To mark the final two shows of Tedeschi Trucks Band’s thrilling six-show run at the Beacon Theatre, we present the full cover story from our January_February issue written in the wake of their latest record Let Me Get By. 

It’s 30 minutes to showtime, and Derek Trucks is uncomfortable.

This is not to say that he’s anxious about the events about to unfold onstage before a capacity house at the ornate Providence Performing Arts Center. He’s good-natured and imperturbable as the minutes count down until the 12-piece Tedeschi Trucks Band will embark on their third show of a brief early-December tour.

Instead, Trucks is experiencing some physical discomfort, the result of a major surgery two weeks earlier. The series of horizontal scars across his torso attests to the gravity of his recent operation, in which surgeons at the Mayo Clinic removed a 4-inch benign tumor from the base of his spine. He entered the hospital in his native Jacksonville, Fla., on the day he returned from a November European tour in order to give himself the maximum recovery time (albeit a scant two weeks) before the December dates.

Still, Trucks acknowledges that he did not fully anticipate the physical toll on his body, wrought from live performance. “The last four or five days before I left home, I would get up, put a guitar on and walk around the house for 30-40 minutes just to feel it out. I wouldn’t think that just going under the knife would wipe out my stamina overnight, but the first show that we did [at Port Chester, N.Y.’s Capitol Theatre] was a two-set show, and toward the end of the second set, I started to get a little woozy and thought, ‘Well, that’s different.’ I also had a finger lock up on me, which I’ve never had happen. I guess since my body was going into healing mode, the other stuff didn’t work quite right.”

Yet even in the face of that locked finger, he maintained his equanimity. “It worked out,” he adds with a laugh, “because I figured, ‘I’ve got these nine other ones that work fine.’ But for a moment there, I was thinking, ‘What is happening? Oh, shit!’ The shows were fun, though. I was surprised by how good it felt to play, to the point where I would get lost in the moment, and I wouldn’t realize that I was leaning in and all the wounds are right where the guitar sits.”

His wife, TTB vocalist and fellow guitar player Susan Tedeschi reflects: “Derek is just a trooper. Most people would have cancelled. I know people who have cancelled for much less—for hair gel in their eye, or if their voice is weak or something silly. So, to have major surgery and be out touring, just shows you who he is, and how determined he is for this band and how much he loves this group. He’s not out there trying to make a buck; he’s trying to do something significant. He’s a great leader, and he shows us that it’s worth the hard work. He pulls us closer together.”
Both Trucks and Tedeschi have done just that during a banner year in which they recalibrated the roles and personnel in their big band, crossed the nation with Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings on their Wheels of Soul summer tour, and embraced their spiritual origins by performing a special tribute to Mad Dogs & Englishmen at Lockn’, all the while tuning up their third studio album, Let Me Get By—set for release in late January—which TTB’s members uniformly suggest reflects a new vitality and vision for the group.

Tedeschi Trucks Band’s 2015 began much like the previous few Januarys, as the group assembled at Swamp Raga Studios, located behind Derek and Susan’s house in Jacksonville. Historically, these sessions have allowed the band to reconnect and prepare for their mid-month appearance at Florida’s Sunshine Music Festival, which the group has anchored since the event began in 2012.

For a few years, the band performed on New Year’s Eve, but they gave up the spectacle—and payday—back in 2011. “Halloween and New Year’s have become such a circus, especially in our scene,” Trucks explains. “We would put so much time and energy into working things up and then we’d look out front and everyone was hammered. Something was lost—it was not this symbiotic thing. I’d rather be home with my family enjoying the new year. We don’t take many breaks, and lately, mid-December to mid-January has been the no-go zone. It’s a nice time of year in North Florida—it’s cool but not too cold. Maybe, eventually, we’ll start doing a hometown New Year’s again, but I felt like it was getting a little silly. For some groups, it’s great, and they thrive off of that energy. But I don’t like watching people vomit in the crowd during the show. I played frat parties when I was a kid. I’ve done that.”

Trucks, who turned 36 in June, has long moved past the era when he was hailed as a prodigy, typically lumped in with such blues-guitar tyros as Joe Bonamassa, Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Jonny Lang. (During this period, the media typically linked them in such a way that one can imagine Trucks recoiling from any number of proposed photo shoots, in which they were all to be dressed as Wild West gunslingers, gripping vintage guitars across their chaps.) He married Susan Tedeschi in 2001 and they welcomed their son, Charlie, the next year, followed by daughter Sophia in 2004. The two musicians then juggled solo careers, even as Trucks balanced careers within his solo career, finding time for the Derek Trucks Band, the Allman Brothers Band and Eric Clapton’s touring group. The Tedeschi Trucks Band came together in 2010 after they tested the waters with a blended Soul Stew Revival tour in the summer of 2008. The then-11-piece group, with all of its attendant expenses, defiantly elevated musical intentions above financial considerations.

