Reckless Kelly Goes Back to its Roots

After a decade of solid albums and steady touring, Reckless Kelly raised its profile considerably with the release of 2008’s Bulletproof. The album debuted in the Billboard Top Country Albums chart, had a #1 hit in Texas with “Ragged As The Road” and helped the band pick up an Americana Music Award nomination for Best Band or Duo.

Bulletproof was a departure of sorts from the Austin-based band, with more of a rock sound than previous albums, and songs like “American Blood” and “God Forsaken Town” that were more topical than anything it had recorded. So to follow up, the band went back to its roots to pay tribute to one of its earliest influences.

Band members Cody (fiddle, mandolin) and Willy Braun (guitar, vocals) grew up in Idaho playing in a band with their father and brothers, and like many young musicians in the Pacific Northwest, they were heavily influenced by the Famous Motel Cowboys and its lead singer and songwriter, Pinto Bennett.

“My dad was a friend of Pinto and all those guys when we were growing up in Idaho. We traveled around the same circuit,” Willy Braun says. “We’ve always been big fans of Pinto’s writing and have gotten to be good friends with all of them over the years.”

Braun has co-written songs with Bennett that have appeared on Reckless Kelly albums –“Seven Nights in Eire” and “I Saw It Coming”–but the band’s new album, Somewhere In Time, was entirely taken from Bennett’s song catalog. It’s the band’s second release for Yep Roc Records and will be available Feb. 9. The first single will be “Best Forever Yet” and will be released to radio soon.

“There’s a bunch of great songs that Pinto’s written, and we’ve always been such huge fans that we figured we’d try to get a little exposure out there for Pinto,” says Braun, who adds that the hardest part of the project was to narrow down the songs to 12 for the album. “We could really do a Volume Two if we wanted to, because there’s a lot of great material to work with. In the end, we pretty much went with our faves and the ones we thought we could do a little different take on.”

The album also goes back to a much more country sound, with Cody Braun’s fiddle and guest Lloyd Maines steel guitar being very prevalent on the record. Songs like “Thelma” and “I Hold The Bottle, You Hold The Wheel” rank as some of the most country-sounding songs the band has ever recorded.

“It’s kind of going back to our older stuff in a way, a little less rock than we’ve been doing lately,” Braun says. “We all grew up playing honky tonk and country music, so it wasn’t too much of a stretch for us to go back and do that. It’s been a long time since we’ve gotten to stick our foot in that side of the music.”

Back in Time

As the band’s principal songwriter, Braun says that the recording process for Somewhere in Time was easier on him than usual.

“It buys me a little time to get ready for the next record,” he says. The songs also lent themselves to Reckless Kelly’s sound pretty well, so the band, which includes the Braun brothers, guitarist David Abeyta, drummer Jay Nazz and new bassist Chris Schelske, didn’t have to do much re-arranging. It’s no coincidence that Bennett’s songs fit in very well with the sound that Reckless Kelly has developed since its 1998 debut album, Millican, considering what an influence he has been on the band.

“We kind of have been ripping him off for years already, so it’s not much of a stretch,” he says.

Bennett himself came down from Idaho to add his vocals to a couple of tracks, and several other Motel Cowboys guested on the record.

“It was great to have him around and hear the stories behind the songs,” he says, noting that Bennett’s songs are all pretty much based on real people and events. “Then we got him to sing a little on the album and watch the master at work. He went in and nailed his vocal takes on one or two tries. That was pretty fun to watch; I usually take a lot more tries than that.”

Cody Braun also sang lead vocals on one track, “I’ve Done Everything I Can Do Wrong,” which marks the first time he’s sung lead vocals on a studio track.

“He learned a new song for the first time in 12 years,” Willy Braun says with a laugh. “He really likes that song, and he’s got a great voice.”

The addition of Schelske also made the recording of the album somewhat of a homecoming. He was the band’s original bassist, and when the band needed a new bass player, he came back from what Braun calls a seven-year vacation.

“Him and Jay, the drummer, play really well together. They’re almost like brothers,” he says. “It was really cool to see that when he came back, there was this old pocket that we really hadn’t had for a while.” Schelske also sings backing vocals and writes, and he and Braun will try to write some songs together for the next album.

For the most part, Reckless Kelly has had a fairly stable lineup, and Braun attributes that to the total commitment that everyone in the band shares.

“We’ve all decided a long time ago that this is what we wanted to do for the rest of our lives,” he says. “Once you’ve made a commitment to being broke and being on the road with all the things that come with it, everybody is on board.” it doesn’t hurt that the band’s following and sales have grown with each successive album.

With the release of Somewhere In Time, Reckless Kelly will spend its 2010 doing what the band usually does — “put out a record and go out and tour until people are sick of it, and go out and make another one,” Braun says, laughing. He points out that the band typically does more than 200 shows a year.

As for the next album, Braun says that there’s no telling what it’s going to be.

“It might be a honky tonk thing, it might be more rock than we’ve ever done,” he says, “or maybe Jazz Odyssey.”