Singer-songwriter Mike Doughty keeps on rolling

By Steve Wildsmith
of the Daily Times Staff

For his 2005 album, former Soul Coughing front man and singer-songwriter Mike Doughty had a hard time letting go.

It wasn’t that he was afraid to put “Haughty Melodic” out — he just wanted it to be perfect. Years of playing wizard at the controls of Soul Coughing’s three studio records made it hard to let his new sound, a singer-songwriter driven batch of sublime pop-rock, go without tweaking and adjusting and rearranging.

This time around, he threw caution to the wind. “Golden Delicious,” released earlier this year, is an exuberant, loose-sounding collection of songs that finds Doughty embracing the flaws that come with making music that springs from the soul of an imperfect human being.

“This record is definitely about flaws,” Doughty told The Daily Times this week. “It’s about a live band playing all at once — that’s kind of the initial template I came up with. ‘Haughty Melodic’ was so meticulously made — it took two years to make it that I wanted ‘Golden Delicious’ to be a lot looser. It only took two months to make it, so in a way, I guess I’m de-evolving.”

In the 1990s, Soul Coughing was at the forefront of bands that grew out of the movement laid down during the college-rock heyday of grunge and indie. Over the course of three albums — “Ruby Vroom,” “Irresistible Bliss” and “El Oso” — Soul Coughing became known for gritty, urban rock ‘n’ roll most strongly identified with New York. Rock critic Ryan Schreiber described the group as “mixing billions of musical influences ... sort of a hip-hop/jazzy/cartoon-style thing with either totally crazy or incredibly colorful lyrics read and sung over them.”

The band could go from the aggressive, adrenaline fueled “Super Bon Bon,” with a beat and Doughty’s growling lyrics that seems to urge listeners to shove their way through crowds of people, to the smooth, R&B tinge of “Soft Serve,” which paints a picture of a hot sunny day and the laziness it inspires. Along the way, Doughty developed a reputation as a quirky, artistic front man with a penchant for obscure lyrics.

With “Haughty Melodic,” however, he went for more of a straight-ahead, singer-songwriter approach. Signed to Dave Matthews’ ATO label, he listened to The Beatles, Bonnie “Prince” Billy and the Magnetic Fields for inspiration. The result was one of the best albums of 2005 — and “Golden Delicious” is a more-than-worthy follow-up. It’s more filled-out, courtesy of the backing band that Doughty finds himself relying on more and more, and an infectious, barroom vibe feel to the assembled songs that come across like a bunch of guys gathered around instruments and a few cases of beer on a sunny, sweaty afternoon, banging out some feel-good music before the bar fills up with girls for them to hit on.

“Musically, I was building around the strengths of my drummer and piano player and giving them some room to sort of present themselves,” Doughty said. “Lyrically, I did a lot of sort-of cut-up stuff — I took words out of books and rearranged them; I had just broken up with a girlfriend, so there was a lot of that in there as well. It’s a little too close right now; I’m sure I’ll have a really direct perspective on it in a few years.”

Thursday, Doughty will bring the songs off of “Golden Delicious” in a paired-down setting to The Pilot Light in Knoxville’s Old City. It’s a show that features just Doughty and a bassist/cellist, Andrew “Scrap” Livingston. Livingston is just one of the musicians who finds himself in Doughty’s inner circle these days — a sign that the guy who swore off bands after Soul Coughing is capable of surprising even himself.

“I find myself getting closer to my collaborators, so I still enjoy somewhat of a collective process, but I also dig being able to sort of guide things in the direction I want it to go, rather than using subterfuge and massage egos and things like that,” he said. “I’m a bandleader, but I’m also trying to get the best out of other guys and collaborate with the best parts of what they do.”