A lot has changed in both the record industry and how people listen to music since 2008 when the Black Crowes put out their last studio record, Warpaint. That is certainly reflected in the roll-out for their brand-new effort, Happiness Bastards.

But co-founding guitarist Rich Robinson still sees something almost noble in the Ways of the Old School, when a new album wasn’t instantly accessible with just a single touch of phone screen or click on a website.

“Streaming services are way more of a thing now then back then, and it’s kind of an interesting conundrum. The more opportunities or avenues you have to listen to something, it almost becomes smaller and more compartmentalized,” he offers over the phone.

“In the past, you could hear it on the radio or go out and buy the album and that was it. Now with YouTube and Pandora and Spotify and Apple Music, it just seems like there is an infinite number of ways to listen to this record.”
For his part, Robinson prefers the almost “ritualistic” (if more time-consuming) process of going out to record store, bringing home a new album, putting it on your stereo, and just absorbing the music without distraction or hearing it as simply background noise.

“By virtue of doing all those steps, you have far more respect for something,” he continues. “It registers on an unconscious level. It creates a mystery, and the record can take you to a place.”

It’s not surprising that Robinson feels that way, given that since their 1984 founding in Atlanta, Georgia, the Black Crowes’ style of rock and roll harkens back to an earlier era (cue the Rolling Stones/Faces/Humble Pie comparisons). But they’ve absolutely also put their own stamp on a series of divergent albums over the ensuing decades.

With Happiness Bastards, the Black Crowes have one of the stronger entries in that catalog, from frenetic rock (“Rats and Clowns, “Dry Cold Sun,” leadoff single “Wanting and Waiting”), blues (“Bleed It Dry”), buoyant pop (“Flesh Wound”) and calmer stuff (“Follow the Moon,” “Kindred Spirits”). They even recruited hot country artist Lainey Wilson to sing on the appropriately country “Wilted Rose.”

To be a Black Crowes fan is to also Ride the Robinson Roller Coaster (cue the Battling Brothers references). Rich and sibling Chris (vocals) have been the only constants in the band, which hase gone through breakups, hiatuses, reunions, and ever-changing lineups.

At one point in recent years, the even put together competing Crowes-style bands whose live shows relied heavily on their material (Rich’s The Magpie Salute, Chris’s as the Crow Flies).

After the last band dissolution in 2015, the brothers didn’t even spoken to each other for nearly four years. That’s when family members began throwing hot water on the pair to melt the ice. It also helped that age changed their maturity and outlooks. A hugely successful 2021 tour celebrated the 30th anniversary of their debut record Shake Your Moneymaker, and the covers EP 1972 followed the next year.
The current lineup of the Black Crowes includes Chris and Rich Robinson, longtime bassist Sven Pipien, keyboardist Erik Deutsch, guitarist Nico Bereciartua, and drummer Cully Symington (Brian Griffin played on Happiness Bastards). The tour stops in Houston on April 5 at the 713 Music Hall.

Robinson says he is stoked about the current incarnation. “Trying people out is just the beginning. The real test comes when you’re out on tour. You have to gel musically and see where everyone goes. And I finally feel that this lineup fits that description,” he says.

“Chris and I always have our thing. Bringing in Sven was right because he’s played with us for so long. But then finding the right keyboard player, drummer, and stage right guitar player took a while. We are of all a very similar purpose now to serve this band and serve these songs. It sounds like a band to me now.”

Asked if his writing process with Chris has changed at all since 2008, he says it hasn’t, but that there is a process. Sort of.
“We have a pattern and it’s not necessarily to have a pattern! The only difference is that we often used to be in the same room. For Shake Your Moneymaker, I was still at home and in high school!” he laughs.

“But to make this record and the way things are now, I can write and record something and send it to him and we throw everything on the table and things start to magnetize toward each other like a jigsaw puzzle. And it’s like ‘Hey, this is where the record is headed.’”

He adds that he never “tries” to write a song, but simply picks up the guitar and starts playing. And if something cool comes out, he tries to turn it into something more.
“If it works, it’s amazing. If it doesn’t, I don’t try to push it,” he says. “Like everything since we’ve been back, we take what feels good. It has to feel good and natural and not forced.”

Outside of the music, some of the commentary about Happiness Bastards centers on the title and artwork. Chris told Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show that he lifted the title (adding the plural) from a 1968 novel by minor beat literature author Kirby Doyle. The “Happiness” referring to the band today, and “Bastards” to their somewhat checkered past.

And the graffiti-like cover artwork—created by Chris’s artist wife Camille—is a literal pasting/writing over of the band’s 1992 The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion cover (with Rich the most visible in the lower left-hand corner). It’s repeated on the back with the Shake Your Moneymaker cover. The interior features in dripping, big black letters the seemingly competing phrases "Trust Us" and "Never Trust Us."
However, Robinson says fans should not take this artistic representation as a repudiation of their past.

“It’s more like the past will always be part of us, it’s very integral. And it’s all there,” he says. “But we also have this new thing, and I thought it was very apropos to represent that in the artwork.”

In terms of that past, neither Robinson brother was thrilled with original/longtime drummer Steve Gorman’s searing 2019 memoir Hard to Handle. It painted the brothers and their control of the group in a less-than-flattering light, though hardcore followers were happy to finally have some book on the band. Asked if he and/or Chris were thinking of penning their own memoir, at least Rich is nonplussed.

“I mean, I don’t know…it’s funny when people write books about themselves. It just seems odd to me,” he says. “Like ‘Hey, a lot of people want to hear about me!’ It’s just not my thing.”
But back to The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion. If you polled Black Crowes fans, it’s likely that this one would win the Miss Popularity contest, having spun off hits including “Sting Me,” “Remedy” (this writer’s ring tone), “Thorn in My Pride” and “Hotel Illness” along with others still on the setlist today.

Last year, it got the Deluxe Box Set treatment. Included was the first officially released live recording of a Holy Grail show that took place right here in Houston on February 6, 1993, at the now-defunct Sam Houston Coliseum on the accompanying tour.

The show was free to attend and sort of a makeup for a Houston gig the previous year at the Astro Arena that was cut short due to security issues and some falling sound equipment. It was also broadcast nationally and has been long bootlegged as “High in Houston.”

According to the authoritative CrowesBase.com, 15,000 people showed up at the 10,000-capacity venue, and it was the last show held at the Coliseum before it was torn down.
Def American labelmates the Jayhawks opened. There were belly dancers. And this writer attended, getting ushered into the pre-show backstage press conference where the five members gamely answered questions from myself and a reporter from High Times magazine. Five bottles of Red Stripe beer were lined up at their table.

Rich Robinson says it was almost a no-brainer to include this concert in the expanded album release.

“Box sets like that are a snapshot, and you want to have something that had bits of the whole journey. And that means including demos and alternate versions. And you try to find a really great show,” he says.

“And that show at Sam Houston Coliseum was such a cool gig. I still vividly remember it, even this far into my age. It was a great show, and represents a band firing on all cylinders.”

The Black Crowes play at 8 p.m. on Friday, April 5, at the 713 Music Hall, 401 Franklin. For more information, call 832-204-6920 or visit LiveNation.com. $64 and up.

For more on the Black Crowes, visit TheBlackCrowes.com