Mavis Staples has been performing for more than six decades. One true vine It is her second album-length collaboration with Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy.
Zoran Orlik/Courtesy of the artist
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Zoran Orlik/Courtesy of the artist
Mavis Staples has been performing for more than six decades. One true vine It is her second album-length collaboration with Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy.
Zoran Orlik/Courtesy of the artist
From small country churches to the stages of the Civil Rights Movement to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Mavis Staples’ career has spanned more than 60 years.
The Gospel legend has shown no interest in retiring. her new album, One true vineis her second collaboration with Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy.
“It’s a completely different CD,” Staples told NPR’s Neil Conan. “It’s a return to my beginning. As far as I’m concerned, it’s brought me back full circle. I’ve gone from strict gospel to folk to country, and here I am back home where I started.”
Staples began singing with her family’s band, The Staple Singers, when she was thirteen. She says her latest album reminds her of singing with her family, and that she always tries to sing at least one song written by her father, Roebuck “Pops” Staples. Who died in 2000. One true vine It includes “I Like the Things About Me,” a song her father used to sing.
Staples says singing his part was a challenge: “Pops, he was a singer. I loved hearing my dad sing. He was so quiet and wonderful. I always wished I could sing like Pops.”
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She says her father taught her to sing from her heart and let it flow. “Just be Mavis,” he would say.
Staples still sings with her sister, Yvonne. “When Pops died, Yvonne tried to tell me to keep singing, and she was going to mind my business,” Staples says.
Staples says she got on stage about three times, but something was missing.
“I didn’t have any family members on stage with me,” she says. “I got off that stage and said, ‘Listen, Yvonne, you have to sing. I need to hear at least one Staples voice on this stage.”
Yvonne still sings backup for her sister along with other singers.
Collaboration with Jeff Tweedy
Producer Jeff Tweedy wrote three songs for the album: “Every Step”, “Jesus Cried” and the title track “One True Vine”. She says that in the songs Tweedy wrote, there were many times when they clashed lovingly in opinions about style and delivery.
“He was lucky because he was in the engineering room and I couldn’t reach out to shake him,” Staples says. “But I went on and did it his way, and I’m telling you I’m grateful. I learned something new.”
Next, Staples says she hopes to release a country album, as well as a tribute to Bob Dylan. “I’m always trying to find new things to do,” she says. “I don’t know which way I’m going to go. My next CD might be country, or Dylan, or Mick Jagger. I don’t know. I like a challenge.”
