Let's Talk Punk with Jim Basnight
Interview By Lisa-PunkrPrincess
Punk Globe: Hi Jim, Thanks for chatting with us. Describe your musical journey. How did you get started playing music, and what inspires you to create?
Jim: I’ve been playing guitar and singing songs, mostly in a rock and roll vein, which in my mind definitely includes “Punk” since I was about six, since 16 professionally. I played in a lot of bands, known best for my time with the Moberlys (1978-1989) and solo in the past 50 years (I’m 68), but have mostly performed as a solo with a band over the past 30 years. Writing tunes is what made me choose music, and it’s what drives me today. I’m still inspired by the fact that I can do it, which I realize now is a rather unique gift, whether you like my work or not, especially for this long of a time.
Punk Globe: What are your interests outside of music?
Jim: Movies, journalism, politics, and sports, mostly basketball, as a fan, no longer as a player, swimming, overcast weather, Mediterranean cooking, African American History, dogs, my kid and her new baby. I wrote the definitive biography of “Sonny Boy Williamson” (Alex Miller died 1965), a mysterious, very misunderstood, but pivotally important figure in American Music and African American History.
Punk Globe: Tell us about your songwriting process. How do you come up with new ideas and bring them to life?
Jim: I often start with music and compose lyrics as I perform the song. Many of my tunes combine ideas that were never finished, which I mix and match. I strive to express honest feelings, be they simple romanticisms or complex topics and commentary. I’ve written about 140 published compositions and co-writes. With the new album and one by Meyce, a band I was in at 18-19 years old, that number should be closer to 170 by Spring 2026.
Punk Globe: If you were a new addition to the crayon box, what color would you be and why?
Jim: Orange, because it would wake me up. I don’t have any problem with being subdued. I have dark moments, but only to provide contrast to my heartfelt and deeply ingrained optimism.
Punk Globe: Tell us about your favorite performance in your career.
Jim: Too many to name or remember. I’ll try doing it by decade:
- ‘60s: Playing with my band of neighbor kids for show and tell in 6th grade.
- ‘70s: Opening for the Ramones in 1977.
- ‘80s: Playing bass for Johnny Thunders in 1982.
- ‘90s: Opening for the Plimsouls in Portland OR in 1995.
- ‘00s: Headlining a huge outdoor summer concert in Bozeman MT.
- 2010’s: Doing a seminar with musical numbers, focused on Sonny Boy in Walla Walla WA.
- 2020s: Doing the same type of show on Sonny Boy in Glendora, MS, where he was born.
Punk Globe: Describe your worst performance and what you learned from it.
Jim: Giving a speech to advocate for a position as class president in 8th grade, after getting ripped the night before.
Punk Globe: If you could have any animal as a pet, what would it be and why?
Jim: One that I’m not allergic to. I love dogs, but recently found that I have an allergy to their dander. A wonderful dog, like my last dog Clyde (pictured on the back of the “Not Changing” album cover, but who doesn’t make me cough.
Punk Globe: What are your favorite and least favorite genres of music to play?
Jim: I have little interest in playing classical or jazz, mostly because I can’t. I also don’t play long extended jams with tons of solos. Whatever interest I ever had in that type of performance is gone. I also have no interest in performing with a track, not even a click track.
Punk Globe: What is your hometown known for?
Jim: Seattle is where I grew up, but I identify with a number of places, including NY, LA, Mississippi, Portland OR, Vancouver BC, and of course where I live now in Indianola, WA on the Puget Sound, across from Seattle. Seattle is probably best known for rock and roll music in its supposed final stages. I reject that. The spirit of rock and roll was there long before the ‘90s, and has always maintained a presence which will be reborn and flourish again.
Punk Globe: Who are your musical influences, and how have they shaped your style?
Jim: They are too numerous to discuss how each one influenced me in this piece. In loosely chronological order they are, Sonny Boy, Hank Williams, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Eddie Cochran, Bob Dylan, Beatles, James Brown, Stones, Mothers, Kinks, Sonics, Aretha Franklin, Rascals, Raiders, most of the major Motown, and Stax acts, Byrds, Cream, Bee Gees, Doors, Moby Grape, Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane, Small Faces, Sly Stone, Carpenters, Who, Curtis Mayfield, Badfinger, Bill Withers, Carole King, T.Rex, Al Green, Bowie, Slade, Lou Reed, Iggy, Dolls, Velvet Underground, Merle Haggard, Television, Modern Lovers, Jayne County, Heartbreakers, Ramones, Suicide, The Heats, Cowboys, Prince, Kurtis Blow, Run DMC and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, Modernettes, Plimsouls, Hoodoo Gurus, Material Issue, Nirvana, Alice in Chains, Oasis, and the Muffs. Every one of these acts has truly inspired me.
Punk Globe: Is there a hidden meaning in any of your music?
Jim: The meaning in my music is to share my love for music as well as to help realize the dreams of the many brilliant people I’ve been blessed to share my life with.
Punk Globe: If you could have dinner with any historical figure, who would it be and why?
Jim: Lenny Bruce, because he was truly a visionary who had so much more to share with the world. He viewed the culture in the U.S. in a way I find both compelling and revealing. I believe the world view and social commentary he put forth in his comedy set a tone and defined a style that was moved forward more by rock creators like Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, and Frank Zappa, than comedians, though he influenced them too.
Punk Globe: What are your ultimate career goals, who would you most like to collaborate with?
Jim: My goals are to continue playing, writing songs and creating stories until the day I die. I’d most like to collaborate with Iggy Pop, because I’d like to learn more about how he creates his style of poetry and feel, and because he’s at the top of the list of those who I’d like to work with who are still with us.
Punk Globe: What five books would you bring to a deserted island and why?
Jim: That’s a tough one. Probably the ones I’ve been meaning to read once I’m done publishing my Sonny Boy biography and potentially a dramatic adaptation based on it. That project has involved a lot of reading, and still does. Probably the Rachel Maddow book, “Prequel,” and other books like that, such as Joy-Ann Reid’s “Medgar and Merlie.”
Punk Globe: Any words of wisdom for new artists?
Jim: If you’re not happy playing for strangers who ignore you, this is not for you.
Punk Globe: Where can we find your tunes? And where would one contact you for shows?
Jim: www.jimbasnightmusic.com peabody.booking@gmail.com
Punk Globe: Thanks for chatting with us, and thanks to all the readers out there.
Jim: This has been a lot of fun. Come see me play live and check out my new album, “Under the Rock” when it comes out later this year. My early band was called the Meyce, and that is scheduled for release on the NW Power Pop and Punk Worx label in Spring 2026.