BJ BAARTMANS: A CAREER OVERVIEW 1980-1990 BJ’s makes his stage debut on October 3, 1980, supporting then #1 Dutch band Doe Maar, with Square Objects (Dominique Maassen: drums, Willem van Wordragen: bass, Marc Lange: vocals), a band which plays original material (!) in both the Dutch and English language and which bears stylistic reference to such new wave acts as The Cure, Gang of Four, and TC Matic. BJ has just turned 15 by then and has been playing guitar since the age of eight, wrapped up completely in the magic of pop music. From the onset the band plays a lot, totaling some 300 gigs in five years. As the 1980’s wear on the band shifts more and more to Dutch-language songs with shades of American rhythm & blues. BJ becomes more prominent as a songwriter. The band finds itself playing the prominent Dutch club circuit but can’t seem to land a record deal, though a number of demos are often played on progressive radio stations. Tuney Tunes, which started out as a short-term alter ego of Square Objects, is an immediate success. With a set of rock and roll classics from the 1950s and 1960s the band soon finds itself playing so many gigs that some band members decide to become fulltime musicians, thus prematurely ending their academic studies. BJ is one of them. After being a student of Dutch and History in teacher’s college for six months he starts to play music fulltime at the age of 18. The band works continously on new songs, promotion and other necessary activities. Combining two different acts within one band proves to be a tall order, though, particularly from an artistic point of view. In 1986 this group of friends succumbs to the pressures resulting from the many expectations. The various band members continue to cross each other’s path but never with the same intensity as before. BJ becomes a steady band member and guitarist for The Chainmen (Ted de Best: vocals, Toon Janssen: drums, Jan van Woezik: bass, Ruud de Grood: piano), one of Nijmegen’s top local bands in the late 1980s. BJ also tours with pianist Clemens vd Ven, one of the hardest working musicians in Holland. BJ soon plays an average of three gigs a week but a lingering wrist injury spoils things drastically, forcing BJ to become a journalist for local newspaper De Gelderlander in around 1988. For four years he does columns, articles and interviews. Meanwhile his music requires a different, less physical approach. BJ continues to write songs (mostly English-language at this stage) and find ways of performing them. In bands like Stagefright and Moving Cartoons he works with various singers but not being able to sing his own songs remains a stumbling block. In that same period his life companion Ghislaine Wijffels encourages him to paint. In the early 1990s BJ produces a collection of multi-colored and upliftingly figurative paintings with much zeal and style. It proves to be a lasting creative sidestep… 1990-2000 In 1990 The Chainmen’s very well-received CD ‘Fool’s Gold’ is released, BJ’s debut album as a guitarist. The band tours Holland’s bigger and smaller clubs for two years and though the CD sells well a real breakthrough fails to materialize. Its successor ‘A Mexican Breakfast’ appears in 1994 as an official solo album of singer/songwriter Ted De Best. BJ has in the meantime appeared on Clemens vd Ven’s first solo album and performs regularly with such acts as Get Rhythm, The Steel Brothers and as a guest guitarist for Nancy Works on Payday. BJ also performs in small bars with former Square Objects singer Marc Lange and a number of friendly guest musicians. In 1992 BJ forms a duo called No Strings Attached with lady singer Henny Oudensluijs, enabling him to write and co-produce his own debut album. The CD entitled ‘To End and Start Again’ contains melodic pop and bluesy songs in the style of people like Bonnie Raitt and Joan Armatrading. In the years ahead BJ and Henny play with a live band but No Strings Attached remains successful as a duo first and foremost. A follow-up album never happens due to their record label having money problems. It’s a real disappointment as BJ’s songwriting is very productive and he’s highly motivated in learning to record and arrange music. A number of songs from this period do end up on some of BJ’s later solo records... In the mid-1990s BJ is once again a sideman guitarist for various topnotch players in the club circuit such as finger picker Philip Kroonenberg and rockabilly/jazz/blues phenomenon Arthur Ebeling, oftentimes with Jan Hendriks, guitar player from Doe Maar and BJ’s guitarist friend and support ever since the early days of Square Objects, on bass. As a session player BJ is involved in various CD projects and can be heard and seen playing on national radio and television. A Square Objects reunion gig in 1995 in the original 1980s lineup leads to Bengels. What the Dutch-language new wave/r&b/pop band of the 1980s failed to accomplish now happens: Bengels’ first demo (partly containing songs dating ten years back!) gets them a record deal, a well-respected booking agency and lots of airplay. Jan Hendriks and Jos Haagmans produce the album ‘Voor Altijd’. BJ is responsible for the bulk of the songs and arrangements. And yet again an alter ego of the band