Los Angeles, CA (Top40 Charts/ 429 Records) The Rides is a new all-star blues-rock trio formed by legendary singer-songwriter and Buffalo Springfield/CSN/CSN&Y principal Stephen Stills, fellow guitar slinger Kenny Wayne Shepherd, and venerable Electric Flag keyboardist Barry Goldberg. The group will tour throughout
September in support of its debut album, Can't Get Enough, set for release August 27 on 429 Records. The series of dates kicks off with the band filming a concert for television from New York City's iconic Iridium Jazz Club on August 28 and 29, and wraps on
September 27 at the Grand
Sierra Resort and Casino in Reno, NV. Highlights also include shows at the Wilbur Theatre in
Boston (9/7), Theatre at Westbury in Westbury, NY (9/8), Pabst Theatre in Milwaukee, WI (9/13), ACL Live at the Moody Theatre in Austin, TX (9/21), and The Fillmore in San Francisco (9/25).
Singer-songwriter
Beth Hart is the tour's opening act. Last December, Hart captured the spotlight when she joined
Jeff Beck at the Kennedy Center Honors to pay musical tribute to
Buddy Guy, and she recently sang at Eric Clapton's Crossroad Guitar Festival at New York's Madison
Square Garden.
The Rides took shape after
Stills and Goldberg wrote together at their mutual manager Elliot Roberts' recommendation. "It was like finding a long lost soul brother," says Goldberg (who hadn't met
Stills before, their shared 1968 credit notwithstanding). "We connected on so many things, started jamming, and soon had begun writing our first song." Next came Kenny Wayne Shepherd, and their three-way chemistry was immediate and intense. "The Rides are a perfect mix of generations, where three musicians who love and play the blues collide and create music that goes beyond all our other individual life experiences and career achievement," says 36-year-old, Shepherd, who's had six #1 Blues albums.
Can't Get Enough is inspired by—and is an homage to—the now-classic 1968 album Super Session, which featured
Stills on guitar on one side, and the late Mike Bloomfield on the other (Bloomfield had founded Electric Flag with Goldberg, who also played on Super Session, as did Blood, Sweat &
Tears keyboardist Al Kooper). The Rides bring a historic and distinctively American musical form into the 21st century, and
Stills calls the group the "the blues band of my dreams."
Currently in the Top 5 on Amazon's blues chart, Can't Get Enough is available for pre-orders for $9.99 . Order here: https://amzn.to/188sQli
Also available on iTunes for pre-order here: https://bit.ly/188sU4w
In addition, The Rides just released a lyric video for the first single "Don't Want Lies." Directed by Rob Senska and filmed by Matt Rabinowitz at CRM Studios in Shreveport, LA, the video can be viewed here.
Among the album's highlights are four Stills/Shepherd/Goldberg co-writes including the barnburner "RoadHouse"—about the life of an itinerant bluesman—CSN influenced "Don't Want Lies," and the title track, a guitar-heavy anthem with a soul-baring lead vocal by Stills. There's also a Crazy Horse-caliber send-up of "Rockin' In The Free World," and four additional covers on which Shepherd sings lead, including "Talk To Me Baby" and "
Honey Bee" by Elmore
James and Muddy Waters, respectively, and
Iggy Pop & The Stooges' "Search and Destroy." The set closes with "Word Game," a song
Stills wrote during his late '60s era with Buffalo Springfield, and which appeared on his 1971 solo album Stephen
Stills 2.
The album was recorded in the studio over the course of about a week at EastWest in Los Angeles, helmed by longtime Shepherd producer Jerry Harrison, a renowned musician in his own right (Talking Heads,
Modern Lovers, Casual Gods) as well as a fellow Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee. Mostly first or second takes made the album's final cut. In addition to Chris Layton—Shepherd's drummer, and also a veteran of Stevie Ray Vaughan's
Double Trouble—the players include bassist
Kevin McCormick (CSN, Jackson Browne).
"In the spirit of that simple, raw authentic 40s and 50s blues music the three of us love, we got in there and boom! A few takes and we were done," says Stills. That spirit will come alive on stage when The Rides tour in September.
The Rides Tour Dates:
Wed 08-28-13 - New York, NY - Iridium Jazz Club
Thu 08-29-13 - New York, NY - Iridium Jazz Club
Sun 09-01-13 - Atlantic City, NJ - Tropicana Hotel & Casino
Tue 09-03-13 - Englewood, NJ - Bergen Performing Arts Center
Thu 09-05-13 - Ridgefield, CT - The Ridgefield Playhouse
Sat 09-07-13 - Boston, MA - Wilbur Theatre
Sun 09-08-13 - Westbury, NY - Theatre at Westbury
Tue 09-10-13 - Munhall, PA - Carnegie
Music Hall of Homestead
Fri 09-13-13 - Milwaukee, WI - Pabst Theater
Sat 09-14-13 - Cincinnati, OH - Ohio River Throwdown
Mon 09-16-13 - Lexington, KY - Lexington Opera House
Fri 09-20-13 - Houston,TX - Αrena Theatre
Sat 09-21-13 - Austin,TX - ACL Live at the Moody Theatre
Tue 09-24-13 - Riverside, CA - Fox Performing Arts Center
Wed 09-25-13 - San Francisco, CA - The Fillmore
Fri 09-27-13 - Reno,NV - Grand
Sierra Resort & Casino
