Joel Hofmann writes a song for all of us
Like every Texas song worth its salt, it starts with guitar.
Solid guitar. Rockabilly and blues guitar played with deft fingers, and within seconds, it’s the kind of song you want to play in a car with the windows rolled down as you ride along RR12 while a sun-warmed breeze streams through.
Then Joel Hofmann’s voice comes in: This deep, resonant baritone that sounds comfortingly familiar. Perhaps that’s to be expected; Hofmann is a San Marcos local who plays with his band — The Joel Hofmann Band — on the regular. With a hint of melancholy that calls to mind rockabilly favorites like Johnny Cash and Roy Orbison, Hofmann’s voice fills listeners with a sense of nostalgia for important things that are rapidly slipping away.
That voice and that guitar are the backbone of Joel Hofmann’s latest single, “College Town,” but the heart of the song beats within its lyrics.
“College Town” is a song about San Marcos as seen by someone who (like many of us) has witnessed the town’s inexorable swell from a sleepy spot on the river to a whole city with a university. The first verse goes: Living in a college town, Condos and fast food all around I won’t be the one to cast the blame The more things that will change, the more I stay the same. But it’s hard to make a living when 20 is the average age.
Yet even as Hofmann acknowledges the changes San Marcos has undergone, he reminds us of what still remains at the heart of the town itself: We got late night bars and old guitars and bands that play til 2 The girls love to dance in their yoga pants And the river still runs right through I’m here to stay, and if I have my way I won’t let it get me down You’ll find me right here Living in a college town.
“I wrote the bulk of it, but got stumped on the last verse,” Hofmann said. “My bass playing and producing friend Ted Russell Kamp helped me with the last verse.”
Hofmann and Kamp’s songwriting synergy makes the single “College Town” more than a lament about the changing soul of San Marcos. It becomes a kind of anthem to those of us who still dance around in our yoga pants and jump into that river every time we can.
Kamp, who won a Grammy in 2020 for his work on Tanya Tucker’s last album, plays bass and organ on “College Town,” with Hofmann playing guitar and vocals, Brian Wheelan on electric guitar and Jim Doyle on drums. The single, which is available on all internet platforms including iTunes, Spotify and Youtube, is part of an album by the same name on which The Joel Hofmann band is currently working. Check out joelhofmannband.com to hear all of the band’s previous albums. If you aren’t already a fan, you will soon be, and the good news is, there will be more to come.
Joel Hofmann Band will play Gruene Grove in New Braunfels on Thursday, May 22 at 7 p.m.
