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It’s exciting to hear the news that Willie K and Amy Hanaiali’i are reuniting after so many years to release a new album and perform live. Before their eagerly anticipated CD will be officially released on Nov. 11, the duo will debut some of their new songs in a concert in the Castle Theater at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center on Nov. 8.
Having both advanced so far in their careers since their duo days, the remerging of these formidable talents has created something never before heard in Hawaii. Adept at so many music styles, they have channeled their considerable mana into a unique work that both honors the past and presents a new direction for contemporary Hawaiian music.
“It took us about a year just processing what songs to use, what avenue we wanted to go with, and how to be a little different, ” Willie explains, when interviewed with Amy at his Wailuku recording studio. “We wanted to upgrade it for a new generation, for younger ears. We had a long discussion about what kind of genre of music we would add to songs. It was like, OK, this is you coming out doing this again, what have you got in your pocket? I experimented a lot. I sent her piles of emails with so many different variations of music behind songs she had written.”
“We tried to coordinate all our genres together and tell a story throughout the album, so the whole album is a body of work,” says Amy.
Their first studio album in 15 years, “Reunion” features 15 songs with Hawaiian and English lyrics that were refined down from a list of more than 50 potential compositions.
Opening with the rousing, rocking “Hawaiian Man,” which Amy composed for Willie, it ranges from timeless sounding hula songs (highlighting her amazing falsetto) that could have been recorded in the 1950s and a tribute to Molokai’s Waikolu Valley, to the moving country/gospel flavored ballad “Down By the River” and a cowboy western, closing with an extraordinarily powerful composition, “Who’s Got the Water.”
In the vein of Native rights’ classics like the Makaha Sons’ “Hawaii 78” and Brother Noland’s “Waikiki (Look What They’ve Done),” “Who’s Got the Water” will most likely be embraced as a new anthem for our time.
As it gradually builds in intensity, Willie cries out, “We must fight for our land that was taken away, we must fight for our children, we must fight for the truth, we must fight for our water.”
“It’s a phenomenal song,” Amy emphasizes. “I wanted it to be like a Lady Antebellum type of song. I wanted that vibe. Every indigenous people deal with who has got the water. Willie expanded it, and it became a masterpiece.”
“It’s my favorite song,” adds Willie. “When we first started it, I think Amy wanted it to be a cappella. We used to do Crosby Stills and Nash’s ‘Suite Judy Blue Eyes.’ (Willie starts singing, adding references to Hawaii and children crying). I knew that wasn’t going to work. Then she created something that sounded like the Marshall Tucker Band. So I added a little country rock with Brother Iz meets Pearl Jam.”
Among the other songs on the album, they hope their couple of new hula compositions, “Pillow Talk Hula” and “Swish Sway Hula,” will inspire dancers.
“When we started this project, I told Amy we need something similar to ‘Hale’iwa Hula’ (featured on her “Hawaiian Tradition” album) that is really catchy,” Willie notes. “And I came up with five different riffs on melodies.”
The traditional “Hilo E,” which Amy covered on “Generation Hawaii,” gets the Willie treatment now, what he calls a “Sunday Manoa version.”
Known for his remarkable gift for performing a smorgasbord of stylistic genres, on “Reunion” Willie adds western-theme music to his repertoire complete with cracking whips and neighing horses on “Hawaiian Rough Riders,” straight out of a Sergio Leone epic.
“I had just got through watching ‘For a Few Dollars More’ and I started strumming and singing and it sounded great,” explains Willie, laughing. “The horses and whips and thunder and lightening all came later.”
And then there’s another standout track, “Mo’okuauhau,” a Hawaiian song about genealogy with a novel, contemporary R&B feel.
“It’s not our style at all,” Amy notes. “With ‘Mo’okuauhau,’ we created a new sound. We’re hoping the younger generation will click onto that.”
“It’s a whole new experiment we’re doing,” adds Willie.
These two pioneering musicians first worked together in the late 1990s, beginning with Willie as Amy’s producer, then as a duo, they released two hit albums that earned them four Na Hoku Awards, including Hawaiian Album of the Year, Song of the Year and Duo or Group of the Year. A recording of their 2003 concert tour, “Amy & Willie Live,” was nominated for a Grammy Award.
