Southern Comfort



Gospel singers, a new guitarist and land walruses - The Black Crowes have all 
these plus a new album. Chris Marlowe listens while Chris Robinson talks. And 
argues. And gets defensive...

The pressing plant's still warm from stamping 'Southern Harmony And Musical 
Companion' on to many thousands of discs, and Chris Robinson is already eager 
for The Black Crowes to tour. "It's going to be pretty wild. We're going to turn 
some heads. We turned some heads before, but it was sort of like a shampoo 
commercial - like the way the chick swings her head. This will definitely be 
more like The Exorcist - heads spinning all around and stuff flying out of their 
mouths."

With a debut album as staggeringly successfuly as 'Shake Your Money Maker' 
turned out to be, a follow-up could have been a daunting project. Did the Crowes 
feel any pressure? "No pressure, except pressure from us to continue to move," 
the hyperactive singer insists. "I don't know if that's necessarily forward, 
sideways or backwards! Just to be in a different place."

Chris categorically denies having any regard for duplicating the more material 
side of their previous achievement, either. "What is success?" he asks 
rhetorically. "It has nothing to do with financial security. It has nothing to 
do with having a nicer house or a big car. It has nothing to do with any of 
those things. It just has to do with us looking ourselves in the face every 
night before we go onstage and knowing that we're going to go up there and have 
a jam that's different every night. And that a couple of thousand other people 
who dig it too are there to hang out with us, you know?"

One person who probably won't be included in that party is guitarist Jeff Cease. 
Chris seems to believe that it's hardly worth asking why Jeff was asked to 
leave, on the grounds that, "It's pretty obvious; the guy couldn't play. With 
us, at least. I hope he can play with other people. I don't know the guy enough 
to care or worry about it." More contemplatively he continues, "You know, Jeff 
Cease never complimented Rich very well. And that was always a problem, because 
when you have a guitar player as strong as Rich, you have to have someone 
equally as strong that can intertwine with them. And that's what Marc Ford is. 
Now Rich doesn't have to cover so many bases, so he can really let his playing 
become even more expressive."

Marc, Jeff's replacement on second guitar, was previously in the under-
appreciated American trio Burning Tree. He was not, however recruited through 
such time honoured traditions as want ads or auditions.

"I've known him for a couple of years from out in LA," says Chris. "He was an 
oasis when I was first out in LA. When everyone was putting a headband around 
their head and getting their Harleys shined up to go to the AA meeting, Marc and 
I were crawling around on the floor of most of the clubs. I kept going, 'Hey 
man, that guy looks like me! He's as drunk as I am - I wonder if he can play?' 
So we became friends first, and then I got into Burning Tree and took them on 
the road. We've always got off playing with each other; he'd always jam with us. 
It was pretty inevitable. It was really up to him."

"We're not a band who just goes out and gets someone for the fuck of it," Chris 
asserts. "They've got to be able to hang. It's not a very easy thing to be in 
this band as sort of a day-to-day thing."

Anyone who followed The Black Crowes' progress as they persistently toured the 
world and climbed the charts might conisder that to be a slight understatement. 
The Atlanta quintet gained a reputation for being audaciously outspoken and 
confrontational, not least of all with each other.

"It has to do with the fact that we're musicians, and we let our emotions run 
high and at the surface," Chris comments. After the briefest pause, he continues 
derisively, "You konw, when we left the UK last time, the last article I read 
said, 'Are they the most dangerous band in the world? No, they're just a little 
fucked up and emotional.' Well, thank God we are fucked up and emotional! What 
else is there? Contrived and sedate?"

That defiant integrity is certainly intact, but Chris sense that in an 
intangible way the Crowes are not the same band they were two years ago.

"I know that in the middle of touring for that long, a metamorphosis sort of 
occured," he reflects. "We went from being kids who wrote good songs and got 
onstage and played, to young men who really started manipulating their sound. 
And using it and twisting it around and finding whatever they could out of it. 
It's a difference!"

Drummer Steve Gorman and bassist Johnny Colt can be heard making their 
inimitable contribution to the new album. Helping complete the sound are three 
other musicians: "Eddie Harsch, who's been in the touring band since January of 
last year, played all the Wurlitzer, Hammond organ and piano on it. And we have 
two backup singers, Pat and Barbara Richardson, who are going on the road with 
us. Gospel singers. Very, very good singers."

