You probably haven’t heard Mac Arnold’s music. Not really. Not the way he wants you to.
That’s because after seven decades as a blues musician, the South Carolina native feels like he has finally found the perfect mix of people for his band, Plate Full O’Blues. And after five studio albums, it’s this sixth one — out this summer — that has their rawest, truest sound.
He’s played with James Brown, Muddy Waters, B.B. King and the Temptations. He created the much-loved Cornbread and Collard Greens Blues Festival. He was inducted into the Alabama Blues Hall of Fame in 2017, and the South Carolina Entertainment and Music Hall of Fame just last month.
During a visit to ArtBomb Studios in Greenville, South Carolina, Arnold squeezed in some time to talk with StankRadio. Leaning into the large, gray, tufted velvet sofa where we sat, he talked about music-making with the earnestness, curiosity and stubborn optimism of somebody who’s just getting started.
What does being inducted into a hall of fame mean for you?
I have accomplished another mission. I always have a mission of being successful in a project that I'm doing. And with this one, it took a long time. It took me 18 years to put together the group that I really think does the job.
What did you feel Plate Full O’Blues was lacking?
I was looking for a rhythm section where the drummer and the bass player is a match. Over the years, I've had jazz drummers and a good bass player playing blues, or vice versa. I never had a team that was on the same page. So about a year and a half ago, it happened, and now we're on the top of our game at this point.
It’s one of those things like a bad marriage (versus) a good marriage. Same difference. People know when it’s not a good musical marriage. It shows up in the music. If (a) person is having a bad day, and they’re a leader of the group, it shows, even though they're trying to cover it up. You can't cover up negativity.
What were you listening for musically, when trying musicians out?
Tones and speeds.You gotta be able to play within the meter of what the rhythm is about. You can’t be going outside and playing for yourself. Bad personality is negative energy in music. Positiveness always shows a better outcome than negativity.
For your enjoyment — the music that really moves you — is positivity important there?
Very, very important all the time. I try to never deal with negativity, okay? I shut negativity off. I don't even hear it. Now, I listen to a little Southern rock and blues. But hip-hop is something that gave me a bad taste, because I was in the middle of it when it started, out in Los Angeles. Bad things happened, and when bad things happen to a person that's thinking positive, you always remember it. So I’m not a fan of hip-hop.
Whose music do you always go back to?
Lightnin’ Hopkins, John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, Blind Willie McTell, Memphis Minnie — all those people is what made music happen. Period. All the music in the world came from blues.
Okay, I’m a Blind Willie McTell fan. What do you go to him for?
It’s his style of playing, and the notes he used to connect his expression to the people. It’s really unique. And when you start picking parts, and learning to play them yourself, it's amazing.
We did a gig here a couple of weeks ago with a young man, 25 years old, (Jontavious Willis), playing all the material from the 1920s, ‘30s and ‘40s. This kid was incredible. He's from Greenville, Georgia. Incredible.
It sounds simple, but it's very hard to get those fundamentals down. A lot of times, I'll be listening to B.B. King’s Bluesville (Sirius XM radio show) and it cracks me up the way they do turnarounds sometimes. Or they’ll just be playing, and all of a sudden quit! I said, “what?!”
Well, it's great, though. They really set a pace for all of us. It's really nice once you get to the point that you can analyze everything, and know how it works. It's like cooking. There is an ingredient, and if you don't use that ingredient, it's not cornbread, it's something else.
What are a couple of songs you enjoy breaking down and working out that way?
Well, one of the songs that I do by B.B. King called “Why I Sing the Blues.” And I have a song of my own, “Nothing to Prove,” where lyrics have to fit in between the syncopation. It’s lines and spaces. That means a lot in music.
Your sixth album comes out this summer.
Yes,“Blues All Over You.” We’ve been working on this thing for about a year now.
What's unique about this one? Was the process any different this time around?
What was different? We did all the recording ourselves instead of going to a studio. My bass player has a studio. My guitar player has a studio. My drummer has a studio. So we did everything ourselves from scratch. I did all the writing of the lyrics. My bass player did the tracks on the bass, and we added to them.
This is 100% homemade. How did that change the experience?
Well, we could never hit the raw sound that we always wanted. It was always compressed. It sounds electronic. We don't wanna sound electronic.
And the only way you can get that is to do it yourself, because all the engineers basically are trained to compress stuff to make it sound a certain way. So many instruments get lost in the mix when they're compressing the audio.
For example, a keyboard player playing a Hammond organ, if he's not trained, he'll take over the band. You won't hear nothing but him. Like I said before, lines and spaces are very important in music.
You've been doing this for so long. What would you say to folks who maybe get a little jaded or frustrated trying to make music these days?
The only thing I can say is that (you) have to think positive, and deal with the situation you can't change. Adjust, do what you can and do it good. You can't stop good and positive.
Find Mac Arnold’s upcoming tour dates at https://www.macarnold.com/tour.
