Singer-songwriter VIC CHESNUTT won't stay quiet

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Vic Chesnutt (GEORGE DOUKLIAS / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS ARCHIVE)

For a guy in desperate need of health-care reform, Vic Chesnutt isn't a fan of President Barack Obama's plan.

The 45-year-old singer-songwriter was left a paraplegic following a car accident in 1983. Over the years he has racked up close to $100,000 in medical bills and has to screen his calls to avoid creditors.

"I'm going to have to sell my house and become homeless; it's one option," he says over the phone from his Athens, Ga. home. "I'm having to weigh all my options here with the help of lawyers and state representatives to help me out. It's the bulls--t country I live in."

Chesnutt says Obama's plan is flawed because of side bills with pharmaceutical companies and the American Medical Association, whom he says control the health-care industry in the United States. He believes a public system would only help a small number of people and would cost more than private insurance in the long run.

"To be fair, I'm not sure I'd want a Canadian-style public health system," he says. "I think I would want a hybrid of Canadian and something like France that has private insurance also.

"In this country, Canadian-style public health won't happen because the right would defeat it, just like social security and Medicaid. It would be called socialism and the powers that be would kill it.

"I prefer some private insurance in a highly regulated market like Switzerland and France and other places. We would have a somewhat Canadian style funded by taxes, where everybody pays into a pool so there's a minimal amount of health coverage for everybody. Then you could buy into private insurance for greater care. That's my dream for America."

Chesnutt has been dealing with the system for 26 years, but as a musician, only had full medical coverage for a fraction of that time, during the period he was on major label Capitol for one album, 1996's About to Choke. That CD came on the heels of the Sweet Relief II tribute album, featuring artists such as Madonna and R.E.M. (Michael Stipe was an earlier champion of Chesnutt's and produced his first two albums) covering his material to raise money for people without health care.

He has kept paying $500 a month for insurance, but that only covers between 60 and 80 per cent of his expenses. Two operations during the past couple of years have put him back in the hole.

It's a topic that's obviously near to his heart and one he has written about numerous times over the course of his acclaimed career. His health issues haven't stopped him from making music, and over the years he has released 15 albums.

His latest release, At the Cut, is collaboration with Fugazi's Guy Picciotto and members of atmospheric post-rock/noise-rock bands Thee Silver Mt. Zion and Godspeed You! Black Emperor, which makes for a loud live experience Winnipeggers will get to see for themselves Friday at the West End Cultural Centre (tickets are $20 at Ticketmaster, the WECC and Music Trader).

"It doesn't have to be loud to be good, but to me this loudness is emotional; when it's physical and hits you that hard it's an emotional experience," he says. "It's a more sensual thing. I've spent my whole life in rock SSRqn' roll, 20 years, being pretty f ing quiet and this is a different experience for me. A friend of mine said the other day that we're heavier than Sabbath, and I think we are."

Chesnutt hooked up with his current backing band in 2006 at the suggestion of his friend Jim Cohen, a filmmaker. The group hit it off and recorded the North Star Deserter album together.

"Then when we went on tour we realized, 'Wow, we're a band,'" he says. "We wanted to explore more; we knew we had more to say than we said on North Star Deserter so we did.

"It's a great deal to have this kind of mind meld. This is an incredible brain trust -- it is an all-star band, absolutely."

rob.williams@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition November 19, 2009 E9