Blues man Keb’ Mo’ on collaboration and inspiration ahead of tonight’s Kauffman show with Shawn Colvin
by Nick Spacek – ThePitch.com
Musician Keb’ Mo’ is a lauded bluesman with five Grammys and a list of collaborators longer than your arm. He’s played with the likes of Vince Gill, Bonnie Raitt, and Taj Mahal. In fact, Keb’ Mo’ has a second collaboration with Taj Mahal out in May under the TajMo aegis, entitled Room On The Porch. The guitarist, singer, and songwriter appears tonight at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts with Shawn Colvin, and we spoke with Keb’ Mo’ to discuss his career.
The Pitch: You have collaborated with a lot of people. You’ve got this new album coming out with Taj Mahal, you’re touring with Sean Colvin. What do all of these different collaborators and tour mates offer you as a musician?
Keb’ Mo’: They keep me from being a lazy bum. They keep me awake. They keep me on my toes.
I can’t imagine you ever being a lazy bum, as much as you’ve done.
It’s over three decades, and then there’s the decades before that no one knows about. I like my relaxing times as much as anybody, but I love being in music. In order to survive in music, or to get anyone’s attention, or to stake a claim, you gotta work.
You’re coming to Kansas City and you’ve been here so many times. What does playing a town that’s as steeped in blues and jazz as Kansas City offer you as a musician in terms of an audience?
I got family roots in Kansas City. My cousin, Joan Carter, she lives there. She’s my late uncle James’s daughter. She had a sister, she just passed not too long ago and she got kids. My uncle James, he was there in the ’50s and he owned two grocery stores in Kansas City, so when I go there, that’s what I think about. The blues? Yeah, Kansas City is big for the blues, but it’s barbecue and family.
I can’t imagine a better reason to come to town than that.
Yeah, and last time I was in Kansas City, I was at the hotel, and I walked out my hotel room, and Bobby Rush was walking by the door.
In terms of all of your collaborators or tour mates, is there anybody in particular that you can point to as someone you’ve learned from, either back when or even now?
Well, I’m a huge admirer of Shawn Colvin. But, Taj is someone I learned from. He’s a big deal. Taj Mahal and Bonnie Raitt, they’re the bookends of who I am.
It’s so funny. We’re talking about Taj Mahal and I am wearing a Jesse Ed Davis t-shirt right now.
I saw Jesse Edwin Davis play with Taj in 1969 in my high school. I didn’t know what I was looking at, but I was looking at Jesse Edwin Davis playing with Taj and it was like, “Whoa.”
I can’t even imagine what seeing that in high school would do to you as an aspiring musician.
Well, it was Taj just starting out. I think he was on his second album then. He was probably 27. He’s nine years older than me. I was probably 17 at the time. That means he was 26.
And now you guys have made two albums together. When you get to record and form a relationship with somebody that you saw at such a formative age, what’s that like? I feel like, even now, there are times I talk to people that I was influenced by at a young age and even at this point in my career, it blows my mind and I have to calm down.
It’s crazy. You turn into a little fan. I was doing the TajMo tour several years ago, I look over and I start to think, We’re on stage, we did an album, we’re out here—I’m like, whispering to myself, freaking out inside—and, oftentimes, I would maybe miss my cue, he’d look over at me, I’d get dirty looking, and I’d go, “Oh!” ’cause I was freaking out.
The first date of that next TajMo tour is at The Grand Ole Opry.
Why’d you tell me that? Don’t tell me that. I don’t need to know that.
Whoops. I always love talking to musicians who have gotten to play there because I feel like there’s so much music that is soaked into that theater that you can’t help but up your game to be there.
Aw man, it’s gummy in there. Yeah, I just love it. It’s like, its floors are sticky with just all kinds of music there.
As someone who has played and performed so many times, who are the folks that you look to now as being the next stage of blues and taking it further into the 21st century?
Oh, that’s Jontavious Willis and Kingfish Ingram. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I like how there was no hesitation on that. What do you hear and see in their playing that makes you answer with those two names, no pause?
Because they’re pure. They got the real deal. It’s not watered down or any kinda way. They’re from the south. They’re born on the right dirt.
You have this tour with Shawn Colvin that’s coming to Kansas City, and then you’re going on the road on another TajMo tour. When you’ve got this for the first half of the year, what does the second half of 2025 look like for you?
It looks like Taj Mahal time. They’re both different, all different music. It’s a lot of homework.
What does that homework involve?
You gotta learn your stuff. You gotta know your songs. It’s like being a side musician. Me being the front guy, I just do my stuff and people kinda rotate under me, but when you’re one of those guys, a side guy, it’s just like you become a whole other person.
You’ve been doing it this long. I assume that you’ve got some tricks at this point?
No, no, I ain’t got no tricks. Just the work. You just gotta work. You gotta get in there, prepare for your rehearsal, and then you gotta get your muscle memory going. It’s muscle memory, so that your body does it. Your memory can’t do it. Your body has to.
And Taj is really good like that. He’s got a mind like a steel trap, in his ’80s. He’s like, prolifically smart. He’s a deep dude. It’s like, he’s a blues man and a college professor all wrapped into one.