September 20, 2001
An Album out of the Blue, without the Twang
By Michael Corcoran, Austin American-Statesman

As advance copies of "Undisturbed" were being readied to ship to music writers and radio programmers a few weeks ago, Beaver Nelson laid down an edict to his publicists.

"I told them that they were not allowed to use two words in promoting me: "Texas' and twang.'

"Ten years ago I would've loved to have been billed as a Texas singer-songwriter," says the Houston native, whose composing lineage comes from Texas troubadours like Townes Van Zandt and Steve Earle. "But these days those words just make people expect you to cover (Robert Earl Keen's) 'The Road Goes on Forever.'"

Meanwhile, the twang is long gone. "Undisturbed," with its rich pop melodies and biting observations, sounds closer to Graham Parker than Gram Parsons. Released Tuesday, two days after Nelson's 30th birthday, his third album continues his progression as an artist, which began with the 1998 debut "The Last Hurrah" and followed with last year's "Little Brother."

Unlike those critically praised LPs, whose songs were cherry-picked from earlier years, Nelson wrote all new material for "Undisturbed." He also made some changes in his creative process.

"The way I used to write a song was I'd get an idea and file it away in my head," he says. "Then maybe I'd write a verse and file it away. A week or two later I'd have the chorus. Then, when I had the whole song in my head, I'd get out a pad and pen and a guitar and just get it all down." Nelson says that he always thought songs that look back on his life—a common theme in his work—should be written over time. "With this record, though, I'd get these big blue bolts from the sky and the song would just come gushing out. I'd be out for a walk, and the next thing you knew I'd be running home for my guitar." Songs such as "The Beauty In Store," which Nelson wrote in anticipation of his first child, Jack, make you understand why Nelson was hurrying home.

Rather than piece the tracks together after the sessions at Music Lane, Nelson and producer Scrappy Jud Newcomb recorded the songs live and in the same order as on the CD. "We even rehearsed in sequence," Nelson says. "I wanted the band (including Ian McLagan, Malcolm Welbourne and the late John "Mambo" Treanor) to know they were playing the leadoff track of the album or the last one. I think it makes a difference."

That Nelson and Newcomb (Scruffy and Scrappy?) are in such control of this project is in direct contrast to Beaver's years in label limbo. Signed to Columbia in 1991 as a 20-year-old who'd never had a beer, yet sounded drunk with wisdom, Nelson finally wrangled free from the contract in 1997, with nary an album to show for his experience.

Married since age 21, he took a job painting houses to pay the bills. When local indie Freedom agreed to release "The Last Hurrah" in 1998, Nelson says he didn't think it was really going to happen until he saw the CD in a store.

Pity the interviewer who tries to pin down Nelson on the meaning of his songs—merely asking him the significance of the flower on the cover yields a rambling 15-minute discourse on death and rebirth. Newcomb, who has produced all three Nelson albums, put it this way: "He's a guy who celebrates the mysteries of life as much as he tries to figure them out."

"I'm a context freak," Nelson says before going into thumbnail histories of Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Van Zandt, Lowell George, Tom Waits and Van Morrison—all of whom he listened to (as opposed to merely heard) during summer camp in 1986. "I liked music and I liked poetry, but until those camp counselors played me those records, I didn't know you could put them together."

When the 15-year-old Nelson returned home, he threw away all his Journey and Peter Frampton records and bought a guitar. He mastered three chords the first day and wrote a song he quickly forgot. Asked how long it took before he became proficient enough on guitar to play in front of people, Nelson lets out a self-deprecating laugh.

"That's a subject open to debate," he says.