Chris responds to a further question about the Richardsons' contribution with 
the impatient retort, "It's just for the sound. I've always loved that, and now 
it's an element that wanted to use. But I've never though about the reason why 
you use back-up singers. Why not? Why wouldn't you? I mean, that's just 
something that you do."

Realising that a defensive edge has crept into his vocie, Chris tempers his 
remarks by adding, "You see, the way we see it is that every question comes 
like, 'What were you trying to do? You used back-up singers because you can't 
sing now? Or do you use back-up singers because it's a marketing thing?' You 
have to be that defensive. We do have chips on our shoulders, because we're so 
used to having to put up a fight everywhere we go about about it. And being 
misrepresented so much. I mean, I don't think there's any real paranoia about 
it, because we don't really give a shit," he laughs. "But it gets annoying."

When it came to recording a follow-up, there was one benefit gained from the 
phenomenal popularity of singles such as 'Jealous Again' and 'Hard To Handle' 
that the Crowes appreciated. Chris says, 'We were allowed to do what we needed 
to do. Like the last record was kind of a stepping stone away from how most 
people perceive to make records. The industry and the people who think, 'Oh, 
that sounds all right.' This record is even yet another statement towards that 
there is a different way to make records. A more earthy, real way."

Part of the Black Crowes' way to make records entailed working extraordinarly 
quickly. "When we got home, we had written a few songs on the road," Chris 
recalls. "Although 'Thorn In My Pride' and 'My Morning Song' are the only two 
songs from the road that made it. But mostly we got home, took a week off, and 
Rich and I wrote half the album one weekend, didn't really hang out for a week, 
then got together the next weekend and wrote the other half. We went in the 
studio two weeks later and cut the whole record in about eight days. Then I went 
to LA and sang some things over. Basically, we just set up and got to it."

A polite, offhand commet about blazing through the procedure sparks Chris off 
again. "It's not blazing through it," he replies emphatically. "It's knowing 
what you're doing! Blazing through it would mean we're a punk rock band who 
doesn't know what to do. For us to get in there and be serious musicians and 
compose songs that quickly and to get it done with that kind of playing, that's 
not blazing. It's just being on top of our game."

Most people would have taken some time off after performing live 350 times. 
Chris dismisses the very possibility, insisting, "We couldn't take a break. We 
had to make this record. I mean, I'm 25 years old! You know, let Bruce 
Springsteen take a break. If I can't do this, what the fuck am I doing? I didn't 
get into this to take it easy, is what I'm saying. There's too many shows to go 
to. There's too many songs to write."

One of these new songs is 'Remedy', which was selected to be the first single 
from 'Southern Harmony And Musical Companion'. Chris has a blithe disregard for 
thinking along marketing line, however, and shrugs, "When you're wrapped up into 
it and you're there for that short time and that much music is just pouring out 
everywhere, you just jump on and do it. You don't second guess! I don't have 
time to think, 'Does this album have more singles on it than the last one?' 
That's ridiculous. And thinking like that is what's gotten the record industry 
to such a stale state."

"I don't think we allowed them to do any edits," Chris says. "Let people like 
whoever edit these songs. We don't edit our songs for radio. I don't think we 
should any more. That's like saying, 'I'd really like to read Macbeth, but I'm 
not really too fond of Act II, Scene IV, so I'm going to skip that out.' I don't 
get it. You know, people also edit because you have to trim the fat. I don't 
think there's any fat on this. I think it's all meat."

He is more ambiguous when pressed to explain why 'Remedy' was chosen. "I don't 
know, I think the sentiment was pretty nice. You know, 'Can I have some remedy, 
remedy for me please? Because if I had some remedy, I'd take enough to please 
me'  It's just saying, like, 'Hey, it's not that great around here, and I wish I 
could feel better. And if there was a drug good enough, I'd do it."

Chris continues ever more cryptically, "It's more about a feeling. There just 
seems to be a lot of people our age that just don't feel right, you know? 
Nothing feels real, nothing feels right. Even physically, you know? I mean, who 
knows what the goverment does to people. Who knows what it all means? You can't 
trust any government. So if you can't trust any government, then you should quit 
lying. Because, at the end of the day, it's going to be you and the people who 
live the way you live."

When it's pointed out that the lyrics could just as easily be about a personal 
relationship, Chris reluctantly agrees, "Yeah, but everything is a personal 
relationship, you know? You have a personal relationship with girlfriends and 
friends. You have personal relationships with your parents, your audience, your 
obnoxious record company - it's all personal relationships. You have a personal 
relationship with whatever mysticism you want to be involved in and with 
whatever drugs you take."

