1984-2015, 2019-Chris RobinsonVocals1984-
Rich RobinsonGuitar1984-
Mark FordGuitar1991-1999
Johnny ColtBass1989-1997
Steve GormanDrums1986-2013
Greg RzabBass2000-2001
Eddie HarshKeyboards1991-2006
Sven PipienBass1997-2013
Adam MacDougall Keyboards2007-2013
Jackie GreeneGuitar2013-2015
Their original name was Mr. Crowe's Garden, after a fairy tale. Mr. Crowe's Garden was originally a punk band before the guys changed their name and sound to find success as The Black Crowes.
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Suggestion credit:
Shawn - Parker, CO
They are strong proponents of legalizing marijuana. They have played various benefits for this cause, including the Great Atlanta Pot Festival.
In 2000, Chris Robinson married the actress Kate Hudson, who is Goldie Hawn's daughter. Robinson went with her to the Oscars when she was nominated for her role in Almost Famous. They had a son named Ryder Russell before divorcing in 2007.
They got kicked off the 1991 ZZ Top tour when Chris Robinson warned the audience about the dangers of commercialization. The tour was sponsored by Miller beer.
Their 1994 album Amorica showed a close-up of a woman's red, white, and blue bikini bottom with exposed pubic hair. The photo was taken from the Bicentennial issue of Hustler magazine. They retouched the cover to get rid of the hair after many stores refused to display it.
The Robinsons are brothers, and write most of the band's songs together. The brother angle was played up during their 2001 "Tour of Brotherly Love," where they were joined buy two other bands of brothers: Oasis and Spacehog.
They played a wide array of festivals, including the Horde Tour, Further Festival, and Monsters Of Rock.
In 2000, they released Live At The Greek, an album with Jimmy Page. For a while, it was only available as a download, with users able to customize the album by paying only for the tracks they wanted.
They toured with Jimmy Page in 1999, where they played mostly Led Zeppelin songs. They got the idea when they played a benefit concert together in London that year.
Chris Robinson thinks of songwriting as a vital means for him to communicate. In his
Songfacts interview, he said of their early songs: "We really weren't an angst-driven band, but on the early Black Crowes records you feel our youthful exuberance and our anger at the system. 'The system' could be the music business, the system could be antiquated drug laws, it could be anything."
They're from Atlanta. They toured in the South for five years before signing a record deal.
The Black Crowes were one of the first major bands to use the internet to distribute their music. In 2000, Live At The Greek was available for download before it could be bought, and in 2001, they set up secure audio streams of live performances for fans who bought their album Lions.
They have toured under such names as O-D Jubilee and Blessed Chloroform.
The group once stopped a concert in Kentucky when they discovered that one of their staff had been severely beaten by narcotics officers trying to bust the band. They were unsuccessful.
Like their forebears the Grateful Dead, the band encourages fans to tape their concerts.
The Robinson brothers are often at odds, which has kept the band out of action for long stretches. They were largely inactive from 2002-2005, and also 2011-2012. After an album and tour in 2013, they again took a hiatus, and in 2015 Rich Robinson announced their breakup. Drummer Steve Gorman claimed they had a tour planned, but Chris Robinson insisted on a 75% but and control of the band name.
Chris and Rich weren't on speaking terms for four years but reconciled in 2019 to plan a reunion tour for the 30th anniversary of their debut album, Shake Your Money Maker. COVID foiled those plans, but they got the tour underway in 2021 with a new lineup that didn't include Gorman, who in 2019 published an incendiary book called Hard to Handle: The Life and Death of the Black Crowes. In 2024 the band returned with a new album called Happiness Bastards.