Spin Doctors are in the midst of their biggest tour since the 1990s supporting If the River Was Whiskey, their strongest album since their celebratory salad days back in the early to mid-90s. Indeed, the work is built upon ten songs of all original blues, which features the Doctors at their quartet best—all muscle, all soul, and all heart, while mastering a whole lotta tunes sounding both classic and life-affirming. Quite frankly, no one expected the band, in their 25th year, to be sounding this energetic, tight but loose, and filled with the resounding sense of melody and craft and hook-laden songs that won over a mass audience over two decades ago. But, they are here, as vital as ever, and arguably one of the best live acts in the present tense, as well, mixing in the hits, along with the also-rans and a healthy dose of old material made new.
Jambands.com spoke with Aaron Comess, Docs drummer, during a Midwest to West Coast swing of dates, and before the band goes back on the road for a month in Europe. The percussionist is friendly, astute, and passionate about the current remarkable state of band affairs. He is also experienced enough to know that these amazing opportunities for a veteran band to sound so fresh and relevant do not always occur, and it is immensely satisfying to enjoy his conversation, while wishing the Doctors continued current success.
RR: I was very pleasantly surprised by the new record; although, its genesis is in your past. Detail how Spin Doctors chose to do an all blues album with If the River Was Whiskey, and how does the work connect with the origin of the band?
AC: The connection with the origin of the band is that about 60% of these songs are old songs that we used to play way back when the band first got together in Manhattan because there were a bunch of blues bars, particularly these two places called the Mondo Cane and the Mondo Perso. We used to play there, Blues Traveler would play there, Joan Osbourne played there, a bunch of other great bands, but for the most part, in order to get a gig there, you had to play blues tunes. And most of the bands played blues covers, so we decided we were going to make a demo tape of blues tunes, and try to get a gig because it was one of the only places in town that actually paid a guarantee, so you could go in there and make some bread.
We decided instead of putting a demo of blues covers together, we were just going to write a bunch of our own blues originals. We basically kind of faked the club out, gave them these blues originals—I think they actually just thought they were old blues covers or something—and we got a gig, and we started playing this place, Mondo Cane. You would do four sets a night. We would go in and do the first set all blues. Second set, we would start out with the blues songs and then, we would slip in the classic Spin Doctors songs like “Big Fat Funky Booty,” or “Jimmy Olsen” and all the other known songs that we had then, or what you might know now.
And then all of these songs fell by the wayside. We made Pocket Full of Kryptonite and started touring and did all the other records. When we were recently out on the road doing a 20th anniversary of Pocket Full of Kryptonite last year, we basically went out and played that whole record. We asked a bunch of people, “Hey, what would you guys like to hear in the encore?” And we kept getting back a lot of these old obscure blues songs that we had, songs like “So Bad,” “Scotch and Water Blues,” and “The Drop.” We busted them out and they are just a blast to play and people really liked them and so we started kicking around the idea that, hey, we should go and record some of these songs.
We ended up writing some more songs that were in that same kind of blues-y vibe. We went into my studio for a couple days with no real intention of anything. We were thinking that we should demo around five of the songs and see what happens. A couple days later, we ended up having ten songs recorded and they sounded great. We said, “Man, I think we have a record here.” It wasn’t like we didn’t feel like doing it again; it just felt really raw, really good, and totally like the Spin Doctors. It’s really the roots of what we come from.
I think the majority of people know us because of we had those big hits—“Two Princes” and “Little Miss Can’t Go Wrong” and the Pocket Full of Kryptonite record. But any of the fans who really know who we are, and who dug deeper into what we do, know that blues is a huge part of where we come from, a big part of our music, so, for us, it just feels totally natural. It’s interesting that a lot of people don’t expect to hear this when they get it. They are like “Wow.” (laughs)
RR: The songs sound timeless. You could say that about the entire blues genre, but they sound like Spin Doctors wrote them six months ago, entered a studio, recorded them live, and, then, stepped back and said, “These songs really cook.” Was there any trouble playing these songs as if you had not played them before? If not, how much did the room, your studio that you mentioned, benefit the atmosphere? The ambience of a place can definitely play a role in the sound of a record, of course.
AC: Absolutely. I think the comfort zone of everybody coming to my place is great. I have a really cozy studio on my first floor. There was none of that big fancy studio pressure. I think the fact that we weren’t even really, in our minds, making a record took the pressure off everybody. It was just a couple of days when everything clicked between the four of us. I think that comfort zone of working over here really helped.
Also, the freshness of the material…I think, you know, this kind of music, your rock ‘n roll, blues-based stuff is timeless music, so if it is recorded right and played with a certain authenticity, I think it sounds good in any era. Thus, a lot of those songs we had not played in about twenty years, so I think there was something really cool about that—they felt really new to us, we hadn’t played them in so long, but there was a deep history because of the fact that we had written and played them a long time ago, and, so, there was just an extreme freshness to them.
