It's more about relationships, and men and women. It's a rock record. Nobody dies on this record. And there are no mentions of Jesus or God or the devil. I've said all I've got to say about those things. There are story songs, but they relate more to relationships between people. The subject matter is a lot different. It's a bit broader than Drink Ring Jesus. Musically it's a lot different and goes in a lot more different direction." – Jeff Hale