The band released two studio albums and a live record with Sony, winning a Best Blues Album Grammy for their debut, 2011’s Revelator. Still, a major-label deal comes with sales expectations independent of critical approbation and swelling live appeal. So when the TTB returned to Swamp Raga early in 2015, they were free agents. In response, the band made a commitment to close the circle and deliver a record on their own terms, produced by Trucks, and recorded by longtime engineer and stage tech Bobby Tis. For the first time on a Tedeschi Trucks Band record, the material was all written in house. (Doyle Bramhall II, an extended family member who first toured with Trucks in Clapton’s band and played on this past summer’s Wheels of Soul dates, joined the group for some sessions.)

“For our second record [2013’s Made Up Mind], the label seemed pretty insistent about bringing in other writers,” says Mike Mattison, who shares backing vocal duties. (Until the recent addition of singer Alecia Chakour, he and Mark Rivers were The Pips to Tedeschi’s Gladys Knight.) “They were certainly talented, but in my opinion, there are about 12 people called in such situations and that took us away from what made us unique, which is a large band full of different perspectives. So on some level, there was a feeling that this material wasn’t altogether ours, that we were a huge-moving cover band. And so it made sense to rethink it and tack back, particularly with such a big group, to keep everybody focused and cohesive and in it.

“This record goes places and that’s because it’s coming from us. We’re the source of it. We didn’t have to position ourselves for singles or hits. With this band, I don’t think that will ever happen, so let’s take that thinking off the table and just do what we do. That’s important because it’s very freeing.”
Tyler “Falcon” Greenwell, one half of the TTB’s drumming tandem and a veteran of Tedeschi’s touring outfit, affirms: “The band has been around for five or six years, and we’re really just now learning how to play with each other. I’m excited about the new direction because we’re learning how to write together and that’s another whole thing. We have guys who can play out in the avant-garde or inside, and Derek has had to focus this behemoth. The question then becomes: How are we going to truly create our sound? And the way you do that is by writing together. That’s where you develop your stamp, your mark in music.”

Trucks helped to initiate the collaborative songwriting process by encouraging everyone to record any interesting jams that emerged during their soundchecks, which became particularly lively after bass player Tim Lefebvre officially joined in the fall of 2013. Lefebvre, a self-described “fast-talking Yankee in this Southern band,” worked with Wayne Krantz for many years and, through the bassist’s association with drummer Mark Guiliana, appears on another anticipated January release, David Bowie’s Blackstar.

“The vibe was incredible, having somebody like that sing with you,” he says of working with Bowie on the Blackstar sessions. “We were in the same room and there’s not much separation in The Magic Shop, where we recorded. If it was anybody else, then I would have blown off the other project, but with Bowie, it’s history. I had to keep it under wraps, although I told the band. Derek and Susan were so cool when it came to scheduling, and I’ll always be thankful for that.”

As for Let Me Get By, eventually acquired by the Concord Music Group for release through its Fantasy imprint, Lefebvre explains, “A song like ‘Laugh About It’ came out of a soundcheck jam, so even though I know it’s in 7/4, it makes sense to me and it really resonates with this group of players. You can hear it in the tone of the record. When you co-write, it becomes more personal for you—you feel like you’re invested, and because the band is your family, even with the songs you didn’t write, you feel like you’re completely in it.”

Tedeschi and Trucks were so willing to follow the muse in this collaborative endeavor that in two instances on the record, Mattison contributes lead vocals. As he describes it, “To my mind, when I was singing ‘Crying Over You’ and ‘Right On Time,’ I was just singing demos for Susan. Then they said to me: ‘That’s good, do you want to keep it?’ I said, ‘OK,’ and because of the way it happened, I didn’t overly craft the performance. It just flowed naturally, which again, is part of the story of the record.”
Tedeschi explains that her own vocals took on newfound nuance and bite with her husband in the producer’s chair. “Over the years, I’ve never really had anybody produce me. It was always really frustrating because I had been told that these were great producers, but they never really worked with me on my vocals. Derek is the first one to actually have the guts to say: ‘Hey, maybe you should rethink this’ or ‘Maybe don’t sing this so belty’ or ‘Try this.’ I really appreciate it because I have somebody who I really care about who is giving me good advice, and I know I can trust him because he hears stuff that other people just don’t.”

