JIM NEWSOM

Jim Newsom is an award-winning singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist who is well known and highly regarded throughout southeastern Virginia.He was named Best Acoustic/Folk Artist in the Hampton Roads regionin the 2022 VEER Music Awards.He has released 10 albums,seven of which are available on all major streaming platforms.His latest album, GroovyTown, was released on October 14, 2022.It is his first “all covers” album of songs written and originally recorded by others.It is a true solo outing as he plays all the instruments and sings all the vocal parts.The recording is available as a physical CD, download or by streaming.

Here are the major streaming links:

Spotify

Apple Music

Amazon Music

YouTube Music

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Jim Newsom and the Cloudless Sky included Gail Keller Smith on keyboards and Rick Jebavy on drums, along with Jim himself on guitar, flute and lead vocals.

The band’s album, Peace Love Happiness, was released on February 9, 2021.

With fourteen Jim Newsom originals, the album is available for streaming,download and on CD from Spotify, iTunes, Amazon,YouTube Music and many other providers.

You can listen here on Spotify:

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Jim’s solo performance of Woody Guthrie’s “This Land is Your Land” to celebrate Independence Day 2022:

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Here’s a 12-song sampler of the band’s performance at Norfolk Harborfest – June 10, 2022:

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Jim’s 2021 entry in the annual NPR Tiny Desk Contest was a new arrangement of
“I Am Not a Jukebox,” recorded for the contest:

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Jim was Barry Graham’s guest on The Acoustic Highway radio program on WHRV-FM in Norfolk, VA, on April 25, 2021, for an hour of music and conversation.You can listen to the program here:

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Jim joined host Hunter Hughes on his Hunter at Sunrise radio program

on March 28, 2021, for an “acoustic session” of songs and conversation.

He played “Peace Love Happiness,” “I Am Not a Jukebox” and

“The Days of Being Bob Dylan Are Gone” from the band’s new album.

You can watch and listen here:

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Jim wrote this song on April 28, 2020, about six weeks into the Covid-19 pandemic in the US. It was the day that the number of confirmed cases in our country hit one million, the same week the president suggested shooting ultraviolet light into the body or injecting bleach because “It doesn’t live well with heat and sun and disinfectant.”

It was written for those who had voted for him in 2016, assuming many of them were regretting their vote and would like to come back to the fact-based world. Jim was thinking specifically of a couple of old-style Republican friends who had cast their votes for the party’s nominee that year. He assumed the response to Covid would end their infatuation with the Orange Clown. Sadly, even the J6 attempted coup eight months later, which they abhorred, couldn’t break them out of the cult.

ORANGE CLOWN

words & music by Jim Newsom

When you’re looking around for someone to blame

And you want to expound and attempt to explain

Just look in the mirror, right in front of your eyes

The obvious culprit who wears no disguise

When you had a choice, how did you choose

Were you suckered by lies or did you seek the truth?

Did you pull yourself up or drag yourself down

When you placed your faith in a dull orange clown?

When life was rosy, and profits sky high

I’m guessing you chose to morally compromise

You justified options you’d never condone

Engaged in behavior you used to disown

Supported, enabled, race-baited and worse

Guzzled the Kool Aid, and fell under the curse

Of a soul-less wretch with a permanent frown

You supped at the trough with a dumb orange clown.

They say ignorance is bliss

And it’s such a sweet temptation

When a grifting narcissist

Cons you with a promise of salvation.

Inept and hapless, you fumble and froth

Lured onto a trap yet you fight to get off

You try to atone for the sins of your past

Struggle to reel in the lines that you’ve cast

You’d like to pack up your things and head out of town

Or crawl into a hole deep down in the ground

Some way to escape from the cult that you found

In the circus parade with a sad orange clown.

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I AM NOT A JUKEBOX
words & music by Jim Newsom

I don’t sit on this stool to regurgitate the hits
But there are certain rules I’ve learned it’s best not to forget
And so I take requests, and cough up songs that I can’t stand
And give them all my best in hopes that I’ll be booked again

I am not a jukebox though I guess I look the part
Strumming on a cheap guitar and singing from the heart
Stuck here in the corner on a postage stamp sized stage
The nights are getting longer and I really feel my age
A long career of hard knocks playing music bar to bar
Though I am not a jukebox, throw a dollar in my jar.

I started out with dreams of writing songs the world would sing
With no idea what sort of things this lonely life would bring
It always looked so easy observing from afar
Tuning in to watch TV, where everybody is a star

I am not a jukebox though I guess I look the part
Strumming on an old guitar and singing from the heart
Looking out at faces in a crowd that doesn’t care
I could be most anyone from almost anywhere
Counting down the tick tocks on the clock behind the bar
Though I am not a jukebox, throw a fiver in my jar.

I’ve spent my whole adult life breathing whiffs of your applause
I cannot count the sacrifices these choices have caused
And now that there is more to look behind at than ahead
I wonder what is left to find, or has it all been said

I am not a jukebox though I guess I look the part
Strumming on this fine guitar and singing from the heart
I’ll slip a song or two of mine between the ones you know
And act as though this cocktail gig’s a soldout headline show
I’ll admit you flocked here just to hang out at the bar
Though I am not a jukebox, throw a ten-spot in my jar.

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Remembering John Lennon

40 years ago, on the night of December 8, 1980, I got a call from a friend telling me to turn on the TV because John Lennon had been shot and murdered. I was numb for days thereafter. Coupled with the election of Ronald Reagan a month earlier, it felt like an ominous portent of dark days to come.

The ensuing four decades have indeed brought much darkness into this world. As the forces of hate have proliferated, it has been increasingly difficult to keep the faith that love is all we need. But I try to retain my hope and belief in the ultimate power of love.

In that spirit, I offer this little medley of John Lennon songs to bring a touch of sunshine and uplift into your day.

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VEER Magazine – February 15, 2020

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New Set of Dreams was released on October 12, 2018:

On this, his eighth album, Jim played all the instruments on this set of 15 original songs:

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“The gold standard for songwriting.”
— Michael Crockett, Nashville Songwriters Association International

“The greatest live performance I have ever seen by a local musician.”
— Sandy Adcock, musician and artist

“Relentlessly positive…a carefree feeling like a day spent
hiking in the hills or strolling on the beach.”
— Paul Shugrue, WHRV-FM

“The original songs, about love, life’s choices and feeling good,
have a go-down-easy, James Taylor-Joni Mitchell, flower-power vibe.”
— Craig Shapiro, The Virginian-Pilot

“A local legend.”
— Coast Live, WTKR-TV

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