SAVOY BROWN play The Coach House Oct. 30
“Just give me a guitar and I’ll find something inside of me that relates to it,” Kim Simmonds of Savoy Brown explained in advance of his upcoming show at The Coach House Oct. 30.
“If you gave me a Gibson 335, which is a jazzy guitar, I would be tempted to play all jazz things. You give me a Telecaster, a Fender, which is always primarily a rock guitar, I would probably rock out, you know?”
His dad bought him his first guitar, a Hofner guitar that he played for a while but didn’t think of it as professional.
“So my first professional guitar was a Fender Telecaster,” Simmonds recalled. “I used that with a Vox AC30 amp. And back in the mid-60s, probably ’65 or something, that was the professional setup.
“I think Jeff Beck had it and maybe Eric Clapton had it. All the guys around me had that setup. They were older than me by a few years so I wanted to be just like them.”
Savoy Brown is no stranger to the San Juan Capistrano venue, having played there several times over the years.
“First and foremost, the audience is always fun,” Simmonds said. “It’s a lovely place to play. Great stage, you know. You can feel the energy coming from the audience. It’s one of those venues where the people are enthusiastic.”
Hailing from the UK, Savoy Brown began to have a loyal following in the U.S. with the release of the 1969 single “Train To Nowhere” from their third album, Blue Matter.
Savoy Brown
They eventually broke the Billboard Hot 100 with 1971’s Street Corner Talking followed by the epic 9-minute “Hellbound Train” which became a staple on FM radio stations across the country the following year.
“There are some of the old songs that I still like playing,” Simmonds said. “I like to do “Poor Girl” from the Looking In album.
“I didn’t sing the original, I’ve always had singers in the band throughout the years. But with myself singing, I’m looking for material from the past that I can do justice to.
“I like doing “Sunday Night”, as well, from that very same album. If we do something from the new album there’s a song called “I’ve Been Drinking”. It is a drinking song, a big rocker, you know? Everybody loves it. I enjoy that one.”
New, old, and future songs fill out the set list on any given night. Simmonds likes to keep it spontaneous, rehearsing new material as he writes it, which he does all the time. He might even add a song for a future album to a live set while it’s still fresh.
“Nothing is over-rehearsed,” Simmonds noted. “If we do some of the future songs, we don’t really know them that well and it’s fun to play them.”
Like many UK artists in the early to mid-sixties, Simmonds was inspired by American blues artists. He continues to be aware of new artists and will always be a fan.
“It’s so easy to do now,” Simmonds said. “You have YouTube and you can check everybody out, see what everybody is doing.
“I’m looking for inspiration all the time. I listen to all the old records I listened to as a kid. I still go back there for inspiration. But I’m constantly listening to music.
“But the thing that happens to us all is we miss an artist. You know their name, vaguely, but you don’t bother to listen to them. And then 20 years later you listen to them and go ‘what the heck was I thinking? They’re great.’
“But I try to keep my mind open, listen to everybody, see what they’ve got to offer and look for inspiration.”
Over the course of Simmonds lengthy career there have been numerous changes along the lines of new technology and of course, the digital age.
“I have a home studio and my home studio has got old 90s technology, you know, I kind of stopped at one point,” Simmonds laughed. “But it’s digital, it’s the old digital.
“Back in the 70s I had an old TEAC recorder, which was top of the line then, with the old tape and everything.”