Thursday, Oct. 01, 2009

Black Crowes pursue Utopia

Multi-platinum vintage blues rockers The Black Crowes, who are approaching 20 years in their career, will perform at the House of Blues in North Myrtle Beach on Sunday, a stop on their Stuck Inside Utopia Tour 2009.

"The Black Crowes fearlessly continue to search for the self- made utopian ideals that makes rock and roll music the last true real American adventure," lead singer Chris Robinson said in a release.

The band is touring in support of its new combo album "Before the Frost Until the Freeze," which released Aug. 31 on Silver Arrow/Magaforce.

"Before the Frost" and its corresponding free album, "Until the Freeze," feature all new material produced by Paul Stacey and recorded in front of an intimate audience of the band's fans at Levon Helm Studios in Woodstock, N.Y.

"Before the Frost" features 11 new Black Crowes tracks which were recorded live over a series of five nights. The second album, "Until the Freeze," is a free download-only CD, accessible through a download code included in "Before the Frost" and serving as a special "thank you" to fans for two decades of support. The free bonus CD features eight new original Black Crowes songs plus a cover of Stephen Stills' classic "So Many Times."

The Black Crowes - vocalist Chris Robinson, guitarist/vocalist Rich Robinson, drummer Steve Gorman, bassist Sven Pipien, keyboardist Adam MacDougall and guitarist Luther Dickinson - have sold more than 20 million albums worldwide.

Kicks caught up with original and founding drummer Steve Gorman to chat about the band's latest effort in a phone interview from his home in Nashville before the start of the Stuck Inside Utopia Tour.

Question | What can fans expect on the Stuck Inside Utopia Tour?

Answer | I imagine that we'll be doing a good bit of the new material. It will be new songs and old songs. At this point it's very straightforward. We just focus on the music we're playing and how we play it. The new album was recorded live at a studio with an audience in the room. So the stuff translates really well in a live setting already. I think for people who are just picking up the album and come to see it, it's going to be a real easy transition.

And like I said, we'll be doing a lot of the old stuff, too. We never really let go of songs. Any song that's ever been on a record is still pretty much fair game. We change the set list every night considerably so whatever show you're seeing is the only time that we do that set list.

Q. | So people may never see the same show twice?

A. | That's a fact. And we do have a lot of fans that travel to see the band multiple times in a year so if they come to a lot of shows, they see a lot of different songs.

Q. | So you recorded "Before the Frost Until the Freeze" in front of a live audience?

A. | Yeah, we recorded it at Levon Helms' studio, his barn up in Woodstock, N.Y., literally in an old barn. He does shows there; it's a studio that's set up in a performance room that holds about 200 people.

So we set up and for over three weeks worked on songs and then on five different nights we had an audience of 200 people that would come in and we would work through the new songs. We were making a record and they were watching. We were trying to get an entire take of the songs. So what those people sat through is the album. If something was wrong with the take, if we were playing a song and something wasn't quite right, we just stopped it. It wasn't like you would go through it like an actual performance so it was a pretty interesting experiment that we tried. So at the end of it we had what we thought was a really good album out of the five different nights.

Q. | Was it nerve-racking having an audience there during the recording? Or, did it not bother you?

A. | It was interesting. Every night at the beginning I think everyone was a little, not "nerve-racked," but very "aware" of their presence, certainly. We have enough familiarity, obviously, playing in front of people. I think it took a song or two more for the audience cause they didn't know what to expect either.

We didn't have a planned system of how we would do it. Every night Chris our singer would say, "We're not sure what we're doing, just bear with us, listen to the songs, we hope you dig them and we'll get through these."

So usually by the first time we would screw up a song and stop the take and the audience had a laugh and the ice was broken, they relaxed and we relaxed and then we got through it.

It was fun for us because it does keep you on your toes a little more when people are sitting there. You certainly have a little bit of adrenaline and you have that sense that this is a show but at the same time we were telling ourselves we're looking for recording takes here.