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Having worked with the likes of Bruce Springsteen, Roy Orbison, Elvis Costello, Slash and Robert Plant, T Bone Burnett’s guitar riffs and production work are deeply ingrained in classic rock ’n’ roll. While Burnett has played all over the world, accompanying others and playing his own original music, the reluctant rock star is only just now settling into the spotlight. On Sept. 11, he’s coming to Portland to support his new record, The Other Side, and with it, showcase his new approach and attitude toward recording music.
“I love the songs, I’ve never written anything like that, I’ve always written very cynical songs,” Burnett says. “This is the first time I’ve overcome my cynicism. I wanted to go out and play them for people, which is a big shift for me.”
When he first began in the music world in the ’60s, Burnett originally wanted to stay behind the scenes. His talent quickly swept him up onstage, though, primarily playing guitar. Bob Dylan was the first to push Burnett into the longing gaze of a large crowd while he was supporting Dylan on tour in the ’70s.
“He put me right towards the end of his set, doing a seven-minute piano ballad called ‘Silver Madness,’” Burnett says. “When I would feel the kind of attention he had built up, it was incredible. It taught me a lot, but I’m just not a natural performer.”
Burnett sees his contemporaries, such as Bruce Springstein, Elton John and Garth Brooks, as the natural performers he could never be, celebrating their ability to capture the attention of tens of thousands of eager ears. While he admires their ability to fixate a crowd on them, Burnett has no desire to attempt to fill stadiums. Instead, his first tour in nearly two decades is meant to feel small and intimate, while hopefully bringing the same amount of focus with a smaller group of people.
“We’re playing all smaller theaters where you can see people, and it feels more like a coffee house or a living room,” Burnett says. “We’re really playing these shows like we’re sitting around in a living room with a lot of friends.”
This mentality in Burnett’s touring style also coincides with a distinct shift in Burnett’s music. While once more focused on rock and country, Burnett’s newest album sits soundly in the realm of folk. (Some may call it Americana, which is a genre Burnett has also embraced.)
To record the album, Burnett employed a strategy he learned from his late friend, Roy Orbison: emphasize tone, not volume. “Orbison [was] probably the greatest rock ‘n’ roll singer of all time, he sang very very quietly,” Burnett says. “If you stood ten feet away from him, you couldn’t even hear him. It was all this very beautiful supported tone, so it sounded huge when you turned it up. I started applying that to all of the recording that we did.”
The most important change in Burnett’s music is not in his recording technique, nor his genre—it’s in his attitude, a change initiated after Burnett finally purchased his dream guitars.
“I went out and I searched around and I found these three guitars that I’ve wanted for 50 years,” says Burnett. “Every time I would pick one up, I would write a song. I became addicted to playing guitar again. I was playing very softly and singing very softly and singing in a much deeper place in my chest. It led to a whole different attitude toward music. Now I love playing songs. I’m sorry I didn’t discover this when I was 20.”
GO: T Bone Burnett plays at Aladdin Theater, 3017 SE Milwaukie Ave., 503-234-9694, aladdin-theater.com. 7 pm Wednesday, Sept. 11. $60.