David Jacobs-Strain is a fierce slide guitar player and a talented, young song poet from Oregon. He’s known for both his virtuosity and spirit of emotional abandon. His performances move from humorous, subversive blues to delicate balladry, and then swings back to swampy rock and roll. It’s a range that ties David to his own generation and to guitar-slinger troubadours like Robert Johnson and Jackson Browne. “I try to make art that you can dance to, but I love that darker place, where in my mind, Skip James, Nick Drake, and maybe Elliot Smith blur together.” His sings of open roads, longing hearts, and flashbacks of Oregon. His stories are a record of emotions big and small, and lyrics that turn quickly from literal to figurative. He’s fascinated by the way rural blues inscribe movement and transience – a music that frees a singer and keeps them on the run, at a crossroads that is both enchanting but dangerous, damaging but beautiful.
David Jacobs-Strain has appeared at festivals from British Columbia to Australia, including Merlefest, Telluride Blues Festival, Philadelphia Folk Festival, Hardly Strictly, Bumbershoot, and Blues to Bop in Switzerland. He’s taught at Jorma Kaukonen’s Fur Peace Ranch, and at fifteen years old was on the faculty at Centrum’s Blues and Heritage workshop. On the road, he’s shared the stage with Lucinda Williams, Boz Scaggs (more than 60 shows), Etta James, The Doobie Brothers, George Thorogood, Robert Earle Keen, Todd Snider, Taj Mahal, Janis Ian, Tommy Emmanuel, Bob Weir, T-Bone Burnett, and Del McCoury.
Many of us know David from his long and celebrated relationship with The Folk Project and his impressive Troubadour appearances. It’s great to have him back and on-line at The Acoustic Stayaway.