Mojo interviews Kevn

(Click to stream, right-click to download)

9/3/10 – Hampton, GA. Atlanta Motor Speedway

9/5/10 – Hampton, GA. Atlanta Motor Speedway

9/10/10 – Macon, GA. The Hummingbird

9/17/10 – Bainbridge, GA. BikeFest

9/18/10 – Raleigh, NC. Powerhouse Square

10/8/10 – Tybee Island, GA. Pirate Fest

11/4/10 – Richmond, VA. The Capital Ale House

11/5/10 – Baltimore, MD. The 8×10

11/6/10 – New York, NY. Mercury Lounge

11/7/10 – Cambridge, MA. TT the Bear’s

11/8/10 – tba

11/10/10 – Philadelphia, PA. World Cafe Live

11/11/10 – Nag’s Head, NC. Kelly’s Outer Banks

11/12/10 – GReensboro, NC. The N Club

11/13/10 – Augusta, GA. Sky City

11/26/10 – Athens, GA. 40Watt

11/27/10 – Chattanooga, TN. Rhythm and Brews

As a special treat to race fans, Atlanta Motor Speedway is adding a third day of racing to the Labor Day Night Race Weekend! Kick off the weekend at AMS with this event designed with race fans in mind as Atlanta Motor Speedway celebrates its 50th Anniversary! The Fan Fest will include a driver Q&A with NASCAR drivers, a concert by Drivin’ N Cryin’ followed by the Georgia Best Chevy Dealers 150, a 150-lap race on Atlanta Motor Speedway’s 1/4-mile “Thunder Ring” featuring the Southern Superstars Short Track Series!

Admission is free with tickets to either the Great Clips 300 or the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series night race. Otherwise, admission is $10 and tickets will only be sold on the day of the event at the Gate 13 ticket window.

http://www.atlantamotorspeedway.com/events/labor_day_nascar_night_race_weekend_fan_event/

Sunday, September 5 Emory Healthcare 500

Race Day !! The 2nd of 2 Labor Day Weekend shows with Drivin N Cryin at Atlanta Motor Speedway! You’ve waited all year for it. Now, finally, it’s back! 500 miles of night racing on Atlanta Motor Speedway’s fast high banks – the Emory Healthcare 500! Come see the best drivers in all of NASCAR battle it out for 500 miles under the lights on Labor Day weekend! It’ll be the biggest Labor Day Party in the USA, and you’ve gotta be here to see it! Stay tuned: more details to follow soon.

http://www.atlantamotorspeedway.com/events/labor_day_classic_500/

Click HERE to redeem your MP3s

There are a couple of ways to check them out: Click HERE to view the video game demos or click on the Drivin N Cryin RBN logo on the right side of this page to purchase the downloads on the RBN website. Rock ‘em out and let us know what you think!!

And as a heads-up to you insiders, yes we’re going to develop some of the older stuff for release later this year. We’re thinking ‘Fly Me,’ ‘Honeysuckle’ and ‘Let’s Go Dancing.’ Let us know what you’d like to have.

By JOE VANHOOSE - Athens Banner-Herald

Published Thursday, August 12, 2010

Most thoughts of Kevn Kinney are served with a shot of straight adrenaline. Kinney is pounding rock ‘n’ roll, cranked-up amps and crowded honky tonks.

But there is a different side to the leader of Atlanta-based Drivin’ ‘N’ Cryin’, a side that is sharp in songwriting and soft in structure.

This Saturday at The Melting Point, that Kevn Kinney will take to the stage. And he’ll have some notable friends with him, too, like renowned guitarist Gibb Droll and ex-Sugar member David Barbe.

“I know it’s listed as a folk show, but I’m too reckless to keep it only folk,” said Kinney, who now lives in New York. “I tend to surprise myself up on stage.”

Kinney’s solo performances are much different than his work with Drivin’ ‘N’ Cryin’, which celebrates its silver anniversary in October. Kinney tends to lean on his lyrics a little more and undress his more popular songs a bit.

He keeps these shows more casual, tells more stories and isn’t above taking requests.

“It’s a chance for me as a songwriter to try some new things,” he said. “It’s open for interpretation.”

But it is not Drivin’ ‘N’ Cryin’. These songs are more mature, even if they’re songs Kinney wrote once upon a time when he wasn’t so mature.

