These quotes are all from this promotional material that came out before the release of Three Snakes - put out by American. It is kind of like a Black Crowes "newspaper page" - that's what it looks like anyway. Two -sided about 16 x20. The front page talks all about the new album, the recording, touring, etc. The back page consists of small bios on all the band members. It was sent out along with their 8x10 glossy press photo of the time. You know that B&W photo with all the members on that spiral staircase, and stained glass windows behind them? Chris is wearing a Dodgers jersey? (I will try to post the pic here, but I don't know if it will work....) Anyway, that's where all these quotes came from....hope that helps. peace always. Maria --- "Throughout Three Snakes and One Charm, their most powerful work yet, The Black Crowes create a sound and sensibility that could only come from them - a mix of tradition and decadence, a place where blues, country, soul, bluegrass, gospel and psychedelia are boldly sculpted by the band into something that is urgent and modern both in musical presentation and attitude." Marc Ford: About living together & recording 3 Snakes at Chateau de la Crowe.... "Everybody was getting along. We all kinda grew up and accepted each other for who we were. It was really an all-for-one, one-for-all kind of thing." About Evil Eye... "We played that song live for a while, and I used to stand onstage with my jaw hanging open, and then things would come out of the air." Johnny Colt: About recording 3 Snakes at Chateau de la Crowe... "We lived and breathed together all day long - the musical options were wide open... almost limitless." Steve Gorman: "We opened up a lot of doors on amorica, and then we stepped through a lot of doors on this record...... This was the most positive recording experience we've had.... I think amorica was the base hit, and this is the home run to follow it up in terms of the ideas we were trying to get across," concludes the drummer. "This record makes perfect sense if you listen to all four albums in a row." Eddie Hawrysch: "I was playing with Muddy Waters at 24, and Chris tells me he's learned more from me than any one person. I'm older than the other guys, and I think I've brought something to the band... and it's not just a case of beer! ...On the other hand, I've learned from them too," affirms the seasoned player. Rich Robinson: "Lyrically and melodically Chris always just hits it on the head. I get a lot out of his writing. It's amazing. I live with these songs, then Chris adds his lyrics and gives them a totally different life." Robinson speaks out vehemently when it comes to placing the Black Crowes within the larger context of modern music. "A lot of people don't look at it as a craft or an art, but it is. We want to put out the best music possible, "he concludes. "We take a lot of time and effort in what we do. Music is such an important part of people's lives; it's an integral part of mankind's existence, culturally, religiously, personally. I hope people get something out of what we do, and it makes them feel good, like it does me." Chris Robinson: "...amorica was definitely an intense record. Three Snakes isn't complacent, just more warm, focused and positive. I think when it got to a point when we really thought about life and being in the band and making a commitment, we decided the band is bigger than us as individuals." "...touring is a great opportunity for us to learn and expand our craft, and I think people enjoy watching us grow up.....It's easy to go on MTV and say music is exciting and you love it and you don't do it for selfish reasons, but you play the same set every night, and you tell people you jam and you're into improv, and it's all this heavy stuff, but it's just PR. With us, there's no hype, you know?... For our gigs, people come from great distances to see the show and we won't short-change them." "It's embarrassing that people are so selfish. That's part of the desperation of our generation, but I think everyone is too selfish to see it, which is a weird catch-22!! But there are some people who don't have shallow one-dimensional pursuits and who really do believe there are still some magical things out there." Onstage, The Black Crowes are known to stretch out musically, rearranging songs and changing set lists all the time.... Elaborates Chris: "It's like looking at a map when you want to get to a certain place. How many roads can you take to get to that place? When we show up for a gig, it's like we're on a road map just trying to get to the same place. It's worth taking off and exploring other musical avenues just to find that magic place every night." A renewed sense of community and family was enhanced by the recording process, which took place with Jack Joseph Puig, who also co-produced amorica with them, at the Chateau de la Crowes in Atlanta, a rented home-turned-studio, full of nooks and crannies where the array of sounds - many of them acoustic- one the disc were harnessed. "It's s totally different vibe doing it in a house, much more conducive to being creative, " says guitarist Rich Robinson, who stretches out his vocals to fine effect on Three Snakes and One Charm, singing lead for the first