Tommy Stinson (feat. Frank Ferrer)

http://www.frankferrerofficial.com/#!gigs/c24vq

Tommy Stinson

23 July 2015 / The Bowery Electric, NY

24 July 2015 / Milkboy Philly, Philadelphia, PA

25 July 2015 / Newport Folk Festival, Newport, RI

26 July 2015 / Cafe Nine, New Haven, CT

Impromptu band run-thru in Bushwick last Tuesday. Stay tuned-so much good stuff ahead that I'm developing rock itch!

Really crappy-sounding clip from an unannounced tour warmup show in Bushwick.

Frank Ferrer on drums
Cat Popper on bass
Tony Kieraldo on keys
Luther Dickinson on vacation

Just a couple months after playing the last of the Repacements’ shows in Portugal, Tommy Stinson is already ready to hit the road again, this time fronting a new MVP-class band that will hit the Turf Club on Sept. 12 with Steve Selvidge of the Hold Steady on guitar and Guns N’ Roses drummer Frank Ferrer. The Minneapolis rock legend also just dropped a new charity single online and has two more new songs coming on a 7-inch single next month.

The one tune that’s out now, a bittersweet strummer titled “Can’t Be Bothered” (posted as a video below), can be downloaded via iTunes or Google Play to benefit Roundhouse Young Creatives, a youth arts fund created by the London studio where the song was recorded.

Stinson laid the tune to tape when the Replacements played the adjoining Roundhouse theater in early June. North Mississippi Allstars frontman and ex-Black Crowes guitarist Luther Dickinson also happened to be in London at the time and performed on the recording, as did Davey Lane of You Am I, the opening band for those ‘Mats shows. Dickinson also played on the sessions for Stinson's new album, which they recorded back in the States before the 'Mats headed to Europe.

Replacements fans, of course, know Dickinson’s prior ties to the Replacements: His late father was legendary Memphis producer and session man Jim Dickinson, who produced the ‘Mats’ 1987 album “Pleased to Meet Me” when Luther was just a 14-year-old punk hanging around the studio. You can hear his masterful 42-year-old slide-guitar work all over the new song.

Tommy explained in a press release, “I did it as a demo thinking I’d record it with Luther and the band, but the experience at Roundhouse was such a hoot that I decided to release it as-is.”

Stinson’s new lineup -- which also features bassist Cat Popper of Ryan Adams’ Cardinals and Jack White’s Peacocks, plus keyboardist Tony Kieraldo – performed at the Newport Folk Festival a few weeks ago and will head to the Midwest in September around Chicago’s Riot Fest, where they play the day after the Turf Club on Sept. 13. Selvidge is filling in for his longtime pal Dickinson on these upcoming shows.
Their new 7-inch, titled "L.M.A.O." and featuring the songs “Breathing Room” and “Not This Time,” will drop just before the gig on Sept. 11. Those tunes are also being issued on cassette by Burger Records. All this is leading up to the full-length album's release sometime next year, Stinson reports. His last solo record was 2011's "One Man Mutiny."

Stinson also produced a new EP by the buzzing Southern California punk band Together Pangea in his (ample) downtime between this past year's Replacement gigs.

9/12 – St. Paul, MN – Turf Club (Sold Out)
9/13 – Chicago, IL – Riot Fest
9/14 – Rock Island, IL – Rozz-Tox (Daytrotter Moeller Mondays)

For this tour, Stinson has put together a lineup of friends that includes drummer Joe Kid from the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, bassist Justin Perkins of the Obsoletes, The Hold Steady’s Steve Selvidge on guitar, and Tony Kieraldo on keyboard. The band has plenty of Wisconsin ties; Perkins grew up in Neenah, and Kieraldo is from outside of Madison.

“It’s been a while since I’ve actually had a band, or a band kind of vibe,” Stinson said. “It’s always been using other people’s bands, or whatever. These last few times out, I have my own crew, even though it revolves or evolves a little bit, and I’m pretty stoked about it.”

With both GN’R and the Replacements reunion behind him for now, Stinson has been enjoying his freedom to refocus on his solo work. In addition to touring with the new band, he’s been spending a lot of time writing and recording new material. Last year he released a two-song 7” record titled “L.M.A.O.”

He said that a couple of labels are interested in putting out a new full-length album, but he’s in no hurry. “It’s predicated on me deciding ‘Okay, now I’m done.’ Only after that will I talk to the label about how we’re going to release it and what it’s going to mean. I’m not quite there yet.”