“I wrote words when I thought I knew what they meant,” he said. “Now I know what they mean, and they sound even better.”

http://onlineathens.com/stories/081210/mar_693687111.shtml

Atlanta, GA – August 11, 2010  by Chris Martin

This week has been one of the best weeks for live music in a long time. Built To Spillplayed the Buckhead Theatre, Green Day tore up Gwinnett Arena, Spoon and Arcade Fire bring their tunes to Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers rock Philips Arena. While each and every one of these shows is top notch, on Friday the 13th, Drivin’ N Cryin’ (DNC) rolls into Chastain Park to end the week of tunes with a show of their own.

Supporting their new record, Whatever Happened to the Great American Bubble Factory, the boys from DNC won’t disappoint. They will hit the stage running, blasting through tunes new and old, engaging your ears with good old fashioned, ear banging, beer swilling southern rock n roll.

If you are a fan of old or new to the band, come enjoy the classic tunes like“Honeysuckle Blue”, “Fly Me Courageous”,“Build A Fire” and “Straight To Hell” and enjoy the new stuff from the new record, “Detroit City”, “Preapproved, Predenied”, “I See Georgia” and “I Stand Tall”. Either way it is a win/win situation.

Also, 38 Special will be sharing the stage rolling through their list of hits for all to jam too.

So leave your picnic basket at home and come rock out at Chastain this Friday, this ain’t no wine and cheese show baby.

WHO: Drivin N Cryin & 38 Special
WHEN: Friday, August 13th.
WHERE: Chastain Park Amphitheatre

http://ww.examiner.com/x-11431-Atlanta-Live-Music-Examiner~y2010m8d11-Drivin-n-Cryin-brings-some-good-ol-rocknroll-to-Chastain

By Andrew W. Griffin

Red Dirt Report, editor

Posted: July 23, 2010

reddirtreporter@gmail.com

Kevn Kinney, lead singer of the Georgia rock band Drivin’ N’ Cryin’, has a voice that over the years has grown noticeably more nasal and somewhat on the annoying side. Yes, this is a difficult admission to make but it is the awful truth. Kinney is not Barry White and never will be. He’s not even Chris Robinson. He’s just a guy who has been pounding away in this mixed-bag-of-a-classic-styled-rock-band for 25 years now and has proven that he has the stones to mix rock, blues, folk and country into a very distinctive sound.

That said, last year, Kinney and his band – including bassist Tim Nielsen, guitarist Mac Carter and drummer Dave V. Johnston got together and recorded Great American Bubble Factory. And what you hear, as Kinney noted in a recent interview, is that it is a “working class operetta” that uses Drivin’ N’ Cryin’s distinctive mix of rock, punk, blues, folk and country – Americana – to get their message across.

And it’s not a particuarly sunny message. Kinney and the boys are upset over the course of the 12 songs onBubble Factory. The recent economic collapse is wreaking havoc on just about everybody. Kinney focuses on the small towns and the factory towns in a way that Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel and many others did over a quarter-century ago.

The sax-fueled power pop of the title track, “(Whatever Happened to the) Great American Bubble Factory” is Kinney’s way of asking, “Where has our manufacturing base gone?” “Why do we have to get everything from China, like a container of bubbles down at the dollar store?” These are good questions and Kinney is one of the few in modern music asking them.

Times are tough. Kinney knows that. Just check out “Preapproved, Predenied,” a song that could have been just as easily recorded by fellow Georgians the Drive-By Truckers as it was with DNC. Kinney truly feels for the down-n-outters, the marginalized and the ones that are simply ignored by the politicians and plutocrats. Another great Kinney number.

Shades of Paul Westerberg can be heard on “Midwestern Blues” or the Replacements-styled “The Hardest Part,” while Kinney’s folkier side is evident on the mandolin-infused “Don’t You Know That I Know That You Know?” and the superb “This Town,” a song that showcases Kinney’s love of small-town America. One of the best in the DNC catalog.

While the lyrics to “I Stand Tall,” an old Dictators song, are a bit cheesy and on the anthemic side, it’s a punchy song that works well on this collection.

And while we’re on the subject of Kinney’s love of America, let’s note “Detroit City,” a shout-out to the Motor City that has certainly seen better days. Drivin’ N’ Cryin’ are in full AC/DC mode on this track.