time on parts of "How Much For Your Wings?" and harmonizing on choruses to nine of the dozen tunes Chris sings lead on. Along the way, they achieve that special yin/yang harmony that only siblings can intuitively reach. The other Black Crowes also found the heart of Three Snakes and One Charm in their temporary home and in the freewheeling yet fruitful recording process. "We lived and breather together all day long - the musical options were wide open... almost limitless, relates bassist Johnny Colt of the relaxed and creative recording. "It was a caravan of people; people upstairs watching crazy art films; people cutting tracks, and eating food. There were dogs running everywhere. And Jack was pulling his hair out over the whole thing of course!" --- Bassist Johnny Colt couldn't have been more excited to record Three Snakes and One Charm. "We had a really good experience with the HORDE tour. It put the band in a great frame of mind. I think we all felt really connected. We were going to take some time off, but after the tour we felt so good we went straight in to make the record." --- He found himself among kindred spirits, and is proud of the working ethics and approach the sextet takes. "We have specific, creative musical values that we've cultivated as a group, the bassist explains. "We continue to push the creative limits of the Black Crowes." On Three Snakes, Colt felt the band was very focused, using tradition as springboard to take music to new places. "Songs are their own entity - the songs' own reality dictates what it becomes almost as much as you do." --- As half of the rhythm section, Colt quips that he's joined to Steve Gorman at the hip, psychically. "Steve and I are there to take the brother's songs from Point A to Point B, It's 100 percent, 24-hour dedication." --- Colt's take on his role in the Black Crowes? "What's interesting about being in a rock 'n'roll band, and specifically the Black Crowes, is that it's a group, a family. But at the same time, you're an individual, the best. It's a bit of a dichotomy. You have to be the best individual you can within that group, " he concludes. --- Reflecting about the positive vibe of the new album, Colt cites the song "Bring On, Bring On": "I think it's learn-from -the-past kind of thing. You learn from experience and face your demons, instead of letting them tear you apart." --- ...willingness to improv and explore is a natural function within the band, as Johnny Colt explains. "I feel different every day, and every show is different. You gotta align with the universe, man. If you want to be creative, you can't try and funnel the show. The quality control argument is null and void." Here's some more quotes from Marc. --- About meeting up with Chris: "We both realized we were trying to make the same kind of music, and we hooked up by being fans of each other's music." --- Guitarist Marc Ford, who joined The Black Crowes six days prior to the recording f the band's 1992 Southern Harmony and Musical Companion, finds all options open within the band. "That's why it all melds so well," he explains. "everyone's coming from a different part of the country, traditionally and musically. You can do anything you want and it always keeps it exciting and fresh." --- As far as his interplay with Rich, it's ever expanding. "It just keeps flowering. Rich used to insist he was a rhythm player, and I told him to stick his toe as a lead player in the water a little bit, and now we're playing with each other, listening to each other. You can do all that sound-weaving." ---- For Southern California resident Marc Ford, recording Three Snakes and One Charm in a rented house in Atlanta was very inspirational. As the respected guitarist puts it, "You could roll out of bed and do laundry in between takes, or make a sandwich. It was very communal and it wasn't rushed. It was so much more relaxing... it made more sense." --- The long Beach, California born guitarist, who began playing his instrument at the age of 10, was thrilled to become a part of The Black Crowes cadre and lend his perspective to the band's freewheeling, open-ended music. "In technical terms, the chord progression for the first verse of 'Evil Eye' shouldn't work as well as they do together; it's very strange," says Ford about the closing cut of Three Snakes and One Charm. "We played that song live for a while, and I used to stand onstage with my jaw hanging open, and then things would come out of the air." Ford, who prefers playing Gibson Les Pauls and Fender Telecasters and Stratocasters, has garnered strong reviews in the critical community. Rolling Stone rhapsodized about the "dual guitars of Rich Robinson and Marc Ford, " who traded "fierce and shapely double-time leads, arcing slide work and visceral power chords." Guitar Player perhaps said it best, "Ford is among the handful of truly convincing young blues-based rock guitarists." That personal and musical camaraderie is a big part of The Black Crowes experience, and the togetherness became even more tight-knit with the recording of Three Snakes and One Charm, as Ford relates: "Everybody was getting along. We all kinda grew up and accepted each other for who we were. It was really an all-for-one, one-for-all kind of thing."