Otis Gibbs’ creative life includes his music, YouTube

Otis Gibbs, a prominent Indianapolis musician with a healthy following in Europe, is experiencing a career renaissance thanks to storytelling videos he posts on YouTube.

The Irvington singer-songwriter lived in Nashville, Tennessee, from 2007 to 2019, fostering friendships with Music City insiders who have personal experiences related to Bob Dylan, John Prine, Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, the Rolling Stones and other icons.

Gibbs invites these insiders to share recollections on his YouTube channel, which boasts more than 110,000 subscribers and more than 30 million views.

The 59-year-old who grew up in Wanamaker, a tight-knit community on the far-southeast side of Indianapolis, has a clear idea of his channel’s viewing demographic.

“There’s a person in Wichita who’s played the Moose Lodge their entire life and loves John Prine, wishing that they would have met him or been inside his circle,” Gibbs said. “This is a window into that world they can look into. That’s all this is. I’m not looking for any trash or dirt. I’ve been the person wishing they could see through that window, and I’ve been a person on the other side of the window. Half of my life has been one or the other.”

It’s time once again for Gibbs to emphasize his own brand of folk, country and rock music. His 10th album, “The Trust of Crows,” is scheduled for release on Sept. 16. He will promote the album, which was made at one of Nashville’s most historic recording studios, with an Otis Gibbs Band show Oct. 25 at Fountain Square’s Hi-Fi venue.

Indianapolis-based photographer Todd Fox, who met Gibbs when they worked food-service jobs in the 1980s, collaborated with him to make music videos to accompany three songs on the new album: “Eastside,” “Raze” and “Ditchweed.”

Fox and Gibbs initially bonded through music, art and road trips. Their habit of driving out of their way to explore unusual places inspired the song “Great American Roadside,” Gibbs’ 2017 salute to the world’s largest ball of twine in Kansas, the Cadillac Ranch in Texas and Howard Finster’s Paradise Garden in Georgia.

Fox said he’s not surprised by the popularity of Gibbs’ YouTube efforts.

“Otis is pretty easy to talk to, a pretty likable guy,” Fox said. “He has a calm demeanor. There’s really no drama with Otis.”

Chuck Mead, a founding member of country-meets-rockabilly band BR549, is a Nashville-based musicologist who appears in the “Eastside” video. Mead and Gibbs co-wrote a song that appeared on Mead’s 2019 album, “Close to Home.”

The tune, “Daddy Worked the Pole (So Mama Wouldn’t Have To),” is a tale of a couple figuring out their work-life balance. He’s a telephone line installer; she’s an exotic dancer.

“There’s hundreds and hundreds of music stories around Nashville, and the historical context Otis puts it in is great,” Mead said of Gibbs’ YouTube channel. “Because he’s an artist and a songwriter, he can talk to people on a different level.”

A ‘magic’ place

One of Gibbs’ Nashville-based friends is Thomm Jutz, a native of Germany who’s played guitar in the bands of Mary Gauthier and late singer-songwriter Nanci Griffith. Jutz co-wrote three songs with Billy Strings that appear on Strings’ 2024 album, “Highway Prayers.”

Jutz also is a songwriting instructor at Belmont University’s Mike Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business. Jutz’s role at Belmont paved the way for Gibbs to record “The Trust of Crows” album at Columbia Studio A, where Dylan made the albums “Blonde On Blonde,” “John Wesley Harding” and “Nashville Skyline” in the 1960s.

Although Columbia Records shut down Studio A in 1982 and converted the space to offices, music industry executive Mike Curb purchased the building in 2007 and revived the recording studio.

Because the studio presently serves as a classroom and learning lab for Belmont students, it’s relatively rare for professional musicians such as Gibbs to work there.

Jutz, who co-produced “The Trust of Crows” with Gibbs, is allowed access because of his faculty role.

“Thomm did so much heavy lifting,” Gibbs said of what it took to make the album happen.

In terms of what the historic setting means to him, Gibbs said, “I love Bob Dylan. I don’t believe in favorites, but if we’re going to make me have a favorite, let’s say it’s Bob.”

Mead made an album at Columbia Studio A’s sibling studio, the Quonset Hut, in 2011. Built in the mid-1950s, the Quonset Hut was the site of recording sessions featuring Patsy Cline, Marty Robbins and Cash.

Mead notes that Columbia Studio A’s history includes more than the trio of Dylan albums. Simon & Garfunkel recorded part of 1970 album “Bridge Over Troubled Water” there. Leonard Cohen, Elvis Costello and Indianapolis native John Hiatt also recorded at Columbia Studio A.

“It’s just one of those magic places where you put the right combination of people in there, and you get hit records,” Mead said.

Vocalist-guitarist Gibbs planned his sessions at the studio in the old-school format of all musicians playing together with him singing at the same time. Jutz played guitar on the album, and the band included bass player Dave Jacques, who backed Prine for more than 25 years, and Lynn Williams, who plays drums in the Wallflowers.