When The Replacements ended their 33-show reunion tour in June 2015, founding bassist Tommy Stinson walked away with his head held high. Armed with a pocketful of new songs and a clean slate, he holed up at his home studio in Hudson, NY and played solo tour dates with a group of A+ players/friends backing him, including Luther Dickinson, Frank Ferrer, Cat Popper, Steve Selvidge, and Joe “The Kid” Sirois. They had more fun than humans should be allowed to have, and over the next year and a half they pieced together a brand new record. A BAND record.

Never one to hog the spotlight, the only logical thing to do at this point was to reanimate ‘Bash & Pop’, the band Stinson started immediately following The Replacements first split in 1991. Fat Possum Records quickly signed them up and will be releasing their sophomore album in early 2017.
...
"Here’s a list of my friends that I have to thank for helping to shape the new album:

Chip Roberts (one-400’s)
Steve “Sleeve” Selvidge (The Hold Steady, Big Ass Truck)
Luther Dickinson (North Mississippi All-Stars, The Word)
Frank Ferrer (Guns N’ Roses)
Joe “The Kid” Sirois (The Mighty Mighty BossToneS, Roll The Tanks)
Cat Popper (Jack White, Ryan Adams & The Cardinals, Jesse Malin, Winning Instagram)
Justin “Carl” Perkins (Screeching Weasel, Obsoletes)
Tony “Tone Tone” Kieraldo (Played at The White House twice!)
Ryder Cooley"

Read more at:
http://fatpossum.com/tommy-stinson-reforms-seminal-post-replacements-band-bash-pop-signs-to-fat-possum/

In September, Replacements and Guns N' Roses bassist Tommy Stinson revealed that he had revived his Bash & Pop project for their first new album since 1993. Stinson has now unleashed "On the Rocks," the brash first single from that upcoming LP Anything Could Happen, in the form of a lyric video that cleverly combines iPhone text messaging with live Bash & Pop footage and behind-the-scenes video.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/see-tommy-stinsons-clever-lyric-video-for-bash-pop-track-w448171

So the lineup, then, went to Janis Tanaka on bass. She was in the Jackson Saints from the San Francisco area, and more recently played for Pink.

Tommy Stinson pairs tragic headlines with anthemic riffs on the second sample from Anything Could Happen, his upcoming reunion LP with post-Replacements band Bash & Pop. On "Never Wanted to Know," he snarls: "Shot down, bleeding from his back in the rain/ Some kid, they didn't even know he was eight," between paint-peeling guitar solos. "You're wishing that it all would end/ They repeat it on CNN."

Thursday’s packed Entry gig was the first official live appearance for Stinson’s revived/recreated ensemble, whose new album, “Anything Could Happen,” lands next Friday via Fat Possum Records. The choice of venue obviously added more of a historic tinge to the proceedings, since Stinson started playing the small room at age 14 not long after the Entry first opened in 1980. Tickets for the show were given out to fans who supported a Pledge Music campaign for the record, which Stinson recorded over different sessions with an all-star casted that included his Memphis bud Luther Dickinson (North Mississippi All-Stars, Black Crowes) and his former Guns N’ Roses bandmate Frank Ferrer.

The lineup that took the stage Thursday as Bash & Pop had its own impressive resume, too, with the Hold Steady’s Steve Selvidge on guitar, drummer Joe Sirois of the Mighty Mighty Bosstones and bassist Justin Perkins – none of whom were in the original, short-lived Bash & Pop. Neither the new nor the old Bash & Pop were reinventing the wheel, though. Thursday’s lineup provided the same sort of spirited, Faces-meets-Johnny-Thunders, barroom-rock backdrop for Stinson’s loose, snarling but melodic and sometimes melancholy tunes.

About five years ago, after nearly two decades living in Los Angeles as a member of Guns N' Roses 2.0 (with a brief stint in Philly along the way), Tommy Stinson relocated to Hudson, a burgeoning city located near the border of Columbia and Dutchess counties in Upstate New York.

ESQ: It's wild to hear how seamlessly Anything Could Happen picks right up from where Friday Night Is Killing Me left off, even though that was never the intention. But it would be interesting to hear how this new lineup was able to kick into gear so fluidly. It was really cool to see Luther Dickinson's name in particular while reading the album credits…

Tommy Stinson: Well, he and I had been buddies for a long time now, and so I got to a point where I was like, "Hey man, are you going to be around on this particular date?" Then [former Guns N' Roses drummer] Frank [Ferrer] and Cat [Popper] came up and we did a session over the weekend. They all stayed at my house, and I think we actually yacked and talked and bullshitted more than we actually played, but we got a few songs done in that first session and we were like, 'Hmmm, we got a cool thing here, why don't we make a whole record like this?' And then between Frank and Cat and Luther becoming busy with their other gigs, I had to wrangle in some other people that—lucky for me—I have.

