Reunited Black Crowes to perform in Tuscaloosa this week: Rich Robinson talks debut album and 1972

When the Black Crowes released the "1972" EP last month, covering six songs from that year, the band, which performs Wednesday in Tuscaloosa, joined heady company. Even well into lucrative careers built on their own songwriting, rockers like to return to roots, cutting covers of others' material.

John Lennon, who wrote or co-wrote several of the best-loved songs in the world, from ballads to screamers, released his "Rock 'n' Roll" disc in 1975, produced by Phil Spector, covering "Stand By Me," "Be-Bop-a-Lula," "Ain't That a Shame," "Peggy Sue," "Sweet Little Sixteen" and other seminal rock works.

In 2012, Counting Crows cut "Underwater Sunshine (or What We Did on Our Summer Vacation)," covering Big Star, Bob Dylan, Fairport Convention, Gram Parsons and Teenage Fanclub. Matthew Sweet, who had written and recorded '90s hits such as "Girlfriend" and "Sick of Myself," has run a parallel career, with Susannah Hoffs of the Bangles, releasing three albums of others' songs, each running with the title "Under the Covers."

Even Bruce Springsteen added three covers to his 2014 album "High Hopes," the first time he'd let anyone else's songs onto one of his studio discs, though in concert he had long showed love for Mitch Ryder, Dylan, Neil Young, the Clash, the Stones, Bob Marley, Prince and others.

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The Black Crowes beat all them coming and going. Though brothers Chris and Rich Robinson compose the bulk of their own material, the band released as its first single a hard-driving revisit to Otis Redding's "Hard to Handle," in 1990. That became their first No. 1, followed closely by a second chart-topper, "She Talks to Angels," written by the brothers. Both came from the 1990 debut disc "Shake Your Money Maker," titled after bluesman Elmore James' song.

When the reunited brothers play the Tuscaloosa Amphitheater on Wednesday, the show will both roll out the tracks from "Shake Your Money Maker" — a planned 30th-anniversary tour had to be bumped up, thanks to the pandemic — and slip in a few of their many cover gems. Recent set lists show them adding the Stones' "Rocks Off," the Temptations' "Papa Was A Rolling Stone," and James' song, the titular inspiration, though not included on that original album.

"1972" wasn't a departure for Black Crowes, said Rich Robinson, in a phone interview. "Not for us, because we've spent our whole career doing covers, from Big Star to the Stones, KInks and Dylan," he said. "It just kind of runs the gamut."

Both brothers used the pandemic-forced break in touring to write and share new work, getting roughly 25 to 30 songs either complete or in progress for a planned new album, but they first created the "1972" disc to help get them back into the studio swing.

"It literally was just a fun project for us," said Robinson, who as lead guitarist writes most of the music, while big brother Chris, the singer, handles melodies and lyrics. "It came out of an idea last year, after the tour, something we'd just floated around."

The project may as easily have become 1969, '70 or '71, he added, all years in which the brothers were still in single digits. They decided to focus on one year, like a snapshot, a mix disc that could have been pulled from FM radio.

"The broad spectrum of what music was back in that day, it's the opposite of what it is today," Robinson said. "There's something like seven million bands in the world, or people claiming to be a musician, but the flood of that has made music smaller.

"I think there's so much competition that people are vying and doing things, kind of getting away from what the original idea was, which was creative expression of the artist. Music really took a turn when bankers started running record companies: bottom lines, money, all this (expletive)."

Of course, that greed element, the manufactured cash-ins from Fabian to the Monkees to the Archies (and other pop "bands" that existed only in the studio), the Sex Pistols and more, all existed in those earlier eras, but it seemed a time when artists expressed more, he said.

"Basically just radio or records is how you consumed music in the day," he said. On radio, you might hear "... Sly Stone doing a Doris Day song, or you could have Joni Mitchell on rock 'n' roll radio, and so was Led Zeppelin, and Patti Smith later, a little bit.

"There was a deep connection between the artist and their expression. And the songs weren't so me-centric. There was more a broad swath of these universal themes of what it means to be human, what it means to be on this earth. When you look back, you can see the expanse of what that music really meant."

