Music Review: Mr. Sam & The People People, ‘Again! Again!’
“It’s how I see the world”: The New Orleans artist shares his love of humanity and the world around him on his spirit-lifting sophomore album.
Mr. Sam & The People People’s Again! Again! album artwork.
Mr. Sam (aka Sam Gelband) and the People People out of New Orleans released their sophomore LP Again! Again! this past June. The album is a pure celebration of love and friendship, presented with the honesty and sincerity that only Mr. Gelband can deliver.
Recorded live to tape on the shores of Puget Sound at Unknown Studios in Anacortes, WA, Again! Again! is filled with rousing vocal arrangements, bouncing pianos, razor sharp steel guitar and grooving percussion, all serving the sounds of togetherness. My discussion with Sam yielded some amazing stories behind these songs, but what I will remember most is his intense love and reverence for friendship and for the people around him. He is truly a one-of-a-kind songwriter, musician, and human, and the songs on this album reflect this wonderfully.
The album kicks off with “Go Baby Go (Part One),” an earnestly positive song of encouragement. The imagery sticks out to me in this song; from dunking his head in the water to glowing in the light of his dashboard, to feeling the wood on his toes in his folding chair, Mr. Sam creates lyrical scenes that pull us along with ease and curiosity.
Sam says that the first verse stems from a self-made ritual from when he was swimming a lot in the summer. Before swimming, he would dunk his head three times while focusing on three positive thoughts: once for thoughts about a friend, the second for something he's looking forward to or happy he had done, and the third for something about himself that he liked.
The second verse is an account of Sam’s experience at a Day of the Dead parade in New Orleans. He was looking forward to going to the parade, but he was running late and was trying to catch it in his car, then he just stopped. He watched the parade grow in his rearview mirror, and his mind drifted to a familiar feeling of just wanting to be with friends, and specifically a camping trip he does every year with Chris Acker.
The next song, “Ask,” is inspired by Sam’s practice of thinking about strangers from the perspective of being a close friend, even when he’s never met them. For every stranger you see, he says, there’s someone who would love to see that person. He practices appreciating people from that POV. Strangers shouldn't have to ask what they want; Sam’s ready to help!
“Oh Me Oh My” was one of the most fun songs to write for this album, he says; it started with the melody, which had so many notes that it opened him up to elaborating on ideas. It’s really a song he wrote to himself—advice to and from Mr. Sam. He jokes that when he plays it, he thinks to himself “so what, you think you’re better than me?”
“Happily” is a sweet-sounding song about love, but loving too much. It’s about attachment and codependency. Sam’s girlfriend gets comments about this “sweet” song he wrote, and she asserts that the song isn’t about her, and it’s not a happy song. The sweetness reflects that warm, safe feeling of a codependent relationship. But a close read of the second verse sums up the true sentiment well:
I’ve filled my cup full enough to be emptied
But who will it take to give what will remain
How should I know how to be loved like loving
If one of us knows then so should us all
I hope you fall so I can be the one that you need
“Filling your cup up to be emptied is not a sustainable way to go through life,” Sam says. “You’ve gotta do that for you and then share what you can.”
On “Every Time Everybody,” the claps holding down the rhythm are inspired by Buddy Holly’s “Everyday.” Sam recounts the song’s origin, when he was at a Mardi Gras parade that culminated with a group of 100-200 people standing around in a circle while a band played “the sweetest song with the most beautiful chords.”
Engrossed in the beauty of that moment and the thought of all the different paths that led everyone to sharing that place and time, he looked across the circle and saw a friend in the distance, and they both began sobbing uncontrollably, overtaken by emotion. Sam says, “On the whole, this song is about appreciating something that comes and goes so quickly, something so beautiful that’s just like a moment, and letting there be an after, and letting that after be just as sweet as before and during.”
Mr. Sam (aka Sam Gelband). Photo courtesy of the artist.
Sam wrote my favorite song on the album, “Now That I Know You,” for his now-girlfriend at a time when he was very comfortable with the idea of them being only friends. “It’s about reflecting on how strong you can feel when you connect with someone for the first time and you make a really meaningful connection, and how much that can give you and how strong that can make you feel, and how open,” Sam explains. “And in a lot of ways, it’s about allowing that to come and go since we’re both touring musicians and can’t be around each other all the time.”
Musically, it’s a sweet lullaby with guitar doubling the melody of Sam’s voice. The lyrics take us on a journey of the transformation that accompanies love, and does it unassumingly, always returning to the refrain “now that I know you” in a way that keeps the listener pleasantly decoding the message. The chorus punctuates the theme of the song perfectly.
And I’m thinking of the water now
And how it can do almost anything
It reminds me of the love in me
Now that I know you
“You are Kind” is another sweet love song, this time about maternal love. Sam wrote it from the perspective of his mom and his friend who recently became a mom. “It’s about that wild amount of hope we have for our kids,” says Sam, who’s helped teach elementary school kids. “It’s about seeing a kid going through something, and it’s in your blood to want the best for them. You can’t tell them how it’s going to go, you can just hope and try to know that it's going to be all right.”
The final track, “Monkey Business,” is about the summers when Sam travels around the northern U.S. to tour in a climate that’s less smoldering than New Orleans. He says it’s always difficult to leave, but ultimately he’s realized that it’s so great to meet new friends and see new places; he feels like he’s home wherever he is. This song is about that angst between not wanting to leave, but loving the new people and scenery.
I was overcome by this album, which surprised me because it’s so much happier than the albums I’m normally drawn to. I asked Sam why he chooses to write such happy songs. “This is just my form of honesty,” he says. “It’s how I see the world.” It was such a simple and straightforward answer. Mr. Sam seems to be on a quest to spread love and friendship through his music and through his day-to-day interactions. He’s real, he’s humble, he’s caring, he’s a hell of a songwriter, and this album is at the top on my list for a spirit lift.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jacson Miller. Photo courtesy of the author.
Jacson Miller is a huge fan of great Americana music and the songwriters who create it. He is a passionate supporter of equity in education and youth development as a Board Member of the nonprofit ‘Search Institute’. A long-time resident of Minneapolis, he grew up in southern Indiana, has a Business degree from Purdue University, an MBA from Duke University, and loves being a dad, playing guitar, and songwriting.