Gibbs said he’s a fan of how quickly recording sessions are knocked out in Nashville, largely because “the players are ridiculously great.”

“We’re not trying to replicate anything,” Gibbs said. “It’s just nice that we’re now a part of the history of that room. While we’re recording, we’re just thinking about the songs. But when you walk in and you’re setting up, you think, ‘Oh this is where that was recorded.’”

Jutz had not worked in Columbia Studio A before the sessions for “The Trust of Crows.” The album’s 10 songs were recorded in two days last December, during the school’s winter break.

“It’s a big room, and there are no isolation booths,” Jutz said. “Everybody’s on the same floor, which creates a certain atmosphere, recording-wise, where everybody’s a little more on the spot. You have to get it right.”

For the birds

“Holy River Blues,” the opening song of Gibbs’ new album, sets the tone with lyrics such as, “The world is burning, but our hearts are growing cold,” and “Wise is the man who earns the trust of crows.”

Social commentary heard in the burning-world-and-cold-hearts line isn’t new for Gibbs, who included a song titled “The Great American Monkey Choir” on his debut album, 2002’s “49th and Melancholy.”

The line about crows is more cryptic.

Gibbs said it originated during years spent in Tennessee with his longtime partner and fellow singer-songwriter, Amy Lashley. They lived in East Nashville, a neighborhood known for its thriving arts scene.

“When we first moved to East Nashville, I would sit in the backyard and worry about the world and things I can’t seem to do anything about or other people’s lives that I wish I could make better in some way,” Gibbs said. “Feeding the birds kind of took the stress of that away a little bit.”

By offering sunflower seeds, Gibbs made a lot of feathered friends.

“The crows were different,” he said. “They wouldn’t come around.”

Gibbs said he eventually made progress with crows but didn’t achieve “trust” status.

What kind of investment is necessary?

“Peanuts in the shell are good,” he said. “It’s really just time and consistency.”

That commitment parallels a life philosophy for Gibbs, who headlined the final show at the Patio venue in Broad Ripple before it closed in 2005. He’s toured England as the supporting act for Billy Bragg and Mott the Hoople singer Ian Hunter. Rounder Records and Pandora each hired Gibbs to host a series of online special content.

He consistently sidesteps a showbiz approach to his work.

“There’s a tendency to want to show up for the photo op and get the quick sugar fix from it, and we live in a world that definitely rewards that,” Gibbs said. “Sometimes we feel a little not so great when we find ourselves walking that path, and you want to pull back. To me, it’s more of just trying to do the hard work and be whatever the hell it is that you are—the good and the bad.”

New song “Raze” features the memorable line, “It’s a beautiful town, they can’t wait to tear it down,” inspired by every city’s tendency to discard buildings and houses to embrace “plastic homogeny.”

The video that accompanies “Raze” includes exterior shots of Tim & Company’s Another Fine Mess, an architectural salvage store at the intersection of East 10th and Rural streets.

Videographer Fox captured a sign paying tribute to Tim Harmon, the store’s founder who died in June.

“It was all kind of fitting, given what [Harmon] restored,” Fox said. “He took the houses that have been razed and brought new life to so much of what he got out of them.”

Algorithm assist

Gibbs launched a podcast titled “Thanks for Giving a Damn” in 2012. Episodes included behind-the-scenes stories from Gibbs amid his conversations with Todd Snider, Bragg and other people in the music industry.

“The punk-rock idea of ‘be your own press’ appeals to me,” he said. “Throw something out into the world that you wish existed. I was the first person in the roots music world doing that.”

Gibbs said he gave tips to Chris Shiflett, the Foo Fighters guitarist who hosted a music-focused interview podcast titled “Walking the Floor” from 2013 to 2022, and singer-songwriter Joe Pug, who launched a podcast titled “The Working Songwriter” in 2016.

The pandemic, however, wrecked one of Gibbs’ rules for recording his show: He always spoke with his guests in person.

In 2020, he shifted from podcasting to uploading monologues to his YouTube channel.

“I thought, ‘I’m going to get on YouTube, and I’m going to talk about music for 10 minutes. I’ll talk about John Prine or whatever and share the things I like and not talk about the things I don’t like in this dark, ugly moment. … I looked at it as my own USO tour: ‘This is how I’m going to cheer a few people up.’”

He didn’t expect his videos would be promoted via YouTube’s algorithm, which funnels viewers toward content similar to what they’re already watching.

“With a podcast, I could say, ‘Hey, you should be listening to this.’ And then you listen to it. That’s the whole thing. If that doesn’t happen, you don’t have listeners,” Gibbs said. “Just immediately, [the YouTube audience] started growing. I could see, ‘Wow, there’s all of this growth that’s faster than what happened with the podcast.’ And it was a nice, warm community. People weren’t saying mean, ugly things. It’s the internet, and people are being nice.”

Country singer Mead said it’s gratifying to see Gibbs connect with an online audience.

“We’re all lucky to have Otis Gibbs around,” Mead said.•