So I got Joe "The Kid" Sirois of the Mighty Mighty Bosstones playing the drums, who I knew when I lived in L.A. and met like eight years ago. Justin Perkins, who played in Screeching Weasel, has been a buddy of ours for a while and has played with me on and off on bass for years. Tony Kieraldo is my local homie here in Hudson; he plays keys. And Steve Selvidge came in via Luther Dickinson. They grew up together, and Luther was like, "If I can't make it to something, you should get Steve." We did one rehearsal with the guy and he had everything fuckin' down pat, and it worked out. Now the band that finished the album and did about two-thirds of the recording is the touring lineup right there. They're going out on the road with me until my eyes bleed.

Read more at:
http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/music/q-and-a/a52779/tommy-stinson-interview-the-replacements-bash-and-pop/

Although the Replacements’ short-lived reunion ended in 2015, since then their founding bassist Tommy Stinson hasn’t slowed a beat, re-forming his 1990s outfit Bash & Pop and keeping busy with solo work and side projects. Always happy to lend a hand to local causes in his adopted home town of Hudson, the rocker is sponsoring Safe at Home, a pair of live-music events that will take place in the Columbia County city next month to benefit the Hudson Little League.

On May 5 at 12pm, Stinson’s acoustic-electric duo Cowboys in the Campfire will perform with Elvis Perkins, Brian Dewan, Chops & Sauerkraut, Magic Stones, Rebecca Bauer, and special guests at Hudson Brewing Company. Tickets are $15. For more information, call (518) 697-5400 or visit https://www.hudsonbrew.com/.

On May 12 at 5pm, Bash & Pop will perform with Alejandro Escovedo, Elvis Perkins, Jesse Malin, Dust Bowl Faeries, and special guests at Club Helsinki. Tickets are $25 and $35. For more information, call (518) 282-4800 or visit https://helsinkihudson.com/.

JM: How was playing with Guns N' Roses different from playing with The Replacements?

TS: [long laugh] I've got one really quick answer for you. Not all that f***ing different [laughs]. And I'll tell you a third one in this. I played with Soul Asylum, I played with Guns N' Roses, and I played with The Replacements. I've done session work with a bunch of different artists, and stuff like that, and worked with different singers and stuff like that. [laughs] I'll tell you what, and this is the short, cut to the quick right here f***ing sentence here about this. Paul Westerberg, Dave Pirner, Axl Rose — they are not very much far apart from one another, in every f***ing way [laughs]. You can close the article with that. In every f***ing way [laughs].

As for Stinson, he’s happy to look back but he’s busy with other things. He’s currently working on a new LP by his post-‘Mats band Bash & Pop release, a collaboration with Nicole Atkins, and another with Chip Roberts called Cowboys in the Campfire.

Tommy Stinson is perhaps best known for his time in one of the most influential American alternative bands of the past 40 years, The Replacements. However, he also spent 16 years as Axl Rose’s bassist in the Chinese Democracy-era version of Guns N Roses and now performs as a solo act as well as with his bands Bash & Pop and Cowboys in the Campfire.

MK: Going back to what you said previously about getting a recording done quickly, that project, the Chinese Democracy album became almost a punch line in the media for how long it took to complete. What kind of project was that for you? Was that something you were in and out of for years? Did you work on your own stuff too?

TS: Nah, that was a fucking huge undertaking. You’re trying to reinvent the wheel at that point, ya know? Without being able to reinvent the wheel. There was a lot of good stuff that was on that record and I’m totally proud of being a part of it and all that. And you can’t, I can’t get too far into it right now, but you can’t underestimate how important it was to try and make a great record. With all the great records they already made as Guns N Roses from the ’80s. It was a different period, a new time, a new place. And Axl is always forward-thinking in a lot of ways, Mike, ya know? He’s always like, he wants to step 20 years ahead and fucking make a record. And the rest of the guys are like, “But this is what we are. This is how we do it.” And he’s just always pushing the envelope in a way. You’re always gonna have a conundrum with that.

MK: Well that’s the mindset of a creative person. They don’t want to look back. They want to keep looking forward.

TS: EXACTLY

TS: And ya know what? For all practical purposes, it was a great gig for me. And I’ll tell you what, I have nothing but respect for those guys, all of them. A bunch of them are my friends. The only one I don’t know is Slash so much. It was a great gig. And ya know, I wouldn’t take any of it back.

