Candlebox has been putting out great music ever since they burst onto the rock music scene twenty seven years ago with their self titled debut. That eponymous album included the monster songs “You” and “Far Behind” that both landed on the Billboard Hot 100. They’ve been putting out killer jams ever since.
Here we are in 2020 and the band just released the new single, “Let Me Down Easy”. For myself and many fans, this has that gritty feel that made us fall in love with the band to begin with.
I wrote this about the song when it first came out – Led by a dark acoustic guitar, the song takes off when the familiar tone of Kevin Martin’s voice appears. It’s low in the right places and gritty in others. In short it’s a perfect combination to bring that sinister vibe to life. That combined with a drum and bass guitar groove that expands ultra wide as the electric guitars hit you left to right.
I caught up with Kevin to talk about the new song and other songs that will make up a new album for the band. I asked him if he went into the studio wanting make a more gritty, dirty sounding record. Kevin says, “One of the statements I made a couple of years ago to the guys in the band was that I wanted to make a Rust Never Sleeps, a Neil Young and Crazy Horse type of a record. The musicians were free to play what they wanted to play and there was no real structure to maybe the songwriting, even. If we felt that the song was gong in one direction we would let it go and see where it ended up.”
Martin continues, “With this song I had connected with Pete Cornell, who I hadn’t seen in years. I had left Seattle in ’98 and we really kind of lost track. We weren’t really friends back then. We knew one another but he came back into my life because he was dating my manager, Amy and they’re now married. We got to talking about the old days and the music and I said, listen man I’m about to make a record and I always loved Pete’s songwriting. Always, always loved his songwriting. Always felt that he was kind of the underdog in Seattle in the music scene. He just never really got the respect that his brother got. And maybe it was because he was older than Chris and Chris wasn’t really in the spotlight when Pete was.”
Martin breaks down his conversation with Pete about the song. He tells me he said to him, “I’m looking to make a record like Rust Never Sleeps. I want something swampy and bluesy. I grew up listening to great blues. Willie Dixon, Robert Johnson and the list goes on and on. It’s what I really loved and kind of what I really loved about the first Candlebox record with Arrow and Rain and those types of things. I wanted to get back to that and I said I needed a song like that. He said, let me see what I got and two, three days later he sent me this on acoustic with some humming and some melody things he had in his mind. It had the same energy. It had the same vibe as what I wanted from the song, with the acoustic. So I knew that it was going to be something special.”
These are the kind of stories and song breakdown notes that keep a person like me engaged in interviewing artists. Just hearing the backstory of a song or to hear the passion in Kevin’s voice really makes it all worthwhile. Not just from a writing standpoint but from a listeners or fans point of view.
It’s this type of passion that makes it no surprise that the band has continued to put out albums and tour to many packed houses of fans wanting to get a chance to see Kevin and Candlebox perform these songs live.
We go deeper into the songs and even get a possible launch date. Of course, this will all be subject to the current pandemic but however long the wait, I have a feeling that it will be very much worth it.
You can hear my entire conversation with Kevin Martin by clicking on the link to your favorite place to listen to podcasts.
-Tommy Marz
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