Of course, the newer songs we had barely ever played before. There is that spontaneity and freshness that comes when you just write a song, and go in the studio. I think we just managed to…all cylinders were just kind of aligned. And with us, we’ve known each other for so long, we’ve had our ups and downs, things can either be incredible, or really horrible. (laughs) Luckily, we’re at a point now when everybody is getting along great, and we have this 25-year musical chemistry and friendship. You get a little older and you start to appreciate what that is. It is all the four members. We’re all grateful we’re all alive, healthy, happy, and enjoying each other’s company and making music. I think this record has been a really great thing in bringing the morale back in the band.
RR: You hit upon something that touched a chord, too. As I found out with my own life experiences, you can’t really tell your younger self that there is a long path and you need to be patient and there are things you will go through. Things can turn out pretty sweet if you just_ try_ to think long-term. And that’s tough at that point in time, especially when you have success pretty early on like Spin Doctors did.
AC: No question. When you’re young and you’re in your twenties, a year seems like an eternity. (laughs) It’s hard to have a real perspective on things, I think, and particularly inside a group when you are dealing with four different individuals. We are certainly…as well as we may click on many levels, we are also four totally different people. It has been part of our magic, but it’s also been part of our curse.
But, you’re right. I think when you get a little older, you become much more patient, you realize a year, even two years, five years, isn’t really that long. It goes by in a flash. You realize, if anything, if you stick with something, it’s gonna blossom. Nothing doesn’t have its ups and downs in life. I think with the band, it’s like…obviously, we’ve had our ups and downs and we’ve had time when we weren’t active, or we weren’t together, but we’ve been kicking it around the last seven, eight years, and not really putting a lot of pressure on ourselves, which, I think, was really the key. Finally, I think we just hit this magic moment where we made this body of work that just feels so right and natural.
With the Spin Doctors, everything seems to work the best when we’re not trying too hard. The initial magic of Pocket Full of Kryptonite was the result of us being a band that played five nights a week in bars, and by the time we entered the studio, those 11 songs that were on that record had been played 300, 400 times because we had played so much. Obviously, now, the chemistry gets developed after all this time. It’s cool.
RR: It has been eight years since the last album. Does it feel that long, and does it feel like now is when everything fell into place to get back into the studio?
AC: Yeah. I think we all put a lot of work into that last record, Nice Talking to Me. I really loved the record. I think it’s a great record, and it was a big accomplishment for us because it was the first time that we had all gotten together and written new songs and made a record in a long time. I think it was smart because after that, we didn’t put
pressure on ourselves like “oh, we’ve got to get back in”; we’d do gigs and we were trying to really make it fun. It’s got to be fun. As soon as things become like a chore, it’s hard to create really good music in that atmosphere. We never put any pressure on us.
This record happened by accident. It was a direct result of getting off that anniversary. It was also great because the Pocket Full of Kryptonite tour really grounded us and brought us back to our roots and it was so much fun to go back and play that music. That music really has stood the test of time. The songs just felt great. Even though we continuously played maybe half of those songs, a lot of those songs we had not played in years. I think that really helped us bring us back to the core of what the band was and go even further back to this blues stuff before Pocket Full of Kryptonite. It just feels right. It’s almost like we are digging deeper into our past in order to come up with something that feels fresh and new to us. It’s really working. (laughs)
RR: I reviewed the 20th anniversary Kryptonite box set for our magazine, Relix, and it made me hopeful for the future of the band because there is so much vitality on that record, including all the bonus material. These days, when I do a retrospective on some band, they are either long gone, or well past their prime, or have lost whatever chemistry held them together in the first place. But I think you have described a way that a band can do it.
AC: I think it is a great template for us to go from here. I think because we’ve gone back to these roots, I feel we are all inspired to write more songs and make more records together. I just felt like we re-found ourselves as a band.
On top of that, like you said, a lot of times, it is very common that a band that becomes 25 years old just lose it. They don’t have that chemistry. They sound tired, and, in our case, I think the thing that has really saved us is that all four of us are really dedicated musicians. In the time that we are not playing together, we are all individually working with other people on our own projects, so you’ve got four lifers here, I like to call it. Everybody’s playing better than ever. There is a certain naiveté and energy that comes from a youthful band, which is why many bands’ first record are always their best. It is hard to recreate that youth.
But, with that said, we’ve all matured a lot on our instruments and learned how to work together, so there’s another thing that is happening now that is a lot deeper and richer from what we had 25 years ago. And that’s really a direct result from everyone working really hard on their craft this whole time and continues to do so. I think that’s what makes…when bands get a little older, the bands that continue to grow and sound great are the ones where everybody takes their instruments really seriously.
