Discography
Elements of folk, country, rock ‘n’ roll and ambient atmospheres flow up into a 21st century music that is textured and sophisticated, blazed by Nolan’s passion for intensely charged electric guitar work and finger-picked approaches to the acoustic guitar. His vocals range in the same way… tender, tough, true.
SONGS FOR HEMINGWAY – LP – released October 2024
SONGS FOR HEMINGWAY – LP – released October 2024
There was one main brief for producer Justin Weaver – “No electric instruments!” With an emphasis on prose, and the not-so-obvious chord change that can surprise but translate with old guitars, these are songs and stories that belong to any era. Jack’s ability to combine personal and universal themes, within a musical framework that transforms the preconception of an acoustic album, takes the listener into truly fascinating and rewarding territory. It’s Australian roots music, of the finest kind – at the nexus of folk, country, ambient atmospheres and poetic rock songwriting. 21st century music that is textured and sophisticated, with vocals tender, tough and true.
Country HQ said “With its heartfelt lyrics, rich instrumentation , Songs for Hemingway will undoubtedly leave a lasting impression on listeners. It is a testament to Jack Nolan’s talent and his ability to create music that speaks to the soul.”
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JINDABYNE – LP – released 2023
JINDABYNE – LP – released 2023
JINDABYNE – released August 2023, was frustratingly delayed by that virus. This is an album that waited in the wings while lockdowns and rules meant the guitar took on a whole new meaning.
One hears JINDABYNE and thinks perhaps that urgency brought on by covid only speeds things up. Here though, the rolling memories remain, the genesis of so many of Nolan’s songs. This is another body of work that traverses themes that ignite, with songs of love and of the muse – that long term companion that appears always, and is no more apparent than in the album opener Dollar with a looping twelve string intro – a big tip of the cap to the mighty Wilburys, as Nolan sings; “And she loved me like no other / When I did not have one dollar / Not a dollar / On me”
Other themes include loss, where in Reading Minds there’s almost a calling to an old friend, where the artist rues the loss of someone close and where the distance of youth recalls what was, left behind by one but not the other, and where “For one moment we were young / Your sun it faded / Sparks light fires / Like fools and liars run”
Then there’s the album title, taken from the ever so sweet Solo Sailor that lets us in on a journey to a place where – “The road is twisted into Jindabyne / Up In the mountains there’s a place you’ll find / A place to lock it up forever / to leave it there and go / With all the other things / That I don’t know. Other highlights include, the up-tempo and popular streamer She Knew where nothing’s perfect, but she knew he loved her, and her knowing that will have to do for now, and the timeless finger picker, All The Ships In The Ocean that floats around lush LA harmonies on “One Crystal morning / Trouble I see” where “Word ‘round the world / Is following me”
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Gabriel (Jack Nolan) – LP – for release Oct ‘21
GABRIEL – LP – released 2021
Gabriel is Jack Nolan’s fifth solo album, and the first album he’s yielded to someone he trusted enough to produce: This is an album that mines its own carefully sculpted acoustic world with a profoundly atmospheric sense of place, and a depth of self-knowledge that speaks of arrival after a lifetime of sometimes hard, sometimes tender experience.
The genesis, Gabriel, came to Jack a few years ago, sat at his side on a long desert drive that he wasn’t sure he’d come back from. The title track, in its own unhurried and roundabout way, eventually found itself in Nashville, USA.
Atonement is upfront in titles like The Hopeless Son and Restitution Song. Others — Tomorrow Came, Faster Than the Speed of Change, A Fool Would Follow Me — are deeper stocktakes, songs from life’s rear view mirror. Ghosts of people and places and other, maybe darker things, receding for sure, but too close to ignore.
Produced by Justin Weaver and captured on two-inch tape in the aptly named ‘Welcome to 1979’ Studios by engineer Chris Mara, the assembled band included drummer Jimmy Paxson, bassist Chris Autry, keys player Phil Towns and pedal steel player David Spires who were joined by backup singers Terri Lynn Weaver & Siobhan Maher Kennedy. Justin himself applied the deeply textured lead and electric guitars.
Gabriel, is a record offering up evocative, ethereal stories, perhaps best signalled on the album’s title track, with Nolan singing “Endless lanes /endless cars // In the absence / of stars” reminding us of this new world, turned on its axis in 2020/21.
