Mike Keltner
[Alan sez: Sadly, I can confirm that John does *not* currently have a
record deal. I don't believe that he's even negotiating with anyone this
week, though he's certainly been thru that stage numerous times before. I
bully him about this whenever I see him. He's such a fantastic, joyful,
sardonic, mischievous player. A lot of songwriters write great songs and
can't "sell" them to an audience. Not so with John Ims. He got one of the
best reactions of the entire Kerrville Folk Fest (and there are a ton of
kickass acts at Kerrville.)
I don't know why John isn't signed. I suspect that it's a combination of
factors. One being too much early success with artist covers. He's made so
much money with cuts that a nice signing package for anyone else wouldn't
look so impressive to him. I have no evidence, but I think that he may
still be fishing for one of those 80's record deals with the $150,000
advance and the "big" record company participation on a major label. A
bunch of his contemporaries got them, but there aren't so many of those
floating around these days for the unsigned act.
Maybe he's just too comfortable sitting in Nashville, cashing checks and
writing more great songs. I'd love to see John start releasing albums. He's
got enough songs to fill about a dozen of them and I've always suspected
that once he started getting some product in the pipe, the big bucks might
start to roll in on their own. It's beginning to look like we may never
know.
There's always hope. My other favorite perennial unknown, Nashville's Garry
Burr, finally recently released his first CD. A live disc with about 18
cuts on it. I don't have it in my hands, it's at home, but I've been
meaning to review it for the list. I think the title is "Stop me if you've
heard this..." I'll try to check in later this week with a more detailed
review and info on how to purchase it.]