When she starts taking about her family’s professional backgrounds, it’s easy to understand how as a young girl, Allison August thought everybody’s parents were in the music business.
Her father was a jazz pianist. Her mother and maternal grandparents were classical musicians, with her grandmother playing drums, viola, and also conducting orchestras.
Her grandparents also played with Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Rod Stewart, and the Jackson Five. A paternal grandmother also infused her with a love of country music. And her listening ranged from Mose Allison and Aretha Franklin to the Beatles and Billy Joel.
“Everyone in my family was a musician. I don’t think I was even aware there was another job that people could have!” she laughs via Zoom from her home.
“Even all of their friends were musicians. I knew that there were ministers and pastors when we went to church, but they played music too. I thought [ministering] was their side gig! And we had a huge record collection—mostly piano players!”
Today, the singer/songwriter is excited about the release of her new album, August Moon (MoMojo Records). She wrote 11 of the album’s 12 tracks, which sonically run the gamut from slinky, groove-based funk (“Afraid of Love,” “Honey Jar,” “Born Yesterday”), bluesier stuff (“What Would Mama Say,” “Blues is my Religion”), rockers (“Dog in You”) to contemplative balladry (“Dashboard Madonna,” “Blue-Eyed Boy”).
There’s also a playful, sassy duet with blues singer Sugaray Rayford in “I Won’t Say No.”
August Moon was produced by Houston native Tony Braunagel. The now L.A.-based drummer, producer, and songwriter has worked or played with everyone from Otis Rush, Eric Burdon, and Coco Montoya to Bonnie Raitt, Robert Cray, Rickie Lee Jones, and a fellow H-town guy, the legendary Lightnin’ Hopkins. August calls him the “Obi Wan Kenobi” of the project.
As to what she wanted to do differently from her last full-length effort, 2016’s Holy Water, August says that she wanted to reflect “how really weird” the world has gotten since that time.
“I think that part of being an artist is sometimes clarifying your point of view, and it’s amazing to have a platform to give people some sort of perspective,” she says.
“One of the things I wanted to do on this record was talk to people about family and what being a human being on the planet means and being kind to other people. Just how I try to live my life. And whether I inspire or enrage people, you want to affect them in some sort of way.”
As for songwriting, she says there is no set way she approaches it. But when inspiration hits, she says her children are used to mommy running into the house with an idea on fire in her head and hearing a rushed “Nobody talk to me until I write this down!” She also credits frequent co-writer David J. Carpenter with inspiring her.
There are a couple of songs on August Moon that are very, very personal to August, and both relate to health crises she and other friends and family have recently faced: “The Cure” and “Desiree.”
The first touches on the struggles had August has had herself with breast cancer. As well as the liver cancer that took the life of her friend and Holy Water/August Moon collaborator Paul Barrere, a singer/guitarist best known for his decades with Little Feat. He died in 2019.
August gets emotional talking about him even today. “Paul was…oh my gosh, that’s….,” she says, her voice trailing off. She met him through their mutual friend, soundperson Jerry Manuel. August flew to New Orleans for Jazz Fest to see Paul play with a bunch of local musicians.
“The very first time I heard Little Feat I loved Paul’s singing, slide playing, writing. He hit me right in the spot where country meets funk. I call it Country Funk, and it’s my favorite thing in the world,” she says.
“I wrote with him and have songs that haven’t even been recorded yet. He had such an intuitive sense of how to put things together. That first record was a catalyst to the whole second part of my making music. I was crushed when we lost him.”
As they were battling cancer and undergoing treatments simultaneously, August and Barrere communicated frequently. Their usual sign off banter being August saying “talk to you later” to which Barrere would reply—with his usual morbid sense of humor—“if the cure don’t kill me first!”
That, ultimately, is what August says happened. As Barrere’s wife relayed to her later, she had taken him to the hospital for what was supposed to be a routine checkup. She offered to stay with him, but Barrere waved her away and said to come pick him back up in an hour or so.
When she returned after running some errands, the grim-faced doctor told her that Barrere had died in just that space of time.
The protagonist of “Desiree” is also facing a health crisis, and in this case the name is real—it’s a cousin of August’s.
“We grew up together and were very, very close. Her life was very different. Then she got cancer and passed away. It was devastating to her entire community,” August says.
“She was this incredible human being who radiated love and acceptance to everyone around her in such a huge way. Over 150 people not even related to us came to the funeral and spoke, from kids to these big burly guys with tattoos. Her loss impacted me so greatly.”
She also wonders of Desiree’s much darker skin tone than the blond, white August (August notes that portions of her family are likely of Native American descent) may have affected the level of care that Desiree received versus her own.
Finally, if you had to slot August Moon into a genre, it would be filed under “blues.” But it’s also got touches of jazz, country, R&B and rock. And August’s voice has often been compared favorably to that of Bonnie Raitt (or, this this writer’s ears, Susan Tedeschi).
When asked about the pros and cons of those comparisons—and wanting as any artist independent praise of their own voices—August says she’s not bothered by them.
“I’m grateful for those compliments! And I love both of those artists. I’ll never be offended by that comparison,” she laughs. “I also get Bonnie Bramlett and Rickie Lee Jones, and it’s never anybody that I don’t love myself. It’s part of the business, I get it. But I also want to be liked for me!”
For more on Allison August, visit AllisonAugust.com
