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Freddy Jones Band has found new verve in its latest work

Carla Jean Whitley
cj@postindependent.com

If you go

Freddy Jones Band at Strawberry Days

Saturday, 7:30 p.m.

Sayre Park, 1702 Grand Ave., Glenwood Springs | Free | strawberrydays.com

It’s not Freddy Jones Band’s first time in Glenwood Springs, and certainly not the band’s first time in Colorado. But returning to the state is always a welcome trip, said lead singer Marty Lloyd.

The band, best known for its 1990s hits “In A Daydream” and “Take the Time,” will headline Strawberry Days. The band takes the stage at 7:30 p.m. Saturday. Colorado has always been good to the group, Lloyd said, and he expects the 120th-anniversary festival to be no different.

Post Independent: The band has quite a history, with 25 years behind you. How is today different from when you started?



Marty Lloyd: Let’s look at the old model: Record the music, pick a song, hand it off to a radio promotions team. They go out to a specific format that’s chosen, they say, ‘Let’s do hot adult contemporary.’ (There may be) 25 spots you’re vying for. Back then, after you get shot down (laugh) or don’t get that many adds around the country, where do you go?

That’s what made some bands such an enigma, how they were able to be so self-sufficient without conventional radio. Imagine what the Grateful Dead would be like if they were starting out today with social media.



There’s more opportunity (today), and because there’s more opportunity, unfortunately the royalties get watered down. But there’s the issue that so many people have with the industry right now. … It’s about songs, not albums anymore. No one buys an album, but people buy songs.

PI: Y’all took a recording hiatus and returned with your newest studio album, “Never Change,” in 2015. Tell me about the difference in recording that album as compared to your previous work.

ML: This was a much longer process, just delivering songs in batches, constantly delivering and only picking out ones that were absolutely standouts. It wasn’t at all like ‘Hey, these are the songs that we have sitting around, let’s do these.’

After coming up with what we thought were the best of the best, we went into the Castle Recording Studios in Franklin, Tennessee, and we were surrounded by a house band. Justin Niebank handpicked his guys. We know these guys, it’s not like they’re random dudes waiting for us to show up, but that was a different process: being surrounded by that house sound that we were after, taking the essence of our sound and surrounding it with greatness. … It was a rush. An absolute rush, it was such a joy.

It’s not only to get a phenomenal performance out of everyone, and the ear they have, the stuff they’ll come up with. … The old days, we’d spend weeks in preproduction. We’d go in a warehouse stage studio, and we would plow through the songs and rearrange each individual’s part before going in and recording.

This was completely opposite of that. This was, here’s the song, here’s the demo of it, make charts, go in the room and see what happens.

Then we started picking stuff apart, what works and what doesn’t, allowing those guys to let their ears do their work. The stuff they were coming up with was awesome.

We were all staring at each other after each take, like, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me, this is what I’ve always dreamed of, that it would sound like this.’ (This was) the best experience recording an album ever for this band. In my opinion, it’s the greatest album we’ve ever put out. I don’t think it’s even close.

PI: Should we expect anything in particular from a festival show, as compared to when you play in a club atmosphere?

ML: I don’t know if I’d say there’s a difference. We’ve been doing both for eons. Certainly it’s fun to come through Colorado, and that time of year to be outside. I think our most memorable times through there have always been summertime outdoor festivals. There’s something about playing music outside there that’s pretty inspiring for as well.


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