Songwriter GETS LEAN AND MEAN on latest recording

--taken from: Winnipeg Free Press

by Rob Williams

Luke Doucet is far from a masochist, but he was looking to take a bit of punishment while working on his new album, Steel City Trawler.

The Winnipeg native hired Sloan's Andrew Scott to produce his fifth solo effort in order to jolt him out of his comfort zone after producing his last three albums on his own.

"I told him, 'I want you to tell me when my songs are done or not done, what's good and what's not good.' I got what I wanted out of that," Doucet says over the phone from his Toronto practice space. "He pushed me around a lot. I gave him free rein. I wrote the songs at least three times and played them over and over, so he pushed me around, saying, 'We need a new bridge here, we need a new chorus, this needs to be shorter or longer.'

"I consider him a genius for his work, but I consider myself a genius for hiring him. I take end credit,"
Scott had never produced an album before, but helped Doucet create a concise 10-track release that the songwriter admits would have sounded entirely different if he'd been left to his own devices.

"There are things in the indie world of DIY that say you have to be responsible for everything or it lacks integrity," says the guitarist, who also plays with Sarah McLachan. "I call bulls--t. I think integrity is it needing it to be the best it can be. The point is not to highlight yourself; it's to make good work."

The album is a departure from 2008's Blood's Too Rich, which featured songs averaging five minutes in length. This time he wanted to make a rock record with more direct, in-your-face material.

"It's lean and mean," he says. "I didn't want to drag things on an extended journey. I wanted things to be brief; I like short records. Live, the songs might get a little longer," he says.

Winnipeggers will get to hear the new songs live when Doucet and his band the White Falcon -- which also happens to be one of his guitars, a 2003 Gretsch White Falcon -- headline the inaugural River Barge Festival Saturday night. The free festival, which started Wednesday, features a wide cross-section of local and national musical talent, along with some theatre and a talk show.

Doucet calls Steel City Trawler a true collaborative effort, because it also includes a comic book by Hamilton artist Dave Collier with lyrics, quotes and observations that combine to create the story/liner notes/comic LD in Steel City.

Collier was given a blank canvas to do what he wanted -- the art didn't even have to be about the music -- and the results are better than expected, Doucet says.

"He just took these little things that may or may not be related and painted a stark picture of Hamilton, my music, myself and Melissa (McClelland, his wife)," he says. "There might be more layers to his onion than mine. He's a compelling person and I'm really glad he's involved."

By layers, Doucet is referring to the fact his lyrics are devoid of clever literary devices -- he prefers to present his feelings and ideas in a straightforward manner instead of wrapping them up in allegories and metaphors.

"I'm simple-minded. I don't have the patience to write a story and bury it between layers of bean dip," he says.

Doucet hooked up with Collier after discovering his work in a comic-book store in Hamilton, where the 37-year-old and McClelland moved nearly three years ago after living in Nashville for six months and deciding it wasn't for them.

The working-class city has many similarities to Winnipeg, but it's closer to Toronto, where Doucet travels frequently. Since it's more affordable than Toronto, it's becoming a place where musicians and artists are migrating, he says.

--taken from: Winnipeg Free Press