The Bacon Brothers don't hail from the Lone Star State. But its spirit does permeate the duo's music. After all, the Philadelphia-reared brothers get here as often as they can and even have a song inspired by Gruene Hall.
But, to be fair to the Bacon Brothers — the duo consisting of Hollywood star Kevin Bacon and his real-life brother Michael — they aren't just country. They stir plenty of soul, folk and alt-rock in the mix too. Backed by a full band, the pair will appear at Friday, Jan. 19 at Gruene Hall.
Most likely, music fans already know Kevin from his other career as an A-list actor, having appeared in anything from Footloose to Tremors to Netflix's recent head-scratcher Leave the World Behind. Hell, he's been in so many films he inspired the movie trivia game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.
But don't make the mistake of thinking the Bacon Brothers is a vanity project. Both brothers write, sing lead vocals and play guitar. Besides, Michael has an impressive musical resume of his own, having scored some 100 movie and TV projects, many for PBS, and even picked up an Emmy along the way.
The brothers have enjoyed performing music together since they were kids, and started the band in 1995. They've even largely kept the same backing lineup together from their formation until today.
Two years after forming, the Bacon Brothers released the 1997 debut Forosoco, the title a word coined to describe the band's mix of folk, rock, soul and country. Since then, the outfit has released 11 albums in total, with a new one — Ballad of the Brothers — on the way in April. The title track is already available on streaming services.
The band's tours have taken it to iconic venues like the Grand Ole Opry and Carnegie Hall. But South Texas audiences can count on it playing its Gruene-inspired tune when it appears at the legendary Texas dance hall later this month.
We caught up with both brothers on Zoom, where they talked about their Gruene Hall inspiration, their new single, choosing a setlist and their favorite albums.
Let's start with the new single "Ballad of the Brothers." It's a rootsy, story-oriented song. Tell us a little bit about how the tune came about.
Michael: This would be a song you would relegate to the pile of road songs, different experiences that we had together as brothers. There's a song Kevin wrote for the new record called "Airport Bar," and I remember exactly the day that the seed got planted in his head. We were at an airport bar at 9 o'clock in the morning, and we walked by this group of travelers who were having a very, very good time, probably going to the Caribbean. And he said, or I said, "Funny thing about an airport bar is it doesn't matter what time it is, you're just gonna be there drinking." And sure enough, my brother's wheels started turning, and he came up with this really cool song. There's many things like that. "I Feel You" is about a place we visited. What city, Kevin?
Kevin: Jackson, Mississippi.
Michael: So, the "Ballad of the Brothers" came about when we played seven or eight times at Gruene Hall. There's something about Texas that I find really fascinating. It's a little like Long Island. It's this very large place that doesn't really care what anybody thinks about it. Being residents in New York City, when you meet someone from Long Island, it's just a little bit different than the rest of us. And that's how I feel about Texas. It's fascinating. The Willie Door is about Gruene Hall, and it's the oldest dance hall in Texas, I've been told. And Willie Nelson loved to play there. Who wouldn't love to play there? It's a very cool place. When Willie would come to play, there was no way to come onstage except by coming through the audience. He would obviously get mobbed. So he said, "Can you do something for me? Take this window in the back and put some steps up. I'll climb up there, grab a rope and swing through the door." They weren't allowed to make a door because it's a landmark historical treasure, but this little window became the Willie Door, and everybody that plays there now goes through the Willie Door, which is really fun. That's a neat story, and I started to fantasize about all the Texas musicians that I've looked up to over the years. My model was "Devil Went Down to Georgia," which is a Faustian story, which is a little bit like that in that these two nerdy brothers all of a sudden become rock stars for a night, but you don't know what happened to them, where they went. They traded their lives for one night of glory.
You've been doing the band for decades now and have a wealth of material. How do you go about choosing the setlist since there's so much ground to cover?
Kevin: Yeah, it's an ongoing question. I think we always want to keep switching it up if possible. We don't switch it up set-to-set. Maybe we'll make a little adjustment here or there. But it's not one of those things where we have this hundred-song catalog and every night the setlist is different. That's not what we do. I love tinkering with setlists, because coming from movies and theater, you edit a piece so it has a flow. A first act, a second act and a third act. Highs and lows. I think of the show in that kind of way. I think both of us enjoy playing new stuff. In our case, we don't have any hits, so it's not like we have to play the hits. (Laughs.) You look at artists who sometimes probably grumble about people just wanting to hear their old stuff, their hits, and they don't get to play their new stuff. We don't have that problem. In our current set, it's pretty much new things. We have a couple of things that have hung around for a while. We try to keep it fresh.
Michael, you have a whole list of scores you've done through the years, some of which our readers are likely unaware of. You won an Emmy for The Kennedys, for example. Is there something near and dear to your heart that you feel really represents your body of work?
Michael: As you say, there's an awful lot of it. As a film composer, you would have to separate a great film that you wrote music for or just forget the film and whatever the music is. I can't give you a single answer, but what I've been doing for the past 10 years is archiving. Most of my stuff is on reel-to-reel tape — that's how long I've been doing this. And reel-to-reel tape does not last. You have to digitize it. And it takes a really long time. So, I have a reel-to-reel tape recorder and a lot of DATs, and it's really fun to go back. I've done so much, a lot of it I've totally forgotten. Kevin and I ran into this song that we recorded on our first rehearsal with the band. It was called "Sweet Little Sweety Sweet Something."
Kevin (looks perplexed): I don't remember.
Michael: It's not "Sweet Child O' Mine." (Laughs.). I tried to find it on Apple Music. Maybe we wrote it in our sleep and forgot.
Kevin, Michael has this body of work without you. Do you ever consider doing a solo album without him?
Kevin: I haven't, no. I like doing the stuff we do with the Bacon Brothers. You know, I'm not drawing a comparison to Lennon and McCartney, but there were songs they recorded that we think of as Beatles songs, and one was not really involved with them. And there's plenty of stuff like that that we've done. We write separately, usually, though we have some co-writes on the new record. Sometimes — especially in the case of Michael — he'll start building tracks, like "San Joaquin." It was pretty much done. Maybe I'll put a harmony on or something. Or play a tambourine. (Laughs.) My point is there's no real burning desire to go and make a solo record.
Let's hear from each of you on this one. All-time favorite album?
Michael: I'd have to say Music from Big Pink [by The Band], if I had to really choose one.
What keeps you coming back to that record?
Michael: I was in a band that was signed to Columbia, and we were listening to mixes of our record. And then that came out. And my partner and I were like, "Where did that come from?" It caught us all really off-guard. I was recently listening to some Beatles stuff, and I think The Beatles were really caught off-guard by it.
Kevin: Oh, they were. And Clapton too.
Michael: It was so simple, and it didn't have all these strange things to it. The songs were beautiful and the harmonies and the grooves. When I read about how it was recorded — I think it was recorded on a four-track machine — it just sounds so good.
What about you, Kevin?
Kevin: I don't know, I guess I never get tired of listening to That's the Way of the World from Earth, Wind & Fire. But there's so many. Revolver [by The Beatles] is amazing. Songs in the Key of Life [by Stevie Wonder]. Blue [by Joni Mitchell]. That first [self-titled] James Taylor record. I can't name 'em all.
$119-$139, 8 p.m. Friday, Jan. 19, Gruene Hall, 1281 Gruene Road, New Braunfels, (830) 606-1281, gruenehall.com.
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