playing 50’s and 60’s cover tunes surfaces: The Rascals, captured on the CD ‘Forever’, which BJ produces. History repeats itself. The realization of a second Bengels album turns out to be a laborious process and The Rascals’ much easier success adds more strain. In 1998 the story ends after the second same-title Bengels CD, produced by BJ, comes out. The well has run dry. Meanwhile, BJ has cut a demo of solo material which portrays him as a singer for the first time. Influences from singer/songwriters like Lyle Lovett, Nick Lowe and John Hiatt can be clearly heard and felt. The demo is soon picked up and appears as a CD album on New Road Records in 1998 under the title of ‘The Pawnshop Guitar Chase’. The CD gets excellent reviews and is a nice seller, but that wasn’t the reason for doing it. BJ’s main rationale behind the CD is to be able to work more as an artist in his own right and to find out what his songs, whether done solo or with fellow musicians, really mean to him and others. BJ sets off on a long string of gigs as a frontman, often in a ‘package’ with Eric Devries, former singer/songwriter for Big Easy. Eric Devries has been BJ’s main musical buddy ever since BJ lands a job as a sideman with Big Easy in 1996 and Eric then becomes Bengels’ rhythm guitarist. The two keep each other on their toes in a good way and despite their different vocal ranges BJ and Eric’s voices mix remarkably well. Six years later the duo has some 400 gigs under their belt. There’s not a pool bar, street corner, music fair, theater festival or club, no matter how large or small, that they haven’t played. From Paradiso, 013 and the Parade festival, down to the Trefpunt bar and the Motto Guzi Club Day this duo plays original stuff as well as cover tunes from heroes like Van Morrison, Hank Williams, Steve Earle, The Beatles, you name it. The experience teaches BJ how to sing and BJ develops into a fluent storyteller. Before the year 2000 BJ cuts three solo albums: ‘The Pawnshop Guitar Chase’, ‘No Soap’ and ‘At Second Hand’, the latter featuring a band which will eventually become known as BJ’s Pawnshop in its regular lineup (Eric Devries: guitar, Gerald van Beuningen: bass, Stephan vd Meijden: drums, Bartel Bartels: keyboards). In between gigs, BJ works as a session guitarist and as a producer of various CD recordings. He conducts workshops and with his own band and various other lineups tours Holland, Belgium, France, the US, and even Egypt, altogether some 100-120 gigs a year. And he fathers three children. An intense period in his life of emotional extremes and a serious physical relapse. Enough stuff to write about, at the very least. 2000-present In 2001 BJ finds a new home for his studio, Leon’s Farm, a beautiful old farm situated in the southern town of Boekend. BJ’s colleague and friend Leon Bartels gets involved with BJ’s work as a producer and engineer, which has increasingly come to consist of production work in addition to live playing. BJ devotes the revenues from his studio work to creating more room for his own projects by being more selective in which gigs to play. BJ doesn’t want to be just preoccupied with himself and all his activities anymore. His family, his health and his well-being have suffered all too often. Still the blood runs thin… There are always tours and festivals (Parade, Oerol, Valkhofaffaire) at home and abroad. In 2001 BJ’s Pawnshop tours the US for two weeks. BJ’s side project The Sidewalk Experience (Stephan vd Meijden: drums, Eric Devries, guitar/vocals and singer/songwriter/multi-instrunentalist/stage animal Bartel Bartels) develops into a popular live act, playing both original material and cover tunes in an energetic and in-your-face manner. The studio work at Leon’s Farm turns out to be a good move. An increasing number of musicians find their way to the Boekend farm, particularly those playing American-style roots music: jazz, folk and blues. But the bluesy songs Arno Adams sings in local dialect and the straight-ahead rootsy rock of Ongenode Gaste, two projects BJ is closely involved with, also come together well at the farm. BJ’s following two CD’s ‘F-Hole Acoustics’ and ‘Red Light Tracks’, which appear shortly after each other, get rave reviews. The music media’s spotlight is firmly fixed on BJ. This generates more work. At the request of Continental Records BJ performs a short tour with New Yorker Eugene Ruffolo. That same month he does a week-long tour with his favorite Nashville songwriter Jeff Finlin. BJ is also out promoting JW Roy’s CD ‘Keep it Coming’ which they both produce. Canadian Shannon Lyon’s CD ‘Wandered’ (production and arrangements by BJ) marks an artistic highlight in the spring of 2003. Being asked to put together the bill of the Helden-Panningen singer/songwriter festival (October 2003) means a lot to BJ. It means he can bring the best of the southern Dutch singer/songwriter scene to the fore. BJ asks all contributing artists to perform a song of one of his big examples, the greatly underestimated Ad van Meurs (The Watchman). The songs are captured on CD (More to Life, a Tribute to The Watchman). During the course of 2003 and 2004 more small ‘sideman’ and ‘songwriter in the round’ tours follow with, to name a few, Billie