Six years on from our last interview (check that out here!), I had the opportunity to sit down and chat with C2C headliners Zac Brown Band. Read on to thoughts on raising the bar musically, performing with icons, and what they really value in the industry - enjoy!
Q: You’ve had such a stellar career so far – what does success mean to you now, and what does it mean going forward into the next phase of your career?
A: I think every tour that we get to do is an opportunity to bring something new to the cities that we went to previously. It gives us a chance to really push the boundaries of what we can do and the kind of experience that you get - not just seeing a great performing band, but also the production behind it, so we're really excited to figure out what the next step there is and how to raise that level.
I remember going to my first Pink Floyd concert, and the way they would manipulate the sound and the lights and inflatables and put you in this new world of things. I think for us, success is being inspired, continually writing new music, and then figuring out how we want to present that live so that the next time we come, people are really excited to see what we're going to be doing next. Obviously we're going to play our songs and think about different ways to present our songs, but we also have to consider what covers we’re going to work up and how we’re going to try to make our own expression of what these other songs are.
Honestly, I think our band is a really hard one to understand until you see it live. Then when you see us once, twice, every time, it's the same quality, but it's presented in a completely different way. That's very important for us. Actually, we're working on kind of our masterpiece for 2024 - we've got a concept for an album and we’re bringing in art as well, we have an incredible artist that we've been working with to help us to pull this off, so that should be exciting.
I think you can always raise the bar on what you're doing if you're focused on and are dedicated to figuring that out. We make sure the nuts and bolts of the music are there when we make it, and then it's trying to exceed everyone's expectations when they see us live. That's our strength - if you just know our music from the recordings, that's the heart of a song, but we're entertainers and want to be able to present that in a way where people are just like, ‘that was the greatest thing that we've seen!’ That keeps us all hungry when thinking about how we’ll present it time and time again.
Q: I really liked your album The Comeback and in particular the collaboration with James Taylor, Love & Sunsets. How did that one come about?
A: James Taylor was my biggest influence really, and as a kid I remember picking up the tablature book that had note-for-note how he would play songs. I was in seventh grade and I had kids at school making fun of me saying I listen to rock and jazz music, but I was listening to James Taylor, Jim Croce, Dan Fogelberg, Gordon Lightfoot, The Eagles, America - there were so many things that I was influenced by. I had older siblings so I was listening to a lot of 70s music which I think was the greatest era of music. I was getting to discover those things and learn the way that artists like James Taylor approached playing the guitar. Then when it came time to craft my own songs, he was already like a superhero to me!
As we went on, we did a version of Colder Weather at one of the award shows with James Taylor, with a version of Sweet Baby James at the end of it. Without a doubt the greatest milestones for us are getting to rub elbows with our heroes and James is definitely one of those for us. We developed a relationship with him through that, and then when I was doing Love & Sunsets, it was very much that kind song that tipped its hat towards James Taylor. I thought ‘how cool would it be to have him on this track!’ Unfortunately, when he came into the studio, he wasn't happy with how his voice was - I wanted him to sing on it, but he was like ‘my voice isn’t really up to par.’ I didn't feel great about it, but he came up with a lot of really great guitar parts and had his son sing on it as well. I tell you, the James Taylor Greatest Hits album was like religion to me as a kid. I listened to it over and over and over again. Being able to be peers with our heroes now and asking them to do things with us like that is just incredible.
Another example is that we were Dolly Parton's band for her induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Things like that mean so much to us, but I think award shows have gotten so political nowadays. If you're not one of the horses of the main corporations in Nashville, you're never going to win those, but they still want us to be there to play at the shows, which is expensive for us! I think we're outliers of that corporate world and we always have been. To go back to your earlier question on how we define our success, we're blessed to be able to sell a lot more tickets than the people receiving all the awards and things like that, but even if you're not one of the horses of the Nashville corporations, they still want you there, they want your viewership, they want the people to tune in and be part of it.
In contrast, when we get to work with our heroes, create the music we want to create, create a live show, we're not anybody's monkey. We’re able to be independent and our loyalty really, truly lies with the fans that come to the shows and see us play. That's the greatest thing. Then getting to call our friends and say, ‘hey, do you want to play on this song with us?’ It's been an amazing experience for us to be able to do that and that's something no one can ever take away from us. We don't owe any loyalty to some corporation who could take it from us.
It’s not about not being grateful for the opportunities and exposure that awards shows and things can give us, but it's also an opportunity cost, you know? Is it worth costing us a couple of hundred thousand dollars to go and play award shows and seeing everyone in the band feel disappointed or feel some sense of failure when we're not revered as part of this fraternity? In a way, it's kind of deflating. So it's like, do we want to continue to do these things, or do we do want? Do we want to go spend those three days we'd be there costing us a lot of money to do it, or do we want to go play three shows and move 30,000 people a night and make them remember that experience?
For us, we're always trying to balance the level that we're being political with the level of what really serves us and feeds us and gets us more fans. We spent the first part of our career trying to win people over, trying to show them what we are and what we do and our dedication. Nobody in our crew drinks or smokes or does anything like that before the show is finished. We take it very seriously - we take care of ourselves and each other so that we can perform at this high level and so we'll be able to do that for many, many years.
I personally feel better now than I did 10 years ago! My creativity, my headspace, my dedication, all of those things. Make no mistake, we're here to win over people here - we want to be here year after year, to keep coming back and proving that so we're selling out stadiums here the same way that we do in the States.
We had so much more to say! Keep your eyes peeled on @CiarasCountry for Part 2 of the interview, coming soon!
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