Band of brothers

The Robinsons formed their first band, named Mr. Crowe's Garden, after Leonard Leslie Brookes's children's book "Johnny Crow's Garden," in 1984 out of Marietta, Georgia, while both were still in high school. They drew influences from progressive Southern rockers like their fellow Georgians R.E.M., and Drivin' N Cryin', the latter of them long-time friends who are opening for the Black Crowes on the Southern portion of the tour.

Changing their name as they evolved a style drawing more deeply on blues-rock, they exploded with the multi-platinum "Shake Your Money Maker" and its 1992 follow-up "The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion," their first No. 1 album. They've sold more than 30 million albums from eight studio and four live discs, and scored No. 1 singles with "Hard to Handle," "She Talks to Angels," "Remedy," "Sting Me," "Thorn in My Pride" and "Hotel Illness."

Readers of Rolling Stone voted Black Crowes the best new American band for 1990. Ramping off their Stones-like swagger, Melody Maker named Black Crowes "the most rock 'n' roll rock 'n' roll band in the world."

Though lineups have rotated often, the Robinson brothers remained at the heart.

"He was the singer, and I was the guitar player, and that's just how it flowed," Robinson said, though in his work outside Black Crowes, he also sings, and writes lyrics and melodies.

"There was never really any discussion. We just kinda did it: 'Oh, we're doing a band,' and just kept doing it for 36 years, starting when we were 14 or 15, whatever the year was," he said, laughing.

Band members churned through the decades, and the Robinsons at times found themselves at odds, for a variety of reasons, most of which they've cut from their lives.

"We've gotten to this place where we're far more mature now, and loving, in a sense," Robinson said, of the siblings' relationship. "Everyone who comes from a family knows that when two of the characters get into contact with one another, sparks can fly. You have the peacemaker, you have the antagonist ... In a band, it's no different.

"We had people around us for a long time who brought a lot of negativity ... But this has always been Chris and I's band; it's always been me and Chris and some other guys.

"When we came back, we wanted this to be positive, brothers first, and with us as creative partners. In order for us to do this right, we had to stop allowing people to speak for us. That's when everything starts going south. ...

"We're really protective of each other now."

During extended hiatuses, each dove into solo and other group projects, but in 2019 Chris and Rich announced a reunion. They got to play up and down the East Coast, including the last live show in New York pre-pandemic and were working out in San Francisco when cruise ship Grand Princess docked off-shore there, with more than 3,000 people forced into quarantine. California's first death directly attributable to the virus came from on board.

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"What are you gonna do? You can't fight it," Robinson said. "For the first time in literally 30 years, I didn't tour."

Robinson wrote from his home studio, sending songs-in-progress to Chris.

"From February 2020 until June 2021, I stayed home," he said, "and really it was the first time in my adult life that I had time off, time to be with my family, and be there. All we could really sort of do is watch it on TV. And we were fortunate to be on a farm, with a lot of acreage, insular and protected."

Coming back, the brothers Robinson aligned with folks they'd known, not only top players, but with the right kind of positive attitudes. Shows on this tour are celebrating the debut disc, spiced with songs from later, and some covers.

"It's a show that moves," Robinson said. "There's not a lot of air in it. We're putting in a good amount of songs, with less jamming. It's a really big show, and Chris sounds better than he's ever been. ... The crowds have been amazing."

This will be Black Crowes' first show at the Tuscaloosa Amphitheater, though in earlier days, around '86 and '87, Robinson recalls the fledgling band frequently playing a Tuscaloosa bar, though the name escaped him

"It was a club like (Birmingham's) The Nick," he said, laughing, "though not as down and out as The Nick."

Wednesday's show starts at 7:30 p.m. with Drivin' N Cryin' opening. Any tickets remaining can be found for $18 and up — not counting fees — through www.ticketmaster.com, or at the Amphitheater box office. For more, see www.tuscaloosaamphitheater.com.

This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Reunited Black Crowes return to their roots, celebrate debut album