Some Black Crowes News

[Mr Walker]

I don't think I want to go to the Stone Pony.
Just saw Butch Walker there and it was a great show, but I can't stand the crowds.

[twonabomber]

the Crowes are at the HOB on July 13...

[Mr Walker]

THE BLACK CROWES ANNOUNCE RELEASE OF NEW CD
AND GIVE FANS A FREE SECOND ALBUM

‘BEFORE THE FROST…UNTIL THE FREEZE’ DUE IN STORES SEPTEMBER 01, 2009

A LIMITED EDITION VINYL AVAILABLE

THE BLACK CROWES will release their new studio CD, Before the Frost... on September 1, 2009.

A second album, titled …Until The Freeze, will be given away for free exclusively through a unique download code which is included in Before The Frost… as a “thank you” to their fans for two decades of continued support.

Before the Frost..., and its corresponding free album …Until The Freeze, were recorded over a series of five nights at Levon Helm Studios in Woodstock, NY. Although both are studio albums, all the new material was performed and recorded in front of an intimate audience of the band’s fans, making them a part of The Black Crowes musical history.

The innovative technique of inviting fans into the studio as part of the process during recording is a rare experience.

Before the Frost... features eleven new and previously unreleased Black Crowes songs including Good Morning Captain, I Ain’t Hiding, Been a Long Time (Waiting on Love), and other original songs that will serve to spotlight the bands ability to make emotional connections through their music. The free album …Until The Freeze is a nine-song collection featuring eight new original Black Crowes songs plus a cover version of the Stephen Stills classic So Many Times.

A limited edition vinyl release of Before The Frost…Until The Freeze, featuring all 20 tracks, will also be available on September 1, 2009.

Chris Robinson conceived the concept of Before the Frost...Until The Freeze.
“I think we fulfilled a musical commitment to continue on the golden road of artistic independence. Approaching 20 years into our careers, we still are ambitious enough to push ourselves to create something unique that we have never done before.”

As The Black Crowes approach the upcoming 20th anniversary of their release of one of rock’s most influential records, Shake Your Money Maker, which produced such hits as Jealous Again, She Talks To Angels and Hard to Handle, they are time and again hailed as one of Rock and Roll’s best live acts.

Before The Frost… (CD Track Listing)
Good Morning Captain
Been A Long Time (Waiting On Love)
Appaloosa
A Train Still Makes A Lonely Sound
I Ain’t Hiding
Kept My Soul
What Is Home
Houston Don’t Dream About Me
Make Glad
And The Band Played On
Last Place That Love Lives

…Until The Freeze (Free Download Album Track Listing)
Aimless Peacock
Shady Grove
Garden Gate
Greenhorn
Shine Along
Roll Old Jeremiah
Lady Of Avenue A
So Many Times
Fork In The River

Before the Frost…Until The Freeze was produced by Paul Stacey and will be released through The Black Crowes label, Silver Arrow Records and Megaforce Records.

For more information, go to blackcrowes.com.

[damngoodtimes]

excellent, loves me some Crowes.

[Mr Walker]

You can download the new single 'I Ain't Hiding' from their website...

Before The Frost... Available September 1, 2009

Fuck... it sounds like 'I Was Made For Loving You' or 'Miss You'... fucking strange.
I don't think is gonna go over well.

[Mr Walker]

Chris used to be such a snotty big mouth... they he kinda started laying real low... here's a semi-recent interview...


The Black Crowes’ Chris Robinson On What It Takes To Be A Great Singer
gbarton / Features / 03/04/2009 16:55pm

Chris Robinson of The Black Crowes is No.21 in our list of Rock’s Greatest Singers – see the current issue of Classic Rock for the full rundown. There follows the complete version of Chris’s interview in that same issue, courtesy of CR scribe Henry Yates…

Without being modest, what exactly makes you such a good singer?
“My father was a rock ‘n’ roll singer in the ’50s, and he didn’t think I was a very good singer, and didn’t encourage me much, but now he’s proud of me and realises what my talent is. I think it has something to do with honest expression. I probably wouldn’t get very far on American Idol. But this is rock ‘n’ roll. What comes out is who you are and how you live. Singing for me is very visceral. That’s the Southern side of me. Just get up there and do it. Open your mouth and hope a good sound comes out.
“There’s more to singing than hitting notes. Otis Redding sang out of key a lot, but he gave so much with his voice, it was as though he was taking a piece of himself in his hands and giving it to you. That always resonated with me. Rock ‘n’ roll is not a perfect science. The music that always grabs me by the heartstrings is the stuff that isn’t perfect but contains that exchange between the vocalist and audience. For me, that’s the way it has to be.”

