Ben Harper sees ‘open road’ ahead Elysa Gardner
Innocent Criminals reunite with pointed commentary to ‘Call It What It Is’
Go ahead, call Ben Harper a protest singer.
“I’ll take it,” the 46-year-old singer/songwriter says of the well-worn term. “I think of Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie and Phil Ochs and Peter Case and Bob Marley and the Wailers and Rage Against the Machine. Not that I’m vaulting myself into that company, but I saw Bob Marley, and I’m dear friends with (Rage’s) Tom Morello; we wrote a song together for his last solo album. Those are my people.” Harper’s new album, Call It
What It Is — his first in nine years with the Innocent Criminals, the band he formed in the early ’ 90s — offers its share of pointed commentary. The title track references Trayvon Martin, Ezell Ford and Michael Brown, and begins with the lyric, “They shot him in the back/Now it’s a crime to black.” Harper has had personal experience with racial profiling: “I don’t think there’s one black person you could talk to who hasn’t experienced it,” he says.
Death and hard times inspired other songs, but so did friendship, resilience and sheer whimsy. The upbeat, fanciful Pink Balloon was conceived by Harper’s wife, Jaclyn, a social activist, credited as the song ’s co-writer.
“The record’s like a book,” says Harper, both relaxed and animated as he shares conversation and fresh-squeezed orange juice. “It’s the closest I’ve ever come to being an author. I drove my band insane with sequencing, because the titles tell a story.”
The Innocent Criminals’ own journey, which resumed when the band reunited for a tour last year, is central. “When we started, there were hair bands and quote-unquote grunge,” Harper says. “We had to create our own lane.” Harper “steered the ship a little too heavy, too hard,” he concedes, but over time he has learned to apply his well-known work ethic “more cautiously and conscientiously.”
Various side projects have taught Harper “to be a better team player,” he says. In recent years, he has teamed with Dhani Harrison (George’s son) and Joseph Arthur in the band Fistful of Mercy, and with Ringo Starr.
Harper also has recorded albums with his mother, Ellen (2014’s
Childhood Home), and blues icon Charlie Musselwhite (2013’s
Get Up!)
“When you’re playing with people like that — and your mother — you’re no longer the boss,” Harper says.
The father of four also has learned from his own children by two previous marriages (the second to actress Laura Dern). “Through my kids, I’ve been introduced to everyone from Skrillex to Ed Sheeran to Travis Scott. My kids are on it — they don’t let me slip. They demand a certain amount of hipness from me if they’re going to let me drop them off in front of the school instead of a block away.”
Skateboarding keeps Harper physically youthful. “You’ll just snap the boards if you’re 5 pounds overweight,” he notes, adding: “If I could trade in all my songs to be Rodney Mullen or Tony Hawk or Chris Joslin, I would. But it’s too late for that.”
Not for the Innocent Criminals, though. “We’re back to stay,” Harper says. “I see 10 years and 10 miles of open road in front of us.”
“My kids are on it — they don’t let me slip. They demand a certain amount of hipness from me if they’re going to let me drop them off in front of the school instead of a block away.”