Despite having been forced by the industry to choose a single, Chris remains 
hard pressed to pick any genuinely preferred song. He muses, "Well, 'Sting Me' 
opens the record. It's sort of call-and-response. It's a 'put your money where 
your mouth is' type of song. And I like 'Sometimes Salvation'. 'My Morning Song' 
is pretty cool - I've always dug that. There's a song called 'Bad Luck Blue Eyes 
Goodbue' which I like. A song called 'No Speak, No Slave' that I'm sort of into. 
'Black Moon Creepin'' is another one. I have a hard time separating songs," he 
comments, rather self-evidently. "I like to listen to the album as a whole."

Two songs do distinguish themselves in the vocalist's mind, however. One is a 
soulful cover verson of a reggae favourite. Chris explains, "'Time Will Tell' is 
like a finishing thing. It's a Bob Marley song, on an album called 'Kaya'. That 
was Rich's idea. I mean, everyone's a big Marley fan in the band, but that was 
his thing."

The other is a pure Black Crowes original. "'Hotel Illness' is really the only 
up moment on the record," Chris suggest. Then, with more than a hint of irony, 
he reflects, "That song's really just about how well adjusted we are to women 
and how we look forward to being manipulated and lied to for the rest of our 
lives."

As verbal as the man undoubtedly is, Chris seems slightly uncomfortable with 
explaining his words. "I never think about the lyrics," he maintains. "I mean, I 
could tell you about a mood. Sort of. But they just pop up and I just write them 
down, you know? I don't really plan to tell a story or plan to let this angle 
loose. I just sit down and there they are. I mean, I have hundreds of notebooks 
full of stuff. You just observe and you have thoughts and feeling and you just 
put them down. I don't know anything else. I just know what we do."

Chris is rescued from this line of interrogation by canine intervention. "Dude! 
My dogs," he murmurs affectionately. "My fat land walruses, that's what they 
are. I have land walruses for pets. But they're very cute."

"There's one thing I wanted to do," he says, returning to discussing the music, 
"You know how people put stickers on records. I wanted to put a sticker on our 
record that said, 'Within contains no apathy'. I thought that would best 
describe what's inside of it. It's a militant record."

Chris considers a moment, then justifies that comment: "Militant in that we're 
really not complacent with any of this. And militant in that the industry is so 
jaded, that we're saying, 'Well, you know, the people who want to believe it, 
that's who this record is for.' And that's why we're going out on tour. All the 
people who are jaded and apathetic should stay at home. If you don't believe 
that real music can be made that means more than just, 'Hey, check it out! I can 
jump up and make my amp explode.'

"I mean, it's very militant and aggressive, but at the same time it's also sort 
of gentle." He shrugs at the paradox, "It's really weird. It's definitely more 
funky. There's a lot more percussion on the record: congas and stuff. I think 
it's a little darker, more aggressive. But I also think it's really sensuous, 
too."

"If this record was sex, this record would mean both people have an orgasm 
instead of just one." Chris laughs at his own analogy, then compounds it by 
concluding, "The first album would have been a good disgusting time, but more of 
a drunk-in-the-woods sort of good time. Whereas this is a little more 
sophisticated."


BURNT OFFERINGS (this was a "sidebar" kind of thing at the end)

Burning Tree released their eponymous and only album in April 1990, which was 
followed shortly by a limited edition live EP titled 'Live From Leeds'. Made up 
of guitarist Marc Ford, bassist Mark "Muddy" Dutton and drummer Doni Gray, the 
trio's colourful '60s-tinged clothing and psychedelic blues sounds caused the 
less discerning to dismiss them as Jimi Hendrix Experience or Cream revivalists.

At the time, guitarist Marc Ford commented, "The three of us pretty much know 
what we're doing with our instruments, and being a three-piece you're either 
going to sound like The Police, Rush or the great three-piece bands of the past. 
We're not good enough to sound like Rush, and we're not stupid enough to sound 
like The Police, so we just sound like we do. It's not a conscious thing."

Another comment Marc made way back then shows how spiritually appropriate it was 
for Burning Tree to open for The Black Crowes on a late 1990 American tour: 
"Music is emotions, feelings - it's not just notes. Notes are just the way you 
get the feelings out."
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