Nearly 23 years passed between the death of Ben Harper’s father, Leonard Harper (in 1998), and his longtime bassist, Juan Nelson (in 2021).

But the two men inextricably influenced the making of Harper’s new album, “Bloodline Maintenance,” a deeply soulful collection of folk, blues and rock songs about love, loss, trauma, reconciliation, redemption, and everything in between. They were written during and after a period of profound self-reflection in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Harper said, and he played most of the parts himself — even the instruments he hasn’t mastered.

The result is a record that feels intensely personal, overtly political and homespun-funky in a way that befits the material.

Now, Harper is bringing his band, the Innocent Criminals, back to Bend for a concert next week. GO! caught up with him by phone for a conversation about his dad, his friend and his new album.

Here’s that conversation, edited for space and clarity.

GO!: How old was your dad when he died, and how does that compare to your age now?

Ben Harper: I’m entering into his death year: 54. I do feel the weight of it, for whatever reason, even if it’s existentially. It has gravity.

GO!: This reconnection with him that led to this album: Did you feel it coming on before the pandemic? Or do you think it was brought on by the pandemic?

BH: It came about because of the pandemic. When you have that much time to, you know, look at yourself that introspectively … it just all came out. As a matter of fact, I hadn’t really faced it. I hadn’t looked at it as clearly as I should have because, one, I move at the pace that I move, and two, well, some things take the time they take, don’t they?

GO!: Did you have a good relationship with him before he passed away? Or were there things left unsaid?

BH: Both. There was a lot that had to be unsaid in order to reconcile. If I had waited for what I needed to hear, there would’ve been no reconciliation. (But) we actually did bring our relationship into a wonderful and smooth landing after as bumpy a takeoff as possible.

GO!: When you were doing this introspection during the pandemic, at what point did you realize it was going to become part of your music?

BH: When I realized that I was having a conversation with him. It turns out you can posthumously pick up where you left off if you have that kind of time on your hands. And that’s what was going on. I was having a conversation in my head with my dad, who was a long time gone. But we somehow managed to pick up conversations and dialogue.

My father used to collect all of his thoughts and musings on paper plates, and he’d dump the popcorn and stack the plates in these tins. And I have more tins that I’ve been able to read in a lifetime. And in them, I was finding our conversations close to verbatim. I just found myself howling with delight as I was reminded of our dialogues.

GO!: What did reading those words do for you?

BH: In a very specific way, it enabled me to find greater peace in his memory than I had to that point.

GO!: Is that when the songs started coming out of you?

BH: That’s when the songs went into karmic overdrive.

GO!: You played almost everything on this album. Why?

BH: These songs called for my funky chops — my sort of unorthodox style on instruments that aren’t my go-to, but that I love to play. To try to convince a drummer to play a drumline as wrong as I would because that’s how I hear it in my head would have been unfair to them.

So yeah, the majority of this record is made in my dad’s memory, and it had to kind of pass my dad’s approval from the great beyond as he lives through me. Like, if it wasn’t funky enough for my dad’s record collection, it wasn’t gonna make the album. That was the test.

GO!: How did Juan’s death interact with this process of conversing with your dad and writing songs in his memory?

BH: Juan came into play because I couldn’t reconcile his passing. Nothing was sticking. No conversation with the people who loved him. Not the memorial. Not family or friends. Nothing. And then (eventually) I found myself in a room full of instruments, one of which was an upright bass, which Juan played. And I just started playing that bass. And that’s what stuck, and then I started to actually let myself grieve.

A lot of this record was written on the bass, which was prompted by the memory of Juan. So both my dad and Juan are really at the center of this record, and it’s not necessarily a record about loss. But there are nods to it.

GO!: Last question: When you play these songs live, do they still feel heavy? Or joyous? Or both?

BH: They feel like a release. It doesn’t feel heavy in that I walk off stage with my head down. I’m walking off stage after playing these songs with my head held high and exhilarated.

What: Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals, with Nathan Graham

When: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 21, doors open 5:30 p.m.

Where: Athletic Club of Bend, 61615 Athletic Club Drive

Cost: $49

Contact: clearsummernights.com.