And while I love classic DNC albums like ’89’s Mystery Road or 91’s Fly Me Courageous, Great American Bubble Factory has it’s own charm and a finger on the pulse of what is happening in America right now.

Oh, and Kinney’s voice will grow on you after repeated listenings. The album is really that good. Don’t miss Great American Bubble Factory.

Grade - B+

For more information go to www.drivinncryin.com.

Copyright 2010 West Marie Media

Mobile Press-Register

You don’t hear much studio on Drivin N Cryin’s newest studio album. From the gritty guitars to frontman Kevn Kinney’s distinctive rasp, the sound is direct and to the point. You aren’t left wondering what the music will sound like live.

When Kinney and the rest of the band roll into Mobile on Friday for a show at Soul Kitchen, it’ll sound just like this: One measure of no-frills rock, one measure of folk and two measures of blue-collar blues, topped off with that voice, which first hit so many ears as the defiant yelp of “Straight to Hell.”

Kinney and the band have covered a lot of miles since that breakthrough single, a track on 1989’s “Mystery Road.” The next album, 1991’s “Fly Me Courageous” was a foray into hard rock. Several albums later, after a self-titled 1997 release, the band basically quit recording.

Kinney stayed busy with a series of solo albums (including “Broken Hearts and Auto Parts,” a 2002 excursion into country) and side projects, such as the Kevn Kinney Band and the Sun Tangled Angel Revival.

But the same players often were involved, even on projects that didn’t bear the Drivin N Cryin name; and the band never stopped touring. When the time finally seemed right for a new Drivin N Cryin release, Kinney wanted to showcase that live prowess.

“We haven’t had a record out for 12 years,” he said. “We decided to go back in the studio and do something fresh and do something new.”

“Our focus was, let’s not reinvent the wheel here,” he said. “Let’s give our fans — ‘our fans’ in quotes — for people who know who Drivin N Cryin is, let’s give them their record. Let’s give them a record that sounds like the band.”

The result was “(Whatever Happened to) The Great American Bubble Factory.” Kinney’s underdog viewpoint remains intact, with song names including “Midwestern Blues” and “Preapproved, Predenied.”

On a facetious level, the name of the title track comes from Kinney’s observation that, apparently, outsourcing has gone so far that even the soapy solution children use to blow bubbles has to be manufactured in another country.

On a deeper level, the album draws an arc from the recession of the late ’70s, when Kinney came of age in the industrial Midwest, to the current era.

“A lot of the songs on it are fun to sing because they’re kind of topical,” he said. “It’s really, ‘whatever happened to the great American factory?’ I just didn’t want to make it sound too heavy.”

One thing about the album that Kinney enjoys is that it’s the band’s first full-length studio work to feature guitarist Mac Carter and drummer Dave V. Johnson — “the new guys, meaning they’ve been with us since 1998.” The lineup is rounded out by founding bassist Tim Nielsen.

Another is that, yes, it sounds like Drivin N Cryin, a unique fusion of rock and folk, carrying songs that often touch on Kinney’s youth in the fading industrial landscape of Milwaukee but still come out sounding Southern.

With so many irons in the fire, how does Kinney know when the song he’s writing belongs to Drivin N Cryin?

“I make a conscious effort to compartmentalize it,” he said. “I really don’t know why I do that.”

“I can’t remember if Drivin N Cryin is the main project or the side project,” he said. But this much is certain: “I think Drivin N Cryin is the most fun, of all the things I do.” It’s the one where he’s most in his comfort zone.

And that means, among other things, that he has no compunction about delving into the band’s classic material.

“It’s like doing a book reading or something. We just try to include one chapter from all of our books,” he said. “We always play the songs that people love. We’re just a bunch of entertainers, you know.”

http://blog.al.com/entertainment-press-register/2010/07/drivin_n_cryin_brings_bubble_f.html

by Chris Martin for The Examiner

http://www.examiner.com/x-11431-Atlanta-Live-Music-Examiner~y2010m7d8-Kevn-Kinney-The-Madison-Square-Gardeners-and-friends-a-five-hour-music-frenzy-on-a-Tuesday-night?cid=exrss-Atlanta-Live-Music-Examiner

This past Tuesday night, July 6th, at the Dark Horse Tavern/10 high Club I was witness to one awesome collection of musicians to jam together on one stage.Kevn Kinney brought his Shayni Rae’s Truckstop, previously rooted in NYC, to Atlanta, and it delivered big time.

