Corb Lund releases his new album, Counterfeit Blues, on June 17 in Canada and on Canada Day (July 1) in the U.S. via New West Records. The spirited set of rockabilly, rock n’ roll and honky tonk country was recorded live, off the floor, at Sun Studio in Memphis, Tenn. in much the same way Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash did 60 years before in that same room.
For the rousing collection, Lund and his band the Hurtin’ Albertans chose fan favourites from some of their early albums – 2002′s breakthrough Five Dollar Bill, their first gold record in Canada, and 2006′s Canadian Country Music Association’s Album of the Year, Hair In My Eyes Like A Highland Steer – and re-cut them in a breakneck two-day recording process resulting in an album that, as Lund says, is “raw, organic and dirty.”
“It turned out really well. Partly because we know the songs inside out and have played them live a thousand times and partly because recording at Sun is a very old fashioned, low-tech process that ends up sounding really great if you can pull it off. My band has been playing behind me for ten years or more, with all the same members so it was a great way to capture the live chemistry we’ve developed over many, many tours. You can’t fake that.”
Armed with just a couple guitars, some mics, a pedal steel guitar, stand-up bass, drums and the amps they plugged into, the foursome eschewed studio trickery for the lightning in a bottle approach and blasted through 12 songs with a confidence and swagger that can only come from years of playing together. The end result serves as both an exciting introduction to the acclaimed band’s early material and as fun must-have reinterpretation of the classics for the fans.
Counterfeit Blues will be available on CD, vinyl and digital download as well as a special two-disc CD/DVD set comprised of the documentary “Memphis Sun,” which originally aired this past December on CMT Canada. The film documents the band’s journey from the north of Alberta to the south of Memphis for the two-day recording session in the hallowed ground where rock and roll was born. The DVD will feature three bonus tracks – “Bucking Horse Rider,” “Good Copenhagen,” and “Shine Up My Boots” – that were not on the original hour-long broadcast.