RR: And that brings us back to the new record itself. It is right there on the cover itself—there are no overdubs; these are live recordings in the studio. The record is strong and immediate; the musicians are essentially locked-in with each other. We talked about patience. The opening of the album. It is your studio and you are opening the album. A cool beat starts things off. I had to laugh when I heard it because that was a perfect moment for the record.
AC: That’s cool, man. Thanks. We didn’t really have a plan, except to go in and record some songs. We didn’t say to each other, “Oh, let’s not do any overdubs.” When we got in there, we started listening to the stuff, and it sounded so good that we felt: “This is what it’s all about; we don’t need to add anything.” I’ve always been of the thought that when you are in the studio that if it doesn’t sound good, if it is just some situation where four musicians are recording together and it doesn’t sound good right when you hear it, it is not going to sound good when you put on a bunch of background vocals, or another guitar part, or a tambourine, or all the stuff that people get so used to doing in the studio.
I know. I work a lot in the studio, and you always hear people say, “That’s great, but wait until I put the background vocals on it, it’s really going to lift it.” That’s cool, but if it doesn’t sound good with a regular vocal, it’s never going to sound good. (laughs) We really just resisted the urge to do any of that stuff, and quickly realized it wasn’t necessary, and I am really glad that we did that.
RR: You and Mark [White, bassist], in the engine room, lock down and play through some of my favorite Spin Doctors moments ever on the record, which also frees up Chris Barron to deliver some of his best vocal performances.
AC: Chris sounds great. I agree. I think Chris is singing better than ever. He just sounds totally relaxed. He’s a great singer; he’s always had great pitch and great rhythm and he’s a great technical singer, but he’s got such an original style, a great style and a great lyricist. He just sounds really unique and relaxed on this record. Eric [Schenkman, guitarist], too, let’s face it, this kind of music is so guitar-driven, and he’s covering so much that we wouldn’t have been able to do this kind of record without a great guitar player like Eric. He really shines on this record. Ultimately, obviously, it’s that chemistry that we all have together, but I have to give props to Eric. It’s a blues record, and it is a guitar-driven form of music, and he really came through.
RR: Yes, Eric was my next target here. It is very difficult to sound original at this point in time within blues, but, not only does the whole band sound original in surprising spots, but you don’t really know where Eric is going to step in and step up, you don’t know where Eric is going to take you, and he does take you to a different spot. He is also recorded really well. I was equally impressed with his work.
AC: There was some separation in the studio. The way my studio is set up is that I am in a drum booth, but right outside of my booth was Chris standing right in the middle of the room with a microphone, Eric was standing right next to him with an electric guitar. His amp is out in the hallway, and then Mark was running direct into a bass amp in the bathroom. So, basically, Chris and Mark and Eric were about two feet away from each other in the main room, and I was just a few feet behind them in the glass-doored control room, and the engineer, Roman [Klun, who also mixed the record] was standing right in front of everybody running the board. We were all right there looking at each other, close-knit, friends and girlfriends hanging out on the couch, and I think it helped having that atmosphere. Nobody really cared; it was just that relaxing thing. Again, it was that chemistry, which is why I think that, even though it’s a blues record, it does sound like…I really respect the blues; it’s the basis of rock ‘n roll and jazz and so many things—it is such an important style of music, and I think it is important to understand the authenticity of this type of music, and everybody in the band really respects it, which is why the record has a certain authenticity. But, I think the fact that we have our own Spin Doctors chemistry without really trying, it just ends up sounding like us.
RR: Let’s talk about touring If the River Was Whiskey. Spin Doctors initially toured the UK and other parts of Europe early in 2013. How did that go, how did the material go over, and how did it feel to be back on the road again with the band? From there, how has it panned out for you as you cut across the States?
AC: UK tour went great, as did our time in Spain. We actually had pre-release records to sell. People loved them, they bought them up, and people seemed to really enjoy the new material, or the old material—whatever you want to call it. It just fits right in; it feels really good within our set. We’re basically mixing up our set. We’re doing a lot of the new stuff. Out of the ten songs that are on the record, we’re doing seven or eight a night. We’re doing about half of those songs and half a mix of our other songs from our other records and this material just feels perfect in there. Again, I think it was what we were doing back in the old days. It just works and the crowd really seems to like it. It’s been great to get out on the road. We did a two-week run on the East Coast that went great, and we had a lot of great dates throughout the summer. We did a lot of flying around—two or three in a row, come home, two or three in a row, come home; we have a good amount of dates, certainly we’ve done more dates this year than we have probably done since back in the 90s. And, yes, the original response in Europe was great, and we are doing a full tour in Europe from September through October. We are going to Spain for a week, and then a month throughout Europe. It is going to be one of our busiest years.
