“The new single is “a13” and it's the first song on the new record, “Elevator” and “Elevator” is my 25th solo record so it's kind of a special one for us; we play “a13” in the show as well as some other things from “Elevator.” There's in fact, nine things in the show that we've never played before but there's also a lot of the power trio material that people like, like the King Crimson stuff and some other good songs and there's an acoustic section where I do a solo acoustic guitar and voice thing for about 20-minutes and take some question and answers from the audience. So, it's a very good well-rounded show with lots of different things.”
Multi-instrumentalist Adrian Belew has worked with some of the most sophisticated artists the music industry has ever produced. Names such as Frank Zappa, David Bowie, Talking Heads and King Crimson are among those who dot his resume and as mentioned above; he has his own extensive catalog of work as well and Adrian will be bringing a powerhouse show to The Newton Theatre in Newton, NJ on August 6; much to the delight of him and his fan base.
Belew is a self-made artist, he writes, records, does his own artwork and his stage shows have garnered a loyal following everywhere he and his band mates go. "Elevator" is his first solo digital album and he has signed with Bliss Entertainment/Ingrooves Music Group to release it to the masses. We all know of Belew's musical prowess but he is also an accomplished artist as well.
"I've been doing my art for; I don't know over 10 years now and you can see some of my work on my most recent records. Over COVID there was so much creativity going on that I couldn't release. So, I decided that what I was gonna do was the same I did with teaching myself to play guitar and all the other instruments; I'm just gonna sit down and figure out how to do digital painting with an iPad and pencil and boy it turned out to be a fountain that I can't turn off! I've probably done a couple hundred of them by now so I thought I'd include some of the most recent ones in the CD package; giving people a bit more incentive to maybe get a CD. So, there's 38 of my digital paintings in the package and yes, they are all digital paintings.”
“Well, in my early days of learning about art," he continued, "I was a big fan of Picasso, David Hockney and people of that style of art but I like a lot of different arts and artists. There are a lot of great artists out there, I find more all of the time but my art is just me being creative. I'm not trying to be a professional painter or artist; it's just another side of being creative and it's the same thing as doing the music. It touches all of the same kinds of things; depth and tonal things and dimension and all of the things you use in music. So, for me, especially during COVID, it was a very helpful outlet. I also of course wrote a lot of music during that time and then curated that into the "Elevator" record which I had a specific idea for which was to make a record that was uplifting, sort of pop-ish because I felt like after COVID, everyone would want to be uplifted and listen to something that makes you happy and makes you want to listen to it again.”
Belew's decision to partner with Bliss Entertainment/Ingrooves Music Group for the digital release was something new but he stresses that this single and record will be available in other forms as well.
"Yes, just for the digital single release and the digital release of the records; it's still going to be out on our site and we still sell it at our online store. We also sell it on Bandcamp and those are the two outlets that we try to guide people to; we're not really trying to stream things yet. I mean, I'm actually not someone who does that I prefer people pay for the music; I'm sorry but that's just what I think is the right thing to do. The thing with streaming is that they pay you the absolute lowest possible percentage, which is a ridiculous percentage that's less than a 100th of a penny per play so that you're never going to make any money. So, artists have now been for many years, reduced to basically what you can make by playing live and hopefully selling merchandise during that time and that's fine; we do it really well. I have a great band, a great situation there's only four of us and our merch person who does a lot of other things and is also my wife and Julie my bass player and Johnnie my drummer. We ride in one vehicle with all of our gear, we do all of the work and then at the end of the night we're also a terrific live show. So, I think that's the best thing you can go with now these days.”
"I mean, frankly, most of my supporters are fans who have been there for a while and they're happy to pay for the music and support us and they do things like come to our band camp and go to the Bandcamp site to buy our products and things. So, I'm not trying to necessarily search out a different audience who wants my music for free and besides, if you look at those things like Spotify and stuff like that; there's millions and millions of songs on there. So, I don't know that equation of, Oh yeah if you put it up there a lot of people will come to it that didn't know you before. I'm not sure that works all that well but I could be wrong. I could be wrong but I prefer to just do it the old-fashioned way. I make the music, I have to play everything, I do everything on it, even the artwork and I expect to be paid something for it, it costs me money to do it. I mean, if you’re a plumber; you don’t expect a plumber to come over to your house and say, hey, I’ll fix your pipes for free; I just do this because I'm a plumber (laughs). It’s not about money for us, I mean we are really doing this for the love of it; we love our fans and they love us and it's a great honor and pleasure to be out and being able to do this again. You just have to be realistic about it, it's unsustainable otherwise we wouldn't be able to do this year after year if we can't at least earn a living at it.”
Those very fans will be in for a treat at The Newton Theatre; right Adrian?
"I think I’ve designed the show in a unique way. When we first come out as a trio, we play some songs as a trio; even some things that we've never done before. We play something from The Bears, we play something from “Elevator,” we play some songs from my catalog that we may have never done before and some favorites. Then I switch gears to just being the solo acoustic part of the show which lasts about 20 or 25 minutes and once again I do some songs that you would know if you're a fan and favorites and then I put in some of the brand-new songs from “Elevator” which I feel are more; there are acoustic songs on the record so they fit better in that format. Then we take a 20-minute break and let everyone go outside and check out the T-shirts and the merch. table and do whatever else they want to do and then when we come back it's full force power trio with a blistering set. There is lots of stuff from King Crimson, from my solo records especially the "Side One" stuff I did with Les Claypool and Danny Carey and also of course “e” and we've got a lot of pieces on “e” which are really great for a power trio and so by the end of the night it's a hot, hot set but it starts out from a song aspect.”
Belew says there is even a pleasant instrument surprise for those in attendance as well.
“Johnnie Luca our drummer, who is also a great drummer by the way, is playing the Bill Bruford drum kit that I now have inherited; it’s the Bill Bruford drum kit, the yellow kit that was played in the ‘90s with the Double-Trio and it's the one on the “Live in Japan” DVD and so it's kind of a famous drum kit; in fact, it is very famous and that's something else that people get a kick out of at the show. I happened to obtain it; it's a long story but I'll shorten it by saying a guy won it in a contest 17 years ago and eventually decided to give it to me. He felt that I should have it; he’s obviously a really, really special person who did that and he's a camper that comes to our King Crimson camp that we do every summer. I had it in storage for a few years and I was only using the snare drum on some of my recordings but then we said well, let's see what condition it's in. So, Johnnie got it out and it was really in near perfect condition so he just put new heads on it and away we go; it sounds great! It’s a great kit, it’s an almost 30-year-old top of the line Tama drum kit.”
To discover more about Adrian Belew, "Elevator" or the August 6 Newton show, please visit https://adrianbelew.net/.
That's it for this week! Please continue to support live and original music and until next week....ROCK ON!