Although singer and songwriter Joshua Radin is 10 albums and 20 years into his career, he still wants to write that perfect tune.
“I say this in all seriousness, but I still haven’t written a song that I feel is great,” he said. “I feel like I’ve written a few good ones, but I don’t feel like I’ve written that song that will stand the test of time. Maybe I will someday, but that is my goal, and I’m going to keep trying.”
Radin will give audiences a good dose of his good songs when he plays three nights, Dec. 4 through Dec. 6, at the Egyptian Theatre.
“I’m looking forward to getting back to Park City,” he said. “I love the Egyptian Theatre. That place is so beautiful and intimate, and I can’t wait to play some songs and tell some stories.”
Radin will be joined by his friend, multi-instrumentalist Gabe Burdulis, which gives him the freedom to not create a setlist.
“When you’re on tour with the full band and there’s a bunch of guys on stage, you have to craft a setlist and stick to it, so they’ll know when they are supposed to play and not,” Radin said. “But when it’s a solo or duo show, I can walk on stage, read the room and play what I feel. And if someone shouts something they want to hear, I can play it if I remember it. After all of the albums, I don’t remember all my songs.”
Radin added to the stack of vinyl with his latest release, “One Day Home,” and as a bonus, he released a band version as well as a piano-and-vocal version.
“I wanted to do that with this album because I have gotten so many messages from people saying they listen to my songs to relax in certain moments — when it’s raining outside and they’re sitting by the fireplace or making coffee in the morning or when they want their dogs to stop barking,” he said. “So, I thought as I was doing the album with the full band, it would be cool to have a second, alternate version that was just piano and vocals.”
Radin said arranging the songs for piano and vocal wasn’t too different from how he writes songs.
“I basically sit on the couch with my acoustic guitar,” he said. “I also usually have a movie on mute playing because I like visual imagery of beautiful films like the Hal Ashby films from the ’70s and old black-and-white films by Frank Capra. Anything that is cinematographically beautiful sometimes sparks ideas in me.”
Radin combined two of his favorite music genres to make “One Day Home.”
“I think people can hear influences in my writing of the type of music I most listen to, like my parents’ record collection — Cat Stevens, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Nick Drake and Elliot Smith and Paul Simon,” he said. “On the other side, when I’m listening to music on the road, in the car or when I’m walking around in different cities, it’s usually a lot of old soul songs — Aretha (Franklin), Sam Cooke, Bill Withers, Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding. So, I thought maybe on this album I could meld them together and make it my own acoustic soul.”
Radin also dug deep for the lyrics.
“I most definitely revealed a lot of myself, but, really, there is no way you can reveal too much,” he said. “But I do think good songwriting comes when you make yourself as vulnerable as possible. That’s what audiences and listeners will always respond to. I think a good song has the ability to shrink the world in a way.”
Shrinking the world means to see commonalities rather than contrasts, Radin said.
“We always see so many differences amongst ourselves, whether it’s language, skin color, religions, political differences or cultural differences,” he said. “But I travel so much, and all I generally see are the commonalities, more so and more so.”
So, Radin has made it a point to make himself so vulnerable when writing his songs that he gets scared to share them.
“Then when someone hears them, they can say in their mind, ‘I feel the same way,’” he said. “Music has brought people together since the beginning of time.”
Radin doesn’t remember a time when the world has been more fragmented.
“I wasn’t alive during the ’60s and the Civil Rights Movement, so I think this is the most divided our country has been in my lifetime,” he said. “So, I have even more motivation to bring people together. With my job writing music and performing for people, all I really want to do is bring Republicans, Democrats and Independents together, and bring Christians and Jews and Muslims together. I’m trying to do everything I can in my small, little way.”
Still, from time to time, Radin has written himself into corners.
“Sometimes I just don’t finish the songs,” he said. “I may go back to them and take a chorus and see if it fits in a different song, but I know there are times that verses and bridges just go forgotten.”
Radin said that has been for the better because the songs he does get to record have helped create a long-standing fan base.
“Even when I started 20 years ago, I would look out into the crowd and see all ages, so I always try to write songs that I hope will stand the test of time,” he said. “And I think those are the songs that appeal to every generation.”
In addition to bringing the world together musically, Radin participates in philanthropy when he can.
“Years ago I started doing a lot of work with children, and then I got hooked up with Northshore Animal League America, the world’s largest no-kill animal shelter that is in Long Island, New York,” he said. “I played concerts for them and wrote a song, ‘Here, Right Now,’ that benefits the organization. So whether it’s kids or animals who can’t take care of themselves, they are always the sentient beings on earth that I gravitate to help first.”
The combination of music and philanthropy is just part of Radin’s life.
“I know it’s so cliche to say, but it’s all about the climb,” he said. “I try to get better every day, but there really is no end. Even if I wrote that one song that would stand the test of time, I don’t know what I would do, because becoming self-actualized means to me that there would be no more struggle. And I think at that point art would die. So, I’m always seeking. And I think that’s good for creativity but bad for personal health.”
Joshua Radin
- When: 8 p.m., Dec. 4-6
- Where: The Egyptian Theatre, 328 Main St.
- Cost: $33 to $59
- Phone: 855-745-SHOW
- Web: parkcityshows.com and joshuaradin.com