Another night, another hotel room – and that’s just the way Jenny Don’t And The Spurs like it. The band’s unique brand of country-fried rock’n’roll has taken them all over the globe and Vintage Rock catches them in a rare moment of downtime as they ply their trade on their latest European tour.
Emerging in 2012 from the melting pot of Portland, Oregon’s underground rock scene, the band were initially an all-acoustic duo featuring singer/guitarist Jenny Don’t and her husband, bass player Kelly Halliburton. They soon morphed into a trio then finally a four-piece band and, after some changes along the way, their current line-up now includes guitarist Christopher March and drummer Buddy Weeks. Coming from a punk background, the band’s sound might seem like a real change in style but Kelly has a different perspective.
“Most of us had listened to roots music in some form throughout our lives,” says Kelly. “My own exposure came largely from growing up in a rural Oregon community where country music was very popular. Despite the stereotype of it being the antithesis of punk rock, there were always certain artists that were more ‘acceptable’ to listen to, and my formative years saw singers like Johnny Cash, Patsy Cline and Hank Williams comfortably co-existing on the turntable with Discharge, Black Flag and Poison Idea.”
Jenny had also performed classic country songs in a previous musical collaboration. “I did some duo work with a roommate I had,” she adds. “We played Loretta Lynn, Patsy Cline and Hank Williams kind of stuff along with our own material.”
Spurred Into Action
As country music seems to have splintered into so many different sub-genres over the years, where the band place themselves on the landscape is still unclear.
“It’s hard to say,” Jenny ponders. “We’ve always played our own style and have never worried about trying to write songs that fit nicely into any specific category. Sometimes this makes it hard to define exactly what we play: Country? Surf? Garage? Punk? We just play a mix of the musical styles we like to hear, and we make music that we’d enjoy listening to.” This type of approach seems to have paid off. “Luckily, we’ve found receptive listeners from all of those musical camps, and a lot of people seem to really like what they hear,” agrees Jenny.
After a nine-track demo CD in 2013, the band’s self-titled debut album appeared in 2015 followed by Call Of The Road two years later. Both albums appeared on the band’s own Doomtown Sounds but their third offering, Fire On The Ridge, saw them move to Fluff & Gravy Records. Did this label change progress the band forward in terms of gaining greater recognition and securing more live work?
“We’ve always been a forward-looking, proactive bunch, pushing ourselves to the next thing, whether that’s a new tour, new album, or whatever,” declares Kelly. “The timing of the release of Fire On The Ridge was pretty fortuitous, as it came out right when things were starting to open up again after more than a year of pandemic shutdowns. So, when the album was released, we were able to get back out on the road to tour all over the place and promote it.”
Broken Hearted Blue
With the Fluff & Gravy connection still intact, 2024 saw the release of the band’s latest album Broken Hearted Blue and the reception has already been positive.
“It’s been great, and the songs for the album which we’ve incorporated into our set seem to go over really well in a live music setting, which is always our best measure of a song’s staying power,” explains Jenny. “We’re very happy with the way it turned out, and people seem to like it but we’re already looking ahead to the next album.”
Each record does seem to have a distinctive feel but for the band this is just something that happens naturally.
“Whenever we set out to write material with a specific style or theme, it turns out totally different than how we planned – and almost every time, it’s for the better. We don’t intentionally try to write a certain way, we like to let the songs and themes develop on their own organically.”
“I think any changes in our sound over the years have been reflections of our own growth and development as individuals and as a band,” says Kelly in agreement. “Channelling that evolution, in our opinion, produces a far more interesting result than if we’d sat down and decided to write songs which fit any kind of predetermined stylistic route that we’d decided to take.”
Although the band’s albums have so far been split between their own Doomtown Sounds and Fluff & Gravy, their singles back catalogue is stretched across numerous labels and the freedom to work with different record companies seems to appeal.
“A few of us in the band are pretty avid record collectors, and we love 45s as a format,” explains Kelly. “We like working with interesting labels to put them out. It’s a perfect low commitment release, too. With a full-length album there is always the pressure to promote and get as much mileage as possible out of it, not to mention the considerable expense involved in recording and manufacturing. With a 7″, we can give a label a couple of songs, they can release it reasonably quickly and cheaply, and everyone can just enjoy the process of having created a new release collectively.”
Dedicated To Sam
Despite the creative freedom they enjoy, things have not all gone smoothly during the band’s time together. Drummer Sam Henry had been with the band since their earliest days, and a friend for even longer, and when he passed away in 2022 it provoked some serious contemplation.
“Sam’s death was a devastating loss, one from which we almost didn’t recover,” recalls Jenny. “Sam was like family, and we loved him dearly. In the weeks that followed his passing, we had to do some real soul-searching and thinking about whether we even wanted to push on. Ultimately we came to the agreement amongst ourselves that it’d be such a waste to throw away all the hard work that Sam had put into the band. We felt that Sam’s legacy would be best preserved by keeping the band going.”
“Another effect that Sam’s death had on us though, was that it was a powerful reminder of how fleeting and unpredictable life can be, and how quickly everything can come crashing down,” adds Kelly. “We decided that we owed it to ourselves and to Sam’s memory to dedicate ourselves and our energies to the band, pushing ahead harder than before.”
Get In The Van
This fervour for playing live is clear to see and looking over Jenny Don’t And The Spurs gig itinerary for the past two years alone is a heavyweight read as they have been all around North America numerous times with tours across the UK, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and the Philippines along the way. This is a band well acquainted to a life split between airport departure lounges, hotel rooms and the back of a van.
“We definitely love life on the road!” Kelly exclaims. “We love travelling, meeting old friends, making new ones and being able to play our music in the craziest and coolest environments around the world. Besides the fact that we love the way music can serve as a universal, worldwide language, we also never get tired of how playing live has allowed us to travel to so many exotic places across the world.
“I, like the rest of the band, grew up in pretty modest circumstances, and unless I joined the military or something, it was unlikely that I was going to be doing much globetrotting. Now, more than 30 years and countless tours later, I still get that thrill every time I step off an airplane or drive down a foreign highway. Most of all, I feel incredibly lucky to be able to share this with Jenny and the other guys in the band who are all just as crazy about this as I am.”
All this live activity is in no danger of slowing down. After their upcoming UK tour ends, the band have just one week at home before they hit the road on a tour through California and Mexico then it’s back to Europe followed by gigs across North America and possibly more dates in Australia and New Zealand.
Somewhere amidst all that they will also be working on a new album. It’s a huge amount of work but the band’s career is something that has evolved naturally rather than some long-term masterplan.
“There’s really no better way we can imagine spending our time than travelling around the world, making friends and playing music,” says Jenny warmly. “We still don’t have any plan or strategy. Regardless of our degree of ‘success’ or whatever level that we reach, the main thing is we keep doing what we love to do.”
As they prepare to get back in the van and head towards the Swiss border, Jenny reflects on the only objective that really matters. “When it stops being something that makes us all happy, and something that we are passionate about, then that’s when we’ll call it a day. Until then, we’ll be out here bouncing around these far-flung highways, doing what we do best.”
For the latest Jenny Don’t And The Spurs news and tour information click here
Words by Craig Brackenridge Featured Image by Jen Noel
SIGN UP TO THE VINTAGE ROCK NEWSLETTER
