For The Good Times

The Bottle Rockets Fire Back With A New Lineup And Fierce New Album

originally published January 24, 2007

Almost 10 years back, Missouri’s favorite regular-guy rock act The Bottle Rockets released a gloomier-than-usual album called Brand New Year. That was 1999, with a new millennium still on the horizon. And with 2007 off to a fresh start, today’s rejuvenated, reshuffled Bo-Rox are looking more like card-carrying members of a brand-new band.

Though the latest release, last year’s Zoysia, is the first to wholly utilize the Bottle Rockets’ new lineup, settling into this shift in membership has been a long time coming. Founding guitarist Tom Ray left the fold shortly before 2003’s Blue Sky album was completed, leaving the group to carry on as a three-piece. Two years later, bassist Robert Kearns left on good terms to join up with modern country singer Chris Cagle, leaving only singer-guitarist Brian Henneman and drummer Mark Ortmann to soldier on.

Almost five years since the creative reshuffling started, the Bottle Rockets of ‘07 are far from fizzled out. Zoysia, which the band recorded during a highly productive week in Memphis’ hallowed Ardent Studios (recording site of Big Star’s #1 Record/ Radio City and The Cramps’ Songs The Lord Taught Us, among others) with producer Jeff Powell, is arguably the most cohesive and forthright album to bear the band's name yet. The addition of guitarist John Horton and bassist Keith Voegele has allowed the group to step things up a notch, as Zoysia presents a highly confident, much more varied portrait of the band than did its predecessor.

“This was the first time we’d recorded with our new bass player, Keith, and our guitarist, John, who’s really been in the band for a couple years now. Really, it’s damn near a new band,” says Henneman. “As a group, I think we’re leaps and bounds better than ever before. So, the musical end of Zoysia was actually a piece of cake. Having John there as a second lead guitarist was cool, too, because that allowed me to friggin’ concentrate on other things for a while, which was wonderful. Actually, I’m kind of addicted to it at this point!”

“Where I’m from ain’t where I’m from… anymore,” laments Henneman on “Where I’m From,” a mostly acoustic, low-key track from the new album. He could be talking about his band’s recent relocation from its longtime homebase of Festus, MO, to the nearby metropolis of St. Louis. He could also be referring to said band’s new membership or label (the Chicago-based insurgent country indie Bloodshot Records). Whatever the case, as both a lyricist and frontman, Henneman - known for most always delivering his songs from the first-person perspective - hasn’t shied away from getting personal during the near four-year interim between albums.

On the surface, the almost-psychedelic title track pokes fun at a current plague ravaging suburbanite communities: lawn envy. The bulldozing “Middle Man” flips a just finger for any working stiff who’s ever been stuck between unpaid overtime and a pink slip. This isn’t the "Blue Collar TV"-inspired version of reality that many good ol' boys and girls subscribe to these days, but rather snippets from a way of life that more hardworking Americans might actually identify with.

“We went into this with the idea of making an actual album. That’s kind of an odd thing to do in this day and age of MP3s and iPods and the whole bit. With all that out there, the album’s almost become a lost art,” says Henneman. “In the past, we would go in to make an album, but it would be more like recording a bunch of songs that we’d later put together and, there, it’d be done. This time, though, it was more like going for one goal. It was definitely the one I sat down and thought about the hardest, as well as the one that came out pretty damn close to what we were hoping it would. I think the speed of the recording, this time, helped because nothing much on the record is from past the third take. Most of the takes are from the first go.”

Currently, the members of the Bottle Rockets are burning off their newest set of steel-belted radials in support of Zoysia. They’ve got a new double live album - recorded at a 2005 tour stop in Heilbronn, Germany - that’s available at shows and at www.bottlerocketsmusic.com. Henneman also says that several new songs have been penned for the next release. If the guys can manage to get one more studio album under their belts, they might even finally see fit to begin a much-needed reissue campaign.

However, those holding out for a new-and-improved version of the Rockets' self-titled debut, recorded here in Athens during that most challenging blizzard of ’93, might want to invest in a nice long breather right about now. “Let me tell you what, we’ve thought about [reissuing the old] shit for about a million years,” laughs Henneman. “It’s gonna take a really good lawyer to figure it all out, though, because the stuff has gotten so scattered. The Brooklyn Side album is really screwed up because it was on the ESP label, then licensed by Atlantic for seven years. Then, when the license was up, it reverted to back to ESP, which was out of business at that point. The first album we did in Athens with John Keane is a tough one to track down, too. I don’t even have a copy of that. Needless to say, a box set of our stuff is gonna take a whole lot of hunting, wheelin’ and dealin’. We still wanna do it, though, but it’s not going to happen anytime this year - that’s for sure!” Seems like trucking it out to Tasty World this week may be the only salve for anyone eager to hear some of those tunes.

Michael Andrews

WHO: The Bottle Rockets, The Bearfoot Hookers, Otis Gibbs
WHERE: Tasty World
WHEN: Monday, January 29
HOW MUCH: $7