Hamell not only records music, performs live, does independent writing, he also paints. All of the images below, and many you see as the accompanying artwork on the digital releases, are Hamell paintings. These vary in size and price, but are all acrylic on canvas. Hamell paints scenes inspired by the 'underground' and 'disenfranchised' of our society. Ed uses bold and bright colors in his paintings which contrast the darker subject matter, championing the underclass, drawing you into the characters he depicts, endearing you to them and sparking emotions one might not anticipate.Hamell is also available for specific painting commissions. For serious inquiries to purchase Hamell original art contact Emily at hamelltv@gmail.com
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about
I wrote this in Austin after going on a Jack Kerouac reading binge. Probably started just as a prose piece then I figured why not make it into a song. I remember I had a temp job working for the State of Texas doing food stamp reconciliation, I'd go in there bleary eyed from playing a gig or a couple open mic's the night before and then on my lunch break I'd go out to my car, take a nap and memorize this. Needless to say a centerpiece for this album and also a song I continue to play regularly to this day.
lyrics
BLOOD OF THE WOLF
When he was 15 years old, already balding, thin basketball etched frame continuously, nervously banging against a box only he could see my friend Frank robbed a Kentucky Fried Chicken with a fork. He courted the girl that worked there on her 'off' time...her girlfriends thought she was 'way off ' to go out with a boy that talked like an electric circuit and they had it all worked out except she must have got cold feet on the day of the robbery because she called in sick. At three o'clock in the afternoon in the 85 degree blue collar melancholy sun, disguised in his brother's red and yellow striped wool ski mask and armed with a stainless steel fork and fifteen years of Catholic Italian longings, Frank ran into the Kentucky Fried Chicken on the corner of Butternut and Lodi and finding no one behind the counter he yelled to the two people sitting at the booth eating their original recipe breasts, “Everyone hit the deck!!” and they looked up at him and they laughed. The manager sauntered oh too casually out from the backroom, and this time Frank screamed again, this time slamming his fork down so hard on the counter that he cut his own hand and the three people saw the blood and the unrelenting fierceness in the eyes behind the ski mask and they knew he was serious. Through the dusty and streaked plate glass window passerbys could easily witness three people huddled on the ground and a masked Frank, fork gripped in midair as he jammed down the register button, grabbed $214 and left.
The first time he told me this story was 15 years later on a blustery evening, we were broke down in the sub-zero snow this side of the Canadian border. That lonely orange U-Haul squeaking with every jet of northern icy wind provided a refuge in it's cab for 8 hours. Me and Frank in the front sharing cigarettes and later end butts and flannel shirts that had been discarded in earlier months summer days.. “C'mon you snakes!” that sun had called, “shed those skins!” to lie forgotten behind the seats but now taken out and used as blankets and stuffed into door cracks to guard against the razor chill. After a few hours and the boredom peaked and the conversation snowballed and turned heated and sillier and confessional and redeeming and Frank told me about his Italian grandmother, how she would stare at his carved body, every inch of which was covered with a thick rug like hair, and she'd shake her head Sicilian serious and she would moan in broken English, “Blood of the Wolf! Blood of the Wolf!' In that truck Frank threw back his head and howled with laughter. Then he told me how he robbed a Kentucky Fried Chicken with a fork and I screamed with laughter, “A fork! A fucking fork!” so hard I almost got warm for a few minutes. When they found us eight blue bone cold chill hours later I was half asleep but Frank was still doing imitations of his boyhood hero, AC/DC's Bon Scott, yelling “And they made it out...with a BULLET IN THEIR BACK!: across the Canadian snow.
That was eight years ago, Frank drives for somebody else and I moved to Texas. We couldn't make a go of our business in Upstate New York and the bank repossessed our truck. Last night, as I was headed to the CD player, I thought I heard that truck outside beeping. I rode in that truck for half a decade, I'd know the sound of it and Frank's loud impatient black coffee and V-8 juice horn blasts and I was ready to ride. But when I went to the window, there was no truck. And as my eyes scanned the Texas horizon, I thought I saw running behind the trees... a boy...he was wearing a ski mask...he was holding a fork.
Hamell on Trial is loud, fast music informed by politics, intelligence and a wicked sense of humor.
1995-Mercury
Records-Big as Life, The Chord is Mightier Than the Sword.
1997- Choochtown
2003-Righteous Babe Records-Tough Love
2005, Songs For Parents Who Enjoy Drugs.
2007-“The Terrorism Of Everyday Life,” (Edinburgh Fringe Herald Award)
2012-New West Records -The Happiest Man Alive....more
supported by 4 fans who also own “BLOOD OF THE WOLF”
I love the Jordan Lake Sessions albums, they're so ALIVE! I'm excited to listen to these versions of my favorite songs forever and ever, and always max out my Mazda's speakers on the sax parts. grenadinegrace
