Francine Reed
Antone’s, Monday, October 21
Standing in the shadows is normal for most backup singers, but only Lyle
Lovett’s crew gets thrown into total darkness every time the spotlight hits his
tall, Texas pompadour. That’s some mighty big hair. Francine Reed knows it,
too; she’s been behind it or off to the side of it since she became a featured
component of Lovett’s Large Band in 1987. You’d remember her if you’ve been to
one of his shows. She’s the one with the pipes. But let’s talk about that hair
for a moment.
“I never saw hair like that before,” deadpans Reed from her home in
Atlanta. “When I first met him, I thought, `God, that guy has a lot of
hair.’ And I thought he was kinda homely. But then I heard him sing…”
Yes, we understand the girls kinda like him.
“Oh, yeah, and I know why,” says Reed in her gravely growl. “He’s
gorgeous. He’s got those beautiful blue eyes, and that kinda crooked
smile, and he’s tall and thin. He’s just a good-looking fellow.”
Good-looking outside and in according to the 49-year-old Reed. He’s got soul.
Delicious country music soul. Outwardly, that might seem worlds away from
Reed’s Chicago-born soul — a potent brew of blues, gospel, R&B, and jazz
all sung through a Robert Cray-like tenor on her second Ichiban release,
Can’t Make It on My Own — yet on the inside soul music is soul music.
“You know when Clint Black and all those guys sing? What is that if it ain’t
soul? They can sing, they can write, they can feel, and deliver it so that
someone else can feel it. That’s called soul. It’s not necessarily black people
`soul.’ But everybody has it. You just have to look for it. I’m glad to be
gifted with a lot of that soul.
“Be it country, be it jazz, be it blues, be it gospel, be it R&B —
whatever — it’s the soul of the music that connects it all. Or the soul in
someone.”
And Reed has soul like Lovett has hair. — Raoul Hernandez
This article appears in October 18 • 1996 and October 18 • 1996 (Cover).