Joyce, Brian Webb, Rod Picott and Terri Binion. It gives BJ a chance to grow as a performer and songwriter. The encounters with kindred spirits from across the pond are inspirational. In May of 2004 BJ and Eric Devries play in the US for a whole week in various cities in Oklahoma. Two nights with two members of JJ Cale’s band form a highlight of the tour. Recordings are made in Tulsa as well as great plans for the future. Back in Holland, BJ and Eric together with fellow singer/songwriters Louis van Empel and Eric van Dijsseldonk found a society called Songwriters United, which is about supporting one another with promotional material, exchanging data, overcoming obstacles and of course performing their own songs as a quartet. BJ, meanwhile, has embarked on a remarkable step in his career. Together with his wife Ghislaine he writes ten melodic and at times quite jazzy songs for a children’s musical, which premiers in May 2005. There is also an exposition of a new series of Cobra-like paintings by BJ in Amsterdam. In October 2004 BJ plays recent Dutch-language material in the Communa Baires (working theater) in Milan, in the hopes of being able to find work in the more intimate Dutch theater circuit. The songs have been translated in Italian and therefore premier in a somewhat bizarre way. Around the show, BJ does a few gigs in Northern Italy which are very well received. BJ’s latest CD ‘Where Lovers Go’ comes out on a new label, Inbetweens Records, and features a musically innovative BJ, to whom piano player Mike Roelofs plays an instrumental part. On the CD, jazz and soul sounds seemlessly blend with the characteristic folky pop songs. 2005-2008 Since 2005 BJ has been recording and performing his own songs in his native language. The albums Verpand (2006) and Verwant (2007) have made quite an impression in the Dutch music scene, both receiving great reviews and considerable airplay. Ironically at the same time BJ backed off a bit in the gigging circuit, as far as his own music is concerned. The focus is more on writing these days and rethinking which way of presenting the material will be most suitable and fun(!) in the next stage of an ongoing carreer. BJ occasionally does solo gigs however, just to keep stuff fresh and he enjoys it a lot. There’s been plenty of work anyway. Even breaking his arm in the spring of 2007 and not being able to play guitar for more than six months hasn’t stopped BJ from producing several albums and doing a lot of sideman work in the last couple of years. On the production side there have been releases by international acts such as Shannon Lyon, Billie Joyce, Iain Matthews and Dutch releases by Barbara Breedijk, Peter Beeker, Loyola Drive and Okieson, just to name a few. BJ was also featured as a guitarplayer (or bass, banjo, mandolin, bluesharp or….) on albums by ao JW Roy, Edo Donkers and Eric Devries. And then there where various club and theater tours with Shannon Lyon, Billie Joyce, JW Roy, André Manuel and The Watchman. Gigs in The Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and the UK. Sideman work always presents itself and that alone is already a good prospect for the future. A fine reputation as a musician, based on workmanship, loyalty and dedication have earned BJ a good spot in the music business. BJ’S LYRICS Central to BJ’s lyrics are the unusual aspects of everyday life. He finds his themes close to home, but also from bartime stories, TV, newspapers or literature. Lust and unrest, fidelity and infidelity, wonderment, anger, doubt… The songs often take on a highly personal character, even if they don’t necessarily deal with BJ’s personal experiences. BJ shuns very little but he doesn’t like big words. Through their transparancy the songs of course do betray a lot about his personal self. Sense of perspective, humor and melancholy are often mentioned when describing BJ’s work. Involvement is another nice word. Being the father of three beautiful kids and being on tour a lot he can’t help but be involved… Through the years BJ has penned a sizeable repertoire, the value of which will reveal itself one day, if only to himself. Right now at least it’s a necessity for BJ, whether he likes it or not. Songs present themselves naturally, like infatuations, horniness, loneliness, anger, amazement, oohs and aahs. Some of BJ’s inspirations as a songwriter: Hank Williams, Guy Clark, Ad van Meurs, Lucinda Williams, Richard Thompson, Lyle Lovett, Eric Devries… Selection of interviews with BJ and articles on BJ Appeared since 2000, in such newspaper and magazines as Heaven, Fret, De Gelderlander, Brabants Dagblad, Music Maker, Gitarist, Vara Gids, De Limburger, div. websites (Alt Country, Vitaminic, Gitaarnet), Maverick, Buzz, various regional magazines… Selection of radio and TV shows featuring BJ Among others: NCRV’s Volgspot, VARA’s Geen Tijd, Mart Smeets Sport op Vrijdag, Vrienden van Amstel, 8 tracks, Cappucino, De Smet live, TROS Muziekcafé, American Connection, Kink FM Zondagmorgen, Weekendcafé, De Avonden, Off The Record, Hubert on the Air, BRTO sessies, Real Roots Café, radio Veendam, TV Gelderland’s Soundcheck, Muziekpaleis Radio Noord Holland... :: Omhoog :: |
         
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