After many years apart, a wedding celebration brought them back to the stage to perform together.
“Our lawyer’s daughter got married, and Amy and her band and myself were invited,” Willie recalls.
“He asked us to do the ‘Hawaiian Wedding Song,'” says Amy. “I said, ‘Are you serious?’ But we did it.”
“It was very emotional,” Willie continues. “We felt like we had never lost it. It was a feeling like we had never left the stage. The dynamics and the guitar and two voices was just meant to be. Right after that, she called me up and said, ‘I was thinking maybe we should get together and do another album.’ Sure. I was in the middle of doing another Hawaiian album. But I was battling within myself because my first Hawaiian album rarely got airplay. Nobody liked it. That’s why I came out with the blues album. So while I was struggling with making a Hawaiian album with original songs, she called. There was the answer. She came with her music and I had my music. We had 56 songs. We had a trilogy project.”
So more reunions are planned?
“On the next one, we’re going to try and pursue more world music,” says Amy. “We’ve got some really cool world music-sounding stuff.”
The two acclaimed artists celebrate the magic of their chemistry on the new album, sharing vocals on the lively, crowd-pleaser “Never Got Over You.”
“It was one of the first songs that came to mind when she asked to do this project,” says Willie. “I wanted to write a song to mend things, so everyone could move foreword. It’s a Band-Aid.”
With lyrics that also express appreciation to their many fans, it’s so fitting that it closes with some hilarious, tongue-in-cheek squabbling.
“That’s how we left it as the Sonny and Cher of Hawaii,” he says. “We never forgot how people thought of us. It’s a comeback.”
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Amy will join her brother Eric Gilliom for a memorable “Rocky Horror Picture Show” Halloween dance party at 7:30 p.m. Friday at the MACC’s Yokouchi Pavilion.
“It’s going to be a great show, really out there,” says Amy. “It’s going to be a huge dance party.”
Featuring the classic “Rocky Horror” film and live music performed by Gilliom and the Sins Of The Flesh, musicians helping out include Jerry Eiting, Dr. Nat, Dale Button, Vince Esquire, Leah Krieg and Kelly Covington.
“We’re going to do the music new and improved, updated with a Prince vibe,” says Gilliom. “We’re pulling out all the stops, making it an alternative to Lahaina.”
The spooky night also includes dance music with DJ Pio Marasco and a costume contest.
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A guitar phenomenon, Andy McKee burst on the world stage with a video for his instrumental “Drifting,” which has now racked up more than 50 million YouTube views. For a time, three of McKee’s videos were concurrently the three most watched on YouTube.
The song, which he composed at age 18, has become so ubiquitous in guitar culture that the entire approach is often referred to as the “Drifting guitar style.”
Influenced by guitarists like Michael Hedges and Don Ross, McKee is able to magically transform the steel string guitar to sound like a full orchestra via his use of altered tunings, tapping, partial capos, percussive hits and a signature two-handed technique.
Prince was so impressed after watching one of his videos that he invited McKee to join him on his 2012 tour of Australia.
“Andy McKee has been launched into the upper stratosphere of the world’s very best acoustic players, and for good reason,” raved Guitar World. “His densely melodic and percussive style is mesmerizing to say the least.”
* Andy McKee performs at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 6 in the Historic Iao Theater. Tickets are $35 for general admission and $50 for reserved Gold Circle seats. For more information, call (808) 896-4845.
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Musician/poet Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo headlines a Halloween party at Charley’s Restaurant & Saloon in Paia on Friday.
Iyeoka began her musical career founding the group The Rock by Funk Tribe, a collective of musicians that enabled her to interweave poetry with jazz, blues, funk and gospel. In recent years, she recorded a live album in Hawaii and sang a cover of U2’s hit “Desire” for the compilation “In The Name Of Love: Africa Celebrates U2.”
In the past, she has toured in support of artists such as Femi Kuti, Zap Mama and Soulive. One of her songs, “Simply Falling,” has been viewed more than 22 million times on YouTube. Tickets are $15 and are available at Charley’s or online at www.iyeoka.eventbrite.com.