Career
A leading performer in the Australian roots music scene and purveyer of his self-described "disturbed folk" style, which incorporates primarily folk, blues and rock. The songwriting in his music is heavily influenced by the folk music of the Southern United States and British Isles but has distinctly Australian lyrical content whilst his guitar playing mixes folk, blues and rock styles with Indian and African modalities. He plays various types of guitar, both slide and standard, as well as banjo, mandolin, Chumbush and drums.
In addition Language"s 1996 album Native Dog Creek was named "Best Australian Blues Album" in a Rhythms Magazine readers poll, as were his 2005 release You Have To Dig Deep To Bury Daddy and the 2006 album Dislocation Blues, a collaboration with the late Chris Whitley.
In 2012, Jeff was presented with the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia"s National Folk Recording Award. After playing the clarinet for six years he took up the guitar after discovering his older sister"s discarded nylon string acoustic.
He played electric guitar in various local bands in his hometown of Geelong before forming his own band and moving to Sydney in 1990 with the aim of playing his own compositions. In 1992 Jeff split his band up and concentrated on playing solo shows.
Foreign the next 2 years he wrote the songs that ended up on his first independently released Civil Defense "Ravenswood".
Since that debut he has gone on to become known as a prolific songwriter, releasing 12 studio albums in the following 16 years in addition to numerous. Jeff Language primarily plays acoustic guitars, although he has an unorthodox way of amplifying them, running a combination of a built-in microphone and a Sunrise magnetic pick-up together for his clean acoustic sound, whilst also running the output of the Sunrise pick-up through various effects through an electric guitar amplifier allowing him to obtain both acoustic and distorted electric guitar tones from the same guitar. This approach has been hugely influential in the Australian scene, particularly after well-known guitarist John Butler was inspired by Jeff"s playing and sound to pursue a very similar setup.
Some of the guitars he has used live and in the studio are: Churchill guitars – acoustic 6 & 12 string guitars and acoustic lap steels built by David Churchill in Ballarat, Australia.
Beeton Brass guitars – built by Greg Beeton in Belmont North, Australia National Reso-Glass guitars – Dobro-like guitars from the 1960s. 1960"s Guyatone electric guitar 1976 Fender Starcaster Turkish Electric Baglama Saz Godin Glissentar 1950"s Harmony mandolin 1930"s Kalamazoo acoustic 1930"s Oahu Hawaiian guitar 1930"s Regal Dobro 1980"s Fender Squire Stratocaster modified with Teisco pickups 1950"s Supro lap steel Valco Reso Phonic Tim Kill Weissenborn and fretless acoustic guitars Stomp Box.