By Norm Dixon
On stage, popular vocalist and trumpeter Vince Jones personifies the image of the smooth, laid back jazz artist. His easy rapport with his band and the effortlessness of their performance win the audience every time. But while his demeanor may be cool, Jones is far from being a socially detached entertainer. His lyrics hint at a deep dissatisfaction with society's direction. At every performance, he dedicates songs to Greenpeace and draws attention to the damage being done to the environment. At a recent Sydney gig, Jones spoke favourably of the role of 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly.
During a friendly, extended chat over coffee in a Kings Cross cafe, Jones revealed passionate views — in his inimitably relaxed, laconic way — on politics, the environment and music.
Vince and his family settled in Berkeley, a working-class area of Wollongong, after leaving Scotland in 1963 when he was 11 years old. His father, a fitter in the coalmines back in Scotland, played in mining union brass bands and in swing bands. Before being "uprooted" from Scotland, 11 year-old Vince was "singing and threatening to get serious on an instrument" but in Wollongong the lack of a music culture in the mining community discouraged father and son from continuing their musical activity. Jones's father went to work at the BHP steelworks.
Growing up in Wollongong and his frequent visits to the town since have influenced his attitudes: "Coming from a steel town with 40% unemployment you get an idea of the promises and lies told by multinational companies. You get an insight into shortcomings [of the system], the boomtimes and then the lean times, when nine out of 10 of your mates are out of work... So I don't have any blind reverence for large companies."
Jones began playing music again when he was 20. That decision was an an individual act of rebellion: "In the Wollongong the schools were manipulated in such a way that the library was the size of three small classrooms but the manual arts block was like an aircraft hangar. You realise you're being trained to be just another ant in the steelworks ... I was more interested in reflecting rather than being involved in these major companies ... I started playing, making a few quid at night, playing around the clubs."
Jones's early inspiration came from Chicago soul bands, as well as performers like Tower of Power, James Brown, War, Blood Sweat and Tears — "I said, 'Wow! Lead trumpet in a band like that would be great!'."
His singing career began when the band's lead singer was ill one night and he took over. "The next day they sacked the other singer and I got the gig". In the years that followed, Jones joined a soul band in Sydney, played in Melbourne, and got a job with a band on a Chinese cruise ship where he was reintroduced to the jazz his father had played and taught him.
"When I got back I started working in a jazz club in Melbourne and started doing three nights a week, every week ... One night a guy came in, liked the sound of the band and said he wanted to record us. I said 'Cool!'." That was in 1979. Since then Jones has made eight albums, his latest, Future Girl, is all originals.
Jones's interest in environmental politics was sparked about 12 years ago, he told 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly. "I started visiting an area in the Victorian Alps where there's various communities who have moved there as an alternative to city life. I fell in love with that area and I started to see the purpose of the city. People are bought to the city for work yet the city is not really a healthy environment for people to live in."
At the same time he believes the greed of big business is devastating the wilderness that is left. "Travelling up and down the coast I constantly see the number of pulp trucks heading to the Eden woodchip mill. Thousands upon thousands of trees being driven from remote areas, where we can't see the destruction, and pulped ... breaking all the rules because there's no one there to watch them.
"I play in Europe quite a bit and I'm always looking out the plane window looking for forests. There's no wilderness in Europe. You fly over the forest in Germany and the evergreen trees are brown, they're dead. And the air in Europe is disgraceful. We're very lucky to have some of the last great wilderness. Most of the air supply for the world is coming from this part of the world — South America, Melanesia, Australia and parts of Africa. Australia must be careful otherwise it'll just disappear.
"In 10 years, if they're not careful they're going to have a revolution because the younger people are going to say 'Hey look! You guys were in control and you never looked at a sustainable environment. You just looked at the short term'."
This concern has led Jones to support groups working to save the environment. "I like the work Greenpeace is doing. I like the Wilderness Society. I like the 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ magazine. My subconscious tells me these people are doing something honest."
Jones believes that it is important for artists to support environmental causes but he is wary of those that just "spout a few phrases". "Where we could really help is by passing on some of our incomes," he told 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly. He is planning to pledge part of his income to those progressive organisations working to save the environment. Another project he has in mind is to make an album and the proceeds of its sales will be distributed among environmental groups.
Musically, Jones also has firm opinions. His greatest affinity is with the late '50s trumpet and saxophone players like Joe Henderson, Miles Davis, Stanley Turrentine, Horace Silver and Eric Dolphy — "I get such a lovely spinetingling feeling from harmonic playing. That kills me, I love it, its sounds great". His singing style draws inspiration from Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn and Frank Sinatra.
The avant-gard work of John Coltrane, and the free jazz of Ornette Coleman do not appeal to him. Neither does hip hop music although, he added, "Ice-T and Public Enemy are really good. I think they say really good things."
The heart and soul of the jazz Jones loves comes from the experience of African-Americans. "In oppressive societies you can get some phenomenal things come forward. In '40s and '50s America, the black people were so oppressed. They came in the back door, they came in the servants entrance and they were paid a pittance. There were only three opportunities for black people to make money: sport, dancing and music. It's still pretty well like that. But man, they became really good at those three things...
"They played music which they liked, the most bent music you've ever heard — be bop. They were always jamming because there was no money it in it. But there was no corruption based on getting into the charts to be successful... The music was so pure, so honest. The blues integrated with European harmonies, it was amazing... They were constantly extending the music. Then the public started digging these guys because they were playing the coolest music. It led to the birth of the modern America's only indigenous art form, jazz."