Starting at 9pm, Kevn, ever the gracious host called out names right and left, and performers came out of the woodwork for their time on stage. Some to help out, some to spotlight their tunes, some to jam, some to melt faces but all to be a part of the this, for lack of better words I will quote my lil’ bro & friends, HAM JAM (this is a good thing). The whole concept was pretty damn sweet; most acts performing a song or 3 with a pretty sweet all out jam at the end of the night, which ended up being 2am. That is right five hours of ear busting, foot stomping, and beer drinking tunes. Kevn needs to take this show on the road.

The night started fast with bands like the Hooligans (I believe that is what they were called) and Ocha La Rocha, rocking hard, then on to a lady who jammed some rockabilly and sweet soulful country. One minute you were standing next to a dude or dudette who was drinking a Pabst and smokin’ a cig, the next minute they were singing about the devil up on stage. The performers kept coming, David Franklin did a few tunes, first time I have heard him sing in years, Abby Owens belted out a few folksy country tunes, she had a great voice and it didn’t hurt she was easy to look at. Connor Christian and Jeff Spirko knocked out a couple of songs that got your foot stompin’; Pete Stein only gave us one song, in my opinion that was not enough from Pete. Matt Wood got up with his guitar and belted out a tune, “Johnny Ray Dupree”, an exceptional tune one of the best of the night, and Cayle Davis sang “Clowns”, a humorous tune about being in love with a clown.

The Back Row Baptists took the stage and were pretty damn incredible. Out of Alabama, armed with a stand up bass and their own washboard player their own brand of country, folk and jug band music kicked ass. Chris Porter’s vocals were gritty and soulful. Their tunes about cooking crystal meth and the devil were sweet. Their southern influenced lyrics definite harkens to some of the Drive By-Truckers tunes.

The Madison Square Gardeners were every bit as good as advertised. This was my first time seeing them live, and their power pop/rock tunes play just as well in person as on their albums. Aaron Lee Tasjan wowed the crowd with jangly guitar licks and pop lyrics comparable to Cheap Trick and Material Issue. The 6 piece MSG’ers delivered big time. Rich Hinman, their pedal steel guitarist added a nice touch to their tunes, and he was the hardest working man of the night, I am pretty sure he was on stage with every act that performed. I would definitely like to see the Gardener’s come back and do a full show on their own, possibly at the Earl or Smith’s Olde Bar.

Kevn Kinney was the head honcho of the night. He hosted, introduced everyone, played two sets of his own, played harmonica and sang a little back up all while tossing out his usual form of witty banter with the crowd. Kevn joined the stage with old pal Tim Nielsen (Drivin N Cryin), Aaron Tasjan(MSG’ers) and Anton Fier (produced Whisper Tames the Lion). They TORE IT UP! While I had seen the other three before, I had no idea that Aaron was that good of a guitar player. They did a version of Drivin N Cryin’s Powerhouse that just flat out kicked ass.

To end the night Kevn came back out and jammed some more tunes with collection of performers that had already graced the stage. It was a full on jam. At one point Aaron Lee Tasjan and Laney Strickland traded guitar licks during one of the best live versions of “A Good Country Mile” and “Which Jesus” I have ever treated my ears to. Kevn hit the nail on the head when he said it was “reminiscent of an Allman Brothers Show” At the end he gave the crowd what many came to see, the usual all in rendition of Straight To Hell. While some love it and some hate it, it seemed a fitting end to a five hour night of jamming tunes.

While the entire night was great from start to finish, there was a guy who really stuck out, Laney Strickland. I had never heard of him before, Kevn called him up on stage, he played a couple of his tunes which were good, but his guitar playing was incredible. He had a southern/bluesy feel to his shredding, and as many said, he melted faces with his jamming.

One of the best shows I have ever seen and I hope they all do it again. Again, maybe take it on tour all over, and get the gospel to the masses.

Kevn and the MSG’ers treated NYC with 75 weeks of the Truckstop, how about a run like that here in Atlanta? If you missed then you definitely missed out, and it was only $5, not bad.

If you did not get to view this sweet jam session, then check out the bands that played, trust me you will dig their tunes and want to pick them up for yourself.