Which other singers do you admire?
“Whether it was Otis Redding or Steve Marriott, it’s all about expression. That’s why Neil Young and Bob Dylan are great rock ‘n’ roll singers. I’m sure you’ve met people who don’t think Bob is a great singer, but his voice is honest within the material and cuts close to the bone, and there’s a sincerity to that. It’s the connection between the audience and the experience of what he’s singing about. Freddie Mercury had great emotional exchange too. You could get bogged down in tonalities. Paul Rodgers has a great tone to his voice as a great white blues singer. Or Rod Stewart, when he was starting out. But the stuff I learnt to sing with was Sly & the Family Stone and George Clinton’s Funkadelic records.”

What do you think is your best vocal performance?
“Early in our career, maybe something like Bad Luck Blue Eyes Goodbye from The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion [1992]. We were still very young; we made that record in a week, so we didn’t spend a lot of time fretting over it, and I think it’s a real heartfelt performance. And personally, I think Oh Josephine from the last album [Warpaint]. I always tend to go for the ballads, where the imagery and the vocal and the song convalesce into something. If I can’t believe in the stories and the words I’m saying, there’s no use singing it. That’s also true of the covers we choose to sing.
“What mood do I need to be in to give a vocal performance? When I was starting out, I was more at the whims of stuff like anger. Now I’m always ready to sing. Even when I’m tired. Even when I’m sick.”

What’s the hardest song you have to sing?
“Virtue and Vice from By Your Side [1999] is a song that as you get older… you know, it’s one of those things where because you were in the moment, you didn’t stop and think ‘maybe we should try this in a lower key’. That’s the way it was and the way it’s gonna be. I’ll tell you a very hard song and that would be from our Lions album [2001] – a real rock song called Lickin’. It just seems to have a very aggressive chorus. That’s probably why we don’t play it very often.”

How have you had to adapt your voice as you’ve got older?
“I’m 42 now, and I definitely have more control and I’m far happier with the quality of my voice, but I’ve lost a certain top of my range that I had when I was 22. Smoking? No, it’s just age. I’ve never smoked cigarettes in my life. I mean, everyone knows we’ve smoked the other thing, but I’ve even cut back on that. But you get wear and tear, because our lives are on the road. I still sing all the high harmonies. It would probably only be noticeable to me and our producer.”

Is there a big difference between singing live and in the studio?
“I never get too hung up in the studio; I don’t even use the headphones. I don’t get very precious about that stuff. Live, the adrenalin is totally different. You go out and it’s a visceral experience. Plus, the way we started out in the little clubs in Atlanta, like any other band with two guitar players and a gigantic man behind the drums, I had to project, because it was deafening.
“When you get out there, there is a sense of responsibility that you wanna do your best. It might be your last show – you never know what’s gonna happen – so you wanna leave it all on the stage every night. Have I ever missed a note? Hey man, you know how many gigs I’ve done in 20 years? The late, great Jerry Garcia had a great philosophy about hitting a bad note – there’s always tomorrow night. You can’t get hung up on it. Once you let it out of the bag, it’s in the atmosphere and it goes away. Like I say, it’s more about the moment than the science. I mean, some people are into the mistakes, because as long as you don’t make too many, they find a charm in that.”

It’s interesting that your voice is very different to your brother Rich’s…
“The interesting thing about my voice and my brother’s is that when we sing close harmonies, there is something genetic that can’t be duplicated. I’m not comparing us to the Everly Brothers, but that kind of close harmony singing is something that we just fall into and it is unique. There’s some weird similarity, but it’s totally different.”

[Mr Walker]

little review of the new single...


Track Of The Day: Black Crowes
terrybezer / Communication Breakdown, News / 02/07/2009 12:45pm

Check out the new Black Crowes track here and get an insight into the day-to-day workings of the Classic Rock office.

We’ve got a very groovy very special Track Of The Day today, as we bring you I Ain’t Hiding, the first song from the new Black Crowes album Before The Frost…
We just listened to it at CR HQ, and here’s what ensued:

SCENE: THE CR OFFICE, TIME: MIDDAY

All the team are heads-down on deadline, headphones are on all round and everyone’s furiously working.

