Jimmy LaFave's career is rich with dichotomy. For starters, he was a drummer before becoming a guitarist; he moved to Austin in 1986, but many people still consider him an Oklahoman because he lived and made music in Stillwater in the 1970s and '80s; and despite being named Songwriter of the Year at both the Kerrville Music Awards and the Austin Music Awards — quite a feat given that Austin is the capital of brilliant songwriters — LaFave has covered 19 Bob Dylan songs on his eight albums. "No one has ever sung Dylan with as much grace and insight as Jimmy LaFave," says noted music writer Dave Marsh.
While his fans love LaFave's infatuation with Dylan — the 12 covers on his 1999 double-disc set Trail were partially to quell the call for a "LaFave Sings Dylan" CD — they keep coming back for more because of the honky tonk rock, folk, country, rockabilly and blues that he puts into his own songs, coupled with a plaintive voice that routinely recalls Steve Forbert's.
The former nightclub manager also reveres Woody Guthrie, and in 1996 he was hand-picked by Guthrie's daughter Nora to participate in a tribute to her father at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and later to speak and perform at Guthrie's induction into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame. In 2003, LaFave produced "Ribbon of Highway — Endless Skyway," a Woody Guthrie tribute show that toured the U.S. featuring a rotating cast of, among others, Slaid Cleaves, Eliza Gilkyson, Sarah Lee Guthrie and Johnny Irion performing Guthrie's songs.
Provenance: Born near Dallas in Wills Point, Texas, LaFave is now based in Austin.
Latest release: Cimarron Manifesto (2007)
© 2007 Nigel Music Media LLC. Used by permission.
Jimmy LaFave