MK: Do you miss it?

TS: No
I miss the people.

I don’t miss the schedule and the touring and all that stuff, the way that was. I did almost 20 years of that and it takes its toll, ya know?

MK: I bet.

MK: So when you left Guns N Roses in 2014, it was during a pretty tumultuous time in your personal life. And so you became a full-time dad at that point. Your daughter was young then.

TS: She’s 11 now. I had to kind of basically (sighs)…I had to say I couldn’t do a bunch of tours right around the time my relationship with my soon-to-be-ex fell apart and had to basically, had to be a stay at home dad. And luckily at the same time, as I was not able to do a four to six-week tour, the Replacements went out and did the reunion stuff on weekends. The weekend gigs I could manage with being a stay-at-home dad and all the stuff going on in my life. But the reality is, I really couldn’t do a four-week tour of Europe or a six-week tour of this or that. I had to say I couldn’t do it because I had a little kid. And I don’t regret any of that. And ya know what? If that’s what spurred on Duff and Slash coming back and playing with Ax, that’s fantastic. People are loving it. It’s great. As well it should be. That’s all I got to say about that.

Read more at NYS Music...

What’s next for you as a solo artist?

Yeah, the next thing I got coming out’s gonna be this Cowboys in the Campfire record that I’ve been working for a while. And that’s my writing partner friend, Chip Roberts, and I. We’re a duo. The record’s got a little bass and drums on it. John Doe from X played a little on it and did a little background vocal on it. We just kind of called a lot of our friends to help us fill out the songs, but a lot of it’s just, you know, him and I kind of playing rock & roll as a duo. Some of it comes off probably sounding a little country-ish. But the next thing that I put out will be that. And then who knows. I think somewhere down the road, I’ll probably make another Bash & Pop record, because I like playing with all those guys too, when I did the band thing.

I read (in a 1999 SPIN cover story) that before you joined GN’R you bought a used CD copy of “Appetite for Destruction” to learn the basslines. Is that true? And if so, do you remember what record store that was and how much you paid for that used “Appetite” CD?

I don’t remember even doing that. I think I got a record from them to learn from, and it wasn’t quite clear right out of the gate what was gonna happen with it. I learned a few songs and went and auditioned and it seemed like they kind of fell for me right there. And then I get some stuff from them to learn and stuff like that, but I don’t ever recall going out and actually buying the record.

I’ve also read Duff McKagan was a fan of The Replacements and your playing with The ‘Mats. As you were learning Duff’s parts on the classic GN’R stuff, what did you find interesting about his basslines? Because I think you’re one of his influences, which is kind of funny.

Yeah, I found that exactly – that we came from kind of came from this similar background, bass player-wise basically, in a lot of ways. Not in every way but in a lot of ways it was, I found, very familiar and similar to where I’d come from. And then, you know, of course then I met him and we kind of became pals about it at all. But yeah, we come from the same background in that regard, especially in the punk rock way.

What’s a track or two from “Chinese Democracy” you’re proudest of? Or maybe enjoyed playing live from that record the most?

Boy, that’s a tough one. Because I haven’t seen or heard that record for ages. But I mean, the title track was always fun to play and we never did “Riad” (“Riad N’ the Bedouins”) live …

“I.R.S.” is a cool one.

That one’s alright. What’s it, “Street of Dreams”? That had a nice bit to it. But without seeing the song titles, it’s a little hard to pull out. But a lot of the stuff we never got around to playing live, which is kind of unfortunate. But we did play enough of it to make it make sense, at the end of the day. Actually, I think they’re still playing the same songs that we played back when we were playing that record. [Laughs]

Before we move on, what’s something you appreciate more now about Axl Rose as a singer and bandmate and a person that that you weren’t cognizant of or aware of from working with him?

You know, without having really spoken to him in a while, I only know anecdotally from others around that it really did a world of good for him to go out and do the AC/DC thing. (Rose filled-in as singer on a 2016 AC/DC tour.) I think for him to get out and be a member of someone else’s band for a minute really had a positive effect on him. I’ve only heard this from people I know that have either been on the road with him or ... I actually went and saw them a couple times and heard exactly that. That it did really have a positive effect on him in a way.

Former Replacements bassist Tommy Stinson has announced Cowboys in the Campfire, a new duo formed with frequent collaborator Chip Roberts, who will release their debut album, WRONGER, on June 2 via Cobraside. The album also features X's John Doe on bass and vocals on a few tracks and you can check out the artwork and tracklist below.