SIAN: “Guys, headphones off. PLEASE tell me what this reminds me of…”

New Black Crowes track is played aloud to all and sundry.

BRAD: “Er, it’s that Bloodhound Gang song, the ‘Discovery Channel’ one… what’s it called, The Bad Touch

SCOTT: “No, it’s Squeeze, Cool For Cats… Who is this?”

Track continues, until the backing vocalists chime in with a timely ‘woo hoo’.

PAUL: “Aha, it’s that Stones song, Miss You.”

SCOTT: “Good spot, yeah, it is.”

At this point, Crowes aficionado James from Metal Hammer strolls across the office.

JAMES: “Aha! You’ve got the new Black Crowes goes disco song. When they did it live at Brixton, nobody quite knew what to make of it. But then it ramps up and really works when the guitar solo kicks in.”

He’s right too. It does. At first we weren’t entirely convinced why the Crowes were now taking the Stones’ disco (OK, weakest) period as their inspiration, but once you’ve listened to it a couple of times it kinda makes sense. It very much makes us want to hear the new album, that’s for damn sure.

So, get yerselves over to Before The Frost... Available September 1, 2009 sharpish and download ‘I Ain’t Hiding’ and let us know what YOU think in the comments below.

Before The Frost is set for release on August 31.

[letsrock]

Anyone ever see them in concert?

[katie]

Yes I have,

Monsters of Rock - Castle Donington August 17th 1991

[Diamondjimi]

Anyone ever see them in concert?

Saw them open for the Michael Schenker Group at a club in Toronto back in
'88. A couple of us were sitting on the stage in front of Rich Robinson as they did their set. He looked nervous playing in front of a room full of Schenker guitar freaks. Singer dude was doing his best Iggy,Rod Stewart/Jagger trip.
Basically ignoring them , he struts over kneels down and starts singing in between us. Unimpressed we continued to ignore him, he got the drift and buggered off...
"Jealous Again" was the only tune I recognised that night as they'd just released their first album shortly before the tour. Over the years I've come to appreciate them a lot more. They were a 'lil too douchey and retro for my liking in the early days...

[twonabomber]

Anyone ever see them in concert?

'92 or so at Music Hall, on the Southern Harmony tour. awesome show. then last year at Bayfest, another great show.

i was going to go to the Jimmy Page/Black Crowes show but it was cancelled before tickets went on sale.

they're at HOB in a couple weeks but i'm not sure if i can make it.

[damngoodtimes]

saw 'em open for Aerosmith back in '90. back then, Chris was the cockiest mofo this side of David Lee. I loved it.

couple times at Music Midtown here in the hometown, 96 and 01, I believe. also at the Fabulous Fox Theatre on an Easter Sunday in 1999 (yes, they played My Morning Song).

then, after he shook of that little blond STD, at a couple of amphitheater shows in 06 and 08.

so, I guess that's six times, all told. they put on a great rock n roll show. lately, they've gotten a lot more in the Dead mode of operations. they'll play like 15 songs in a two hour set. lots of long jams, plenty of cover tunes, of the Crowes numbers they do most aren't the hits. that seems to bug a lot of the more casual fans, but they really sound great.

I suppose I'd like to see them play Remedy again, too. I mean, who the hell else is gonna do it?

twona, I had tix for that Page/Crowes show too. Atlanta was on the second (cancelled) leg along with Cleveland. I really loved the live disc of that collaboration. Jimmy's back gave out. ugh.

[Mr Walker]

New Crowes disc in stores today... caught me a bit off guard being available on a Monday rather than the usual new release day of the week Tuesday... going to have to rearrange my schedule a bit.

[High Life Man]

The 1st is a Tuesday, Mr. W!

I'm listening to it right now.

Digging it.

[Mr Walker]

The 1st is a Tuesday, Mr. W!

I'm listening to it right now.

Digging it.

Yeah, I know...
I saw it in Best Buy's Sunday circular. I thought it was coming out toward the middle of September. I went to the website and it said it was released on 8/31 and available in stores, so I went and although it took the young lady about 45 minutes to find it, I wound up picking it up.
Nice packaging... mini vinyl replica thing plus a 2009 tour sticker and a code to download the "....Until The Freeze" lp (lp for lack of a better term).