Folky singer-songwriter Matt Urmy’s Out of the Ashes could be the most fascinating Nashville album of the past decade … and it almost went unheard.
Perhaps the final project produced by legendary songwriter, recording guru and freethinker Cowboy Jack Clement (he came up with the mariachi horns on Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire,” discovered Jerry Lee Lewis and helped Charley Pride break the color barrier with “Kiss an Angel Good Mornin’ ”), the album was thought lost in the fire that claimed Clement’s studio/home, The Cowboy Arms Hotel and Recording Spa, in 2011. But as the title suggests, the recording ultimately rose up like a phoenix.
Arriving March 31, Out of the Ashes features 10 songs of Americana poetry filled with a smoky mysticism and irreverence befitting Clement’s out-of-this-worldview, paired with a sound that evokes The Band, Ryan Bingham and Todd Snider. It’s is an intelligent and adventurous project — at turns joyful, curious and gloomy — but it’s also something more. It’s the story of a quirky old genius and a clued-in kid who forged an unlikely bond.
Back in 2009, Urmy was playing an AmericanaFest showcase at 3rd & Lindsley, when in sauntered Clement and his entourage. Blown away by the legend’s poise, Urmy felt an instant connection to the flamboyant entertainer. He was, after all, known for fully embracing the “magic” of the universe, and Urmy had recently returned from five months studying tribal healing with the Maori people of New Zealand. Clement caught the performance after Urmy eventually worked up the courage to cold-call Clement and ask if he would be the guest of honor at an upcoming gig. But Clement resisted, instead inviting Urmy over to the house to get acquainted.
“I go over there, and it’s like walking into a time capsule,” Urmy tells the Scene, sipping coffee in East Nashville as a smirk forms at the memory. “It’s 2010, but there’s shag carpet that hasn’t been changed since the ’70s. There were big framed pictures of him with Johnny Cash, they still smoked inside, and it smelled like a musty old bar. It was awesome.”
Over cigarettes, the two talked for hours about life and music, and sensing a kindred creative spirit, the elder agreed to attend Urmy’s show. Clement enjoyed the night so much, he invited Urmy back the next morning.
“That’s when he gave me a tour of the studio upstairs and was like, ‘So, do you have any songs for a record?’ ” Urmy says.
The album was Clement’s idea, and as such, he offered to do it for free. But there was one condition: Urmy had to use the band Clement saw backing him at the show — a heavyweight group that included guitarist Kenny Vaughan (Marty Stuart), bass player Dave Jacques (John Prine), keyboardist Mike Webb (Poco) and drummer Paul Griffith (Lucinda Williams). “That band did kick ass,” Urmy says.
Taking a supremely hands-off approach — punctuated by stories, naps and smoke breaks — the 78-year-old taught Urmy how to sing into a studio mic, find a song’s pocket and lead a proper session, all the while regaling him with incredible tales and encouraging him to embrace the “magic” he found everywhere. He compared the youngster to Kris Kristofferson, saying, “You can’t sing for shit, but the words are really good.” The pair began hanging out two or three days a week.
“I think he really liked having this kid around who was just like, ‘Tell me everything,’” Urmy says.
Then, on June 25, 2011, Clement’s home caught fire. Urmy got the news and raced to the house, only to find the whole place engulfed.
“It was devastating,” he says. “I went up to him and said, ‘Jack, can I get you anything?’ expecting like, ‘A bottle of water’ or something. He looked up at me with his hair all sticking up, wearing that Elvis bathrobe with bloodshot, teary eyes and said, ‘A new world,’ then put his head back down.”
Things did get better. Urmy helped put together a 2013 tribute concert called Honoring a Legend: A Tribute to Cowboy Jack, bringing in Clement collaborators like Kristofferson, Pride, Prine, Emmylou Harris and even Michelle Obama and U2’s Bono. He also got to work on a new project — Artist Growth, a cloud-based resource platform for musicians that helps with touring and bookkeeping — all but forgetting about the album, which now seemed like an afterthought.
“When the record burned up in the fire I was like, ‘Fuck it, that’s not what this was about,’ ” Urmy says. “’I’ve got Jack as my grandfather now, and I get to go hang out with him. To hell with the record.’”
But almost a year later, there came a surprise. Urmy and others had sifted through the rubble the day after the fire, pulling out a few dented, melted and waterlogged external hard drives. Miraculously, some of the data could be salvaged, including what would become Out of the Ashes. Over the next few years, Clement’s home was rebuilt, and Urmy’s project was finished up. The album is clearly influenced by Clement’s raw magnetism, if not his own creative spark.
He spread his “vibrato-y, bellow-y” vocals all over a new version of his unofficial theme song, the hypnotic and trippy “We Must Believe in Magic,” while other standouts include Urmy’s slow-rolling “Easy Train,” and the effortlessly cool talk-folk of “Cup of Grace.” Prine lent his pipes for a heartfelt gospel tune Urmy wrote called “Out of the Ashes,” and they recorded it in Clement’s upstairs studio, closing the loop on a project that literally survived fire … like magic.
Clement died August 8, 2013, at the age of 82, leaving behind a body of work that included some of the most enduring music in history … plus an oddball album for a young artist he had never heard of, and at least one “adopted” grandson. Now, six years after they began working, the album is finally being released.
“The Cowboy chapter took my world from black-and-white to technicolor,” Urmy says, fighting back a swell of emotion. “I didn’t realize the world could actually work like this, and what more could you ask for? I think I might be the luckiest kid in Nashville, ever, because I got to spend two or three years making an album and hanging out with Cowboy Jack. I miss him every day.”
