Kevin Devine and The Goddamn Band LIVE @ The Space

There are very few interviews that I book months in advance and even fewer that will make me nervous just thinking about. However, Kevin Devine is an example of an exception to the rule. I worked with The Space in Hamden, CT, and Devine’s management team for a couple of months to set up this interview and it was worth all of the time it took.

Devine is a musical icon who is the prime illustration of someone who loves what they do day in and day out. Taking fifteen minutes out of his already small dinnertime before his show, Devine sat down with me for an interview that was enlightening, especially as a musician myself.

“I’ve done about fifteen shows at The Space,” said Devine, “all of them with different bands like Miracle of ’86, but I’ve been playing here for a decade now; since 2003.”

I always love to ask an artist what song means the most to them, so that when I am listening to their set and I hear it, I can know notice the more genuine passion on stage.

“The songs that mean the most to me generally change over time,” said Devine who may just be the artist with the most longevity in his career I have ever had the pleasure of interviewing. “It normally tends to be the most recent song I write because I am still in the mind set of the story. “Ball Game,” has a new meaning to me now that I am 33 years-old, then it did when I wrote it at 23. The opposite can be said for songs that I have written in the past, where I end up in that same head space again years later and its’ meaning comes back to me.”

“I have the strongest connection to ‘Red Bird’ right now because there is something about the last verse that really gets me. It makes me feel like I did when I wrote it, and like I said, that is a special moment when a song can re-appeal to you and sort of come full circle.”

After Devine told me about the different meaning that “Ball Game” holds for him now, I was provoked to ask him how he thinks his writing style and instrumentation has changed since he began his career.

“My writing style is more open now. When you are younger you feel things heavily. Your feelings are so big, but you are actually writing about the same small group of things that in retrospect have more meaning in your head. I am no longer a hyper-sensitive-drinker who writes about lost love. It is like the camera was pulled back for my songs so that a wider landscape could be revealed.”

“Elliot Smith is my biggest influence,” he said when I asked who his musical inspiration would be. “He was a bit more classic when it came to his song form, but I learned a lot about the marriage between writing and song form from him.”

I then asked who his greatest influence in his personal life was.

“It may sound cliché because it is so true, but my mom is the reason I got into music and has supported me up to this very day. I never had to convince her that my dream was worth it, my whole family has always supported what I wanted to do. My father also gave me my work ethic and I think I would be at a much different stage in this business if that had never been instilled in me.”

Kevin Devine is the most interesting artist I have ever interviewed because he not only answered my questions, but triggered me to think about my own career and the things that are most important, verses what just seems important at the time. His music is experimental, fun, and meaningful with introspective and sometimes controversial lyrics. He is a musician who is not afraid to break boundaries with songs like, “Private First Class,” which is so refreshing in today’s music industry.

If you haven’t heard Devine’s work yet, I suggest you give it a listen and try to find a local show because he has a much larger impact live.