Peter Wolf on music, collaborating with heroes and the beauty of record stores

There’s nothing quite like chatting with Peter Wolf. An energetic storyteller who puts as much time into being a fan of music as he does creating it. And that’s not always the case. Some musicians look at their art as merely a job. But, for Peter, music is a lifelong passion that he feels fortunate to get to explore and share with his bandmates and audiences around the world.

Peter Wolf and The Midnight Travelers will make an appearance at The Music Hall in Portsmouth Saturday, Oct. 15. They’ll use the stage on this particular evening to revisit tunes from Wolf’s extensive repertoire, from his solo work to classic J. Geils Band numbers, tipping the cap to the old before putting out a new record in the near future and touring on new material.

Seacoastonline caught up with Wolf to trace some roots, check in on what’s been cooking, the merits of exploring local record shops, and what excites him about being back on the road. We’ve spared you the 6,000 words of two avid record collectors going back and forth and nerding out over crate-digging scores. You’re welcome.

Seacoastonline: Have you gathered any further appreciation for getting the opportunity to share music to an audience following the forced layoff we all recently experienced during the pandemic?

Wolf: Oh, definitely. I mean I always had the appreciation as this has always been something I’ve enjoyed doing, but during the pandemic, I had the chance to step back and listen to a lot of music. A lot of reading. Caught up on a lot of things. But I really enjoyed going back through my record collection and doing some serious listening again.

Seacoastonline: Old things, new things, or a combination of both?

Wolf: A little bit of both, but revisiting was definitely the bulk of the experience. Things like Muddy Waters, Hank Williams, early doo-wop stuff, Carl Perkins … a lot of stuff that has always inspired me. Chuck Berry, of course. But there was a lot of newer things, too. Bowie’s last records … a whole assortment.

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Seacoastonline: Funny you should mention Mr. Berry. There’s a bunch of photos of you from 2012 with Chuck Berry, Leonard Cohen, Keith Richards, etc. at the JFK Library. My 10-year-old kid is currently obsessed with Chuck Berry. Like, it’s the only thing he listens to. You have any fun stories? What was he like?

Wolf: Chuck Berry was very much a hero of mine when I was 10 years old. Chuck Berry and Little Richard. We played a lot with Chuck. He was always very nice to us. People have stories of Chuck being cold and distant, but he was always extremely nice to us. We backed him up, The Geils Band. He enjoyed us. We shared a lot of similar musical passions. Charles Brown, Nat King Cole, and of course, Little Walter, the great harmonica player he had a fondness for. And because the Geils Band had Magic Dick playing harmonica, Chuck kinda respected what we were trying to do, which was pay homage to the music that he loved, and we loved.

Seacoastonline: OK, it’s been six years since your last record, “A Cure for Loneliness” came out. Is there anything in the works, or is that it? You cracked the code for loneliness. I mean, I guess that’s as good a place as any to stop, but, yeah, what’re you working on?

Wolf: Working on a new record that is about 85% done. We’re just waiting on some finishing touches. So, I’ve been working on that, and I’ve also been putting together some memoirs of working with — as a fan — artists I admire; Chuck being one of them. People like Sly Stone, Dylan, Van Morrison … It’s something I’m deeply in the middle of. Hopefully, sometime next year they’ll come to light.

Seacoastonline: You’ve led a wild existence and have so many great stories to share. Let’s talk about the art of collaboration and how getting to work alongside some of your peers and perhaps heroes might inform your approach to your own music, or to life in general. Who and what are some highlights? Aretha Franklin comes to mind, Merle Haggard, the list is vast.

Wolf: I love to collaborate. I do my best work in collaboration. I also paint and write, which are more solitary activities, but with music, with playing in a room with a lot of people, everyone gets to put their two cents in. I love that. With songwriting, you don’t get as distracted. I’m more disciplined when I’m working with another writer because you get an immediate reaction from them, from someone you respect the opinion of. It’s the preferred way for me.

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Seacoastonline: Love the lineage of how you added “Wolf” to your name. I’ve read in a couple of different interviews you’ve done over the years that Howlin’ Wolf is a “fascinating individual,” but nobody ever seems to follow up with a “why?” I’d love to learn more about your collective experience with the original Wolf.