RR: How much thought goes into mixing up the setlist every night?
AC: We’re mixing it up every night. We mix it up. Anybody that comes out and sees the band on a regular basis knows that we mix it up a lot. We improvise and every night is a little bit different. There will be drum solos some nights, bass solos some nights, and, sometimes, we will do weird jams. You never really know what is going to happen with us. I usually write the set list. I’ve taken on the job of writing the setlist for the band, so every year they change a little bit. Right now, we are certainly focusing on a combination of songs off [ If the River was Whiskey and trying to mix in all the other stuff, too.
RR: It must be nice to know that “O.K., I’m doing the setlist, and whatever I pick, the crowd is going to be able to vibe off of it fairly well because there is a lot of material that holds up,” right?
AC: Yeah, it seems to work. I mean…I’m a big believer that if you really play something with all your heart, you make it really good, it almost doesn’t matter what it is. Obviously, it’s great when you play a song like “Two Princes,” or “Little Miss,” or “Jimmy Olsen.” O.K., you know the people are going to cheer, and they’ll like that, but the trick is to try to get that same reaction off of lesser-known songs. You would think that going out and doing a song like “Scotch and Water Blues,” a slow blues, would be tough to win a crowd over, but if you play it with all your heart and soul and give everything you have into it and do great with it, it does just as well. “Scotch and Water Blues” has turned into one of the best songs in the set. People love it. It is very dynamic, it gets very loud, very quiet, the lyrics are great, Eric plays amazing guitar solos on it, and it is just proof that you don’t have to hit them over the head all night. I think we are really noticing lately that a lot of the more dynamic, even slower tunes, are songs that move all around and are the ones that people really react to. I think a lot of bands make the mistake that you just have to go out there and hit them over the head: bam, bam, bam, bam. But you really just tire people out by doing that.
It’s another thing that comes with being in a band for a while—a little more maturity, and realizing what works. That has been really encouraging to see that. With that said, we are mixing things up even more dynamically, which makes me really happy because I love music that is very dynamic. I love being really, really loud, but I love being really, really quiet, too, and that’s what makes music.
RR: Let’s wrap up with another run at going full circle in life and a career. Last year, Spin Doctors shared a stage with Blues Traveler at the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester. Obviously, both bands share so many things from back in the late 80s and 90s, and have achieved separate but equally amazing careers. The Capitol gig was pretty epic for a lot of fans, so I feel it is appropriate to hear your comments.
AC: We had a great time. It was awesome to get back on stage with those guys. Obviously, there is so much history there. We used to do those kinds of shows on a regular basis when both bands were coming up in New York City, and it had been a really long time since we had done it. It was great. It was really great. We are talking about doing some more next fall, so fingers crossed there will be some more events like that. Both bands had a great time. We came off saying, “Why haven’t we done this in so long? Let’s do this some more.” And the people really liked it. I think it is something because people like to see these two bands together. [John] Popper used to always sit in with the band, especially back in the early days in New York. He was and is always welcome on stage; he would always pop in and play, and it was always great to have him play with the band. Different people would sit in with different bands. We have so much history. Bringing that camaraderie back is something great and I think we would all love to see it happen more in the future, and, hopefully, it will.
RR: Did you think, 25 years later, you would still be at your peak, pushing forward as you are as a musician, while looking around and seeing Popper there, too?
AC: Yeah. I’m just really happy to see him. We’ve lost a few good people along the way, and I’m just happy we are all still here. Yeah, you know…it’s a funny thing. It seems like yesterday we were all playing at the Wetlands and playing at the Nightingale. Time really does go by amazingly fast. (laughs) I’m just grateful that we are all here and everybody is playing great and we can keep doin’ what we are doin’. It is a trip to, all of a sudden, think: “Holy shit—25 years. Wow, how’d that happen?” (laughter) It’s good. I actually like getting older because I just feel like I am getting better. For me, my number one goal has always been to try to be the best musician I can be—on my own and with the band, and whoever I am playing with—and try to bring the most I can to any musical situation. So, for me, those goals? I feel them even more now. I’m 45 and I’m taking drum lessons again. I just want to keep getting better and better and better, as opposed to, like, I see a lot of people just burn out and kind of lose their direction at this point. I really feel like I’m just in the middle of it all and just getting started and I have a whole long, huge musical thing ahead of me. I don’t judge the whole thing by success, or how many records are sold, or how many people are in the audience. I really judge it by how I feel the music I am a part of is good or not, and how I feel I am playing. I feel good right now because I am a part of so many great things and, most importantly, a great musical moment here with the Spin Doctors, and, hopefully, we’ll just keep doing it.
There is so much to learn and gain and, really, as soon as you feel you have reached the peak, you’re dead. (laughs) There is always more to learn, and that’s what I want to do.