Album release October,2021
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Our Waverley Star (Jack Nolan) – LP – released 2019
Our Waverley Star – LP – released 2019
A very cool story about how I went and finished this in Nashville Our Waverley Star is my fourth solo album or fifth album overall if you also count The Kelly Gang’s Looking for the Sun. Original sessions were all at in Sydney at Electric Avenue with my usual band, Hamish Stuart on drums, Alexander Hewetson on bass.
During a break in proceedings I played some of the work in progress to a US producer friend who spends a lot of his time working in LA. He urged me to take the record to the US and finish and mix it there, which is what I ultimately did.
There was a few select people I had in mind but the name that kept coming up in credits of LP’s I loved was Mike Poole, he’d worked, mixed and engineered three all-time favourites – Robert Plant’s Grammy-nominated Band of Joy, Patty Griffin’s American Kid, and Buddy Miller’s The Majestic Silver Strings.
I found him online reached out, and after he’d heard the work in progress was keen to work with me and finish it, so off the Nashville TN I went for what was to be the beginning of not only a friendship but a new association with the town. High Quality Recordings in Nashville, Our Waverley Star was produced by me – with additional production on the Nashville sessions by Mike Poole.
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Lost Property – (Jack Nolan) Out Takes & Demos – EP – 2009
Lost Property – Out Takes & Demos – EP – 2009
This is an EP (5 tracks) that were songs left over from our ‘That’s The Sea’ album. Another project after the Kelly Gang disbanded, Martin Rotsey and I produced this too, and his playing is all over these titles. Included with his electric guitar is mandolin, slide and so on. Martin also co-wrote two tracks with me off the EP. For fans of Australian music this is additionally worth checking out for some of Martins writing outside of Midnight Oil.
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That’s The Sea (Jack Nolan) – LP – 2008
That’s The Sea – LP – 2008
The real story behind these titles is that after the Kelly Gang disbanded, I continued to write songs, but was moving slightly away from the Kelly Gang rock vibe and more into the Americana or Darlinghurst Country vibe that I inhabit to this day.
Martin was keen to work on and we also both produced the album too. The ever reliable and fantastic Hamish Stuart plays here again, on drums, with Alexander Hewetson on bass, and Mitch Anderson on keys and backing vocals as well
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The Kelly Gang – Looking For The Sun – 2003
The Kelly Gang – LP – Looking For The Sun – 2003
This was a huge album in the context of the personnel, starting with legendary bassist Rick Grossman who at the time, had a break in Hoodoo Gurus proceedings. We decided to record some songs we’d worked up. Midnight Oil had taken a hiatus when Garrett had gone into politics, so Rick pulled together some of the boys to play, these boys being some of the finest musicians in the country to perform and record the album Looking For The Sun. I covered lead vocals and guitars, while Rick again teamed up with old friend Rob Hirst on drums to form a rhythm section that needs no explanation. Electric guitars are a world class highlight too, with Martin Rotsey & Brad Shepherd, while Scotty Aplin plays the piano and keys.
We really wanted an Australian name, and so in honour of my Irish and genetic rebellion, The Kelly Gang suited up to appropriately sing odes like Snake Charmer, where “The greatest of thieves dress well in suits / And hide behind banners of fine pursuits”, clearly suggesting none of this was by chance. It’s also clear that our songs on this album attack the same kinds of issues that faced the famous bushrangers in their battles with authority during those early years of the Australian colony. But the Kelly Gang wasn’t all about anger and protest. We wanted to deliver rock music with a bit of country and a bit of folk, drawing on the myriad of great musical influences of the band’s founders.
Recorded during 2003 at Megaphon & The Vault Studios, Looking For The Sun includes artwork from the stunning and iconic paintings of our late, great artist, Sir Sidney Nolan. His Ned Kelly Series appear in brilliant colour, a privilege not lost on the band, who see these works as blending beautifully with the words and music on the CD.– all blending with our beloved country.
These are songs with substance, melody, and raw sound, from a group of players who in many ways resembled the original gang of bushrangers, short lived, passionate and rollicking, though all the members of our musical gang did and have managed to survive!
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Dreams of Flying (Jack Nolan) LP – 2000
Dreams of Flying: LP – 2000
This one goes way back and was my first foray into a ‘real’ studio, the old and famous, Paradise Recorders in Potts Point that sadly is no longer.
I had all these songs and my good friend Steve Balbi (Noiseworks, Electric Hippies) who put up his hand to produce the record – it was a great experience, Steve taught me what a 20 hour working day looked like, and the album had many highlights, none more than the single remix, Madeline which caught the attention of Bob Harris at the BBC,
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