Wolf: Well, first of all, the immediate point of fascination is, of course, the music. Just to hear him taking the essence of Charlie Patton and Son House — earlier bluesmen —and creating his own soundscape from that. The voice. The images he sings about. The character of the voice. ... He was a complicated man. His influences and traveling in Chicago, his experiences in the Army, the relationship with his band; as an individual he was very bright and very complex. As is Chuck Berry. There were many different sides to Howlin’ Wolf. I was able to be around him and feel fortunate for that, but I wasn’t as close to him as I was to Muddy Waters or James Cotton, Junior Wells — other blues musicians from the South Chicago scene. I was a great fan, and still am, of Howlin’ Wolf.

Seacoastonline: Last time I saw you was on accident. You, Marty Ballou and Duke Levine were playing at Dyno Records on Record Store Day back in 2018. Talk about being in the right place at the right time. Do you remember that moment? How many hours have you spent in record stores throughout your life? What’s their significance historically and, well, in these contemporary times when music is more of an “on demand” commodity.

Wolf: Whoa. That’s an action-packed question. I guess this is as good a time as any to mention that the guy who played before us that day, a fella by the name of Bobby Keyes, is in my band that will be with me on this run. He’s an amazing guitar player. It was sort of serendipity that we were all playing on the same afternoon. I remember it quite well.

I always spent time in record stores. I worked in record stores. Record stores were kind of my main headquarters. And when I was growing up, there were things in records stores called listening booths. So, you could try out what was new, and if it appealed to you, you would buy it. That was a great treat. Sometimes I’d spend hours in those booths listening to records. Record stores were my big archive of, dare I say, wonderment. That’s where I discovered so many things that I’ve cherished all my life. Not being on-demand required more of a search of getting music into your personal domain, shall we say. That in itself added to the intrinsic value of whatever you wound up walking out with.

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But on the other hand, while talking to someone, about say, someone like Howlin’ Wolf or Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers and be able to bring up the particular song you’re talking about on the spot … There’s something to be said about that being a great resource. So, there’s positives and negatives to the way music is being presented today. I sort of miss the old school way of discovery.

I’m not going to get into it, but in the audio file sense, when you compress something into an MP3, you’re not getting all the information. It’s, to the ear, like a Reader’s Digest summary of what you might be listening to. It’s tricking the brain that what you’re hearing is whole. That is, of course, until you put it on a turntable — a real system — and, um, for me, I’m much more emotionally involved when that needle hits the wax and falls into the grooves.

Seacoastonline: Do you ever think about rekindling your days as a disc jockey? Or do you prefer to share your passion for other folks’ tunes from the stage (along with your own songs, of course)?

Wolf: Yeah, you know, from the stage we do a bunch of covers. Music that has inspired me over the years. Music I’d be playing on my show if I still had one. Being able to shed new light on some of those tracks from the stage? That satisfies me.

Seacoastonline: In general, why do you seek music? Why do you create it? What keeps you chasing this thing?

Wolf: Well, my dad was a musician. He was a singer. When he was 14, he left home and joined the Schubert Theatre and traveled around the country. Always playing music. I come from a very musical family. Everyone was musical … except me. I didn’t have the talent that they had to play piano or guitar. But it was always around me. It became an important attraction to me. I became moved by it, motivated by it, and as I started listening to radio, which was very important in those days … Radio was the way of discovering all sorts of great artists. I’d stay up late listening to country music on AM stations, jazz stations, rock and roll most of the time. Music always moved me and the moods that music played was an important part for me. When I was studying painting, music was on in the background. Always. It stayed with me. As I said earlier, when I started moving from painting into music, I found that working and playing with a bunch of musicians to study, break down, and figure out songs was endlessly fascinating. Playing with an ensemble of top-shelf players always keeps it exciting for me.

Seacoastonline: Alright, you’re playing The Music Hall here in Portsmouth on Oct. 15. What excites you about the gig? What can fans expect when they come out to see you play this time around?

Wolf: Well, I’ve got a request list out there, so we’ll pick stuff from my solo albums, my favorite Geils’ songs, and mix in requests that people want to hear. The next time we tour we’ll have the new record out, so this is sort of like saying goodbye and revisiting some of the older material be it my own, or the Geils. A last celebration of that stuff before we move on to the next chapter. Looking forward to getting out there on the highways and byways!

For more information on The Music Hall show on Saturday, Oct. 15 at 8 p.m., check out themusichall.org and peterwolf.com.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Peter Wolf & The Midnight Travelers at Music Hall in Portsmouth NH