Most of us music freaks make our own mix tapes, but few of us get to actually record our own mix-tape album. But that’s just what Jules Shear—the guy whose “All Through the Night,” “If She Knew What She Wants” and “Whispering Your Name” are undoubtedly found on numerous compilation discs—has gone and done with Sayin’ Hello to the Folks.
Why would someone who primarily makes his living as a singer/songwriter decide to do an album of covers? “I’d written songs for a new record but then I decided I didn’t want to make that record,” he says. “I felt like recording songs that I like a lot that I didn’t write.”
So Jules set about making lists and burning discs of his most beloved tunes—a chore he didn’t find at all difficult. “I’ve got so many mix CDs it’s ridiculous. That’s basically what I do when I’m not doing anything else. I play them in the car, and I never know what’s coming up; I think it’s fun to not know what’s next. That’s why I thought that making the record would be cool because you wouldn’t know what’s coming.”
Eventually, Jules got with his producer, Stewart Lerman, who was tasked with winnowing about 60 tracks down to album size. “Stewart and I had a really good time listening to the songs and imagining doing them. I allowed him to select the songs and he chose these 12.”
“These 12” include fairly disparate choices—I mean, how often do you see numbers by Todd Rundgren (“Be Nice to Me”), James Brown (“Ain’t That a Groove”), Brian Wilson (“Guess I’m Dumb”) and Procol Harum (“Too Much Between Us”) sitting side by side? But Shear pulls them all together with sympathetic arrangements, plaintive singing and the love of worthy tunes in need of a little TLC.
“I thought it would be good to record songs that didn’t have a life but should’ve had a life. This is my attempt at giving them a life.”