That’s not to suggest that the affable singer is a pushover when it comes to the studio. “There are certain lyrics that are cheesy that I just won’t sing. I am funny about that but, thankfully, we don’t write those kinds. Years ago, I had an old band member who wrote a song for me and it was talking about how I should wear a red dress and it was Valentine’s Day and all this stuff, and I said, ‘No, I’m not doing that.’” She laughs. “I just can’t sing about how I’m going to put on a sexy dress for you… A song has to have some type of a meat to it, some kind of meaning. It can’t just be fluff and it isn’t with this band.”

Mattison carries a wry and often somewhat pessimistic worldview that is reflected in some of the lyrics on the new record—in “Crying Over You,” he sings, “If the grass is greener, I think it might be chemical”—but he is altogether sanguine and sincere in his assessment of Let Me Get By. “I’m not running down the first two records. I’m not saying that the songs on those first two records aren’t great.” (Indeed, one of the songs that he contributed to Revelator, “Midnight In Harlem,” is destined to endure as a standard.) “But I think that having that sense of ownership when you’re a touring band out there every night is essential. This feels like our first record. It feels like our statement and we own it and it’s exciting.”

Backstage in Providence, the band crackles with energy in anticipation of their imminent performance. Strolling through the halls with his Gibson around his neck, Trucks runs his fingers over the strings deftly, almost absently. Tedeschi calls him into a few brief exchanges with friends and relatives, while tour manager Chris King confirms the 15-minute warning. Through it all, he remains cordial and nonchalant beyond his active hands, as he takes a moment to reflect on his family and the path that led him to this moment.

“People will show up sometimes with photos of me playing as a kid, and I look just like my son. It’s a total trip. I remember early on, especially having to travel in the blues circuit and the club circuit at a young age, a lot of people asked my dad, ‘You’re letting your son do this?’ like it was this awful, taboo thing. But where else are you going to learn how to do it? There’s a football field if you play football, there’s a baseball field if you play baseball and there’s a stage if you play live music. This is where you cut your teeth. If you happen to get in too early, there is still no other place to do it. The camps and the Schools of Rock and all that is good, but there’s nothing like getting up with grizzled, old-ass musicians, who are lifers and will tell you if you’re good or bad. That’s how you learn and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

“But I was lucky because my dad is a unique character. He didn’t shield me from everything; he shielded me from just enough. But he wanted me to know what was going on, too. It was just on the edge of unruly, but they were great lessons. Even at 13, 14, 15, I would see corrupted people and watch their lives nosedive. Maybe I didn’t know exactly which substance they were doing, but I knew it wasn’t beer and it wasn’t whiskey and it wasn’t weed. So I learned: ‘Well, some things should not be messed with.’ I would see the course of people’s lives. I knew a lot of musicians who had families, but then they’d just become road dogs, and I was like, ‘That looks like fun…’ But then, ‘Oh, wow, that didn’t turn out very well.’ For a decade, when I was 11-21, this was my education, I could see who lived a good life. I think that about my kids, too. I don’t want to shield them from everything. There are lessons out there that you don’t learn in normal channels.”

Trucks also speaks of the musical tutelage he acquired during this era. He emphasizes that his connection with Col. Bruce Hampton, Jimmy Herring “and the team was a game-changer for me.”

Greenwell is another Hampton disciple. The drummer, who played with The Codetalkers for a few years, describes how Hampton’s approach is echoed in the TTB. “It’s a tightrope every night, in the best of all ways,” he says. “When I played with Col. Bruce, he preached relentlessly: intention, intention, intention. It doesn’t matter if you’re the greatest musician in the world, if your intention is for shit, then what’s the reason? Derek is all about intentions. If you come off stage feeling like you had a shitty night, Derek really doesn’t care as long as your intention is coming from a pure place. That’s all that really matters with him, and just bringing it. I’ve never seen a musician who can create a sonic atmosphere like he can. Playing double drums behind him is incredible. People talk about going to 11—well, he goes to 12. Just when you think he can’t go anywhere, or do anything else, then he does.”
“You can’t be complacent and just sit there,” adds fellow TTB drummer J.J. Johnson, “you’ve got to dig deep. There are a lot of unspoken expectations. And that’s just the beauty of how Derek leads his band. He is one of the most elusive, silent leaders until he sometimes says something, but he does that very rarely. He lets people find it and go with it. He trusts you to go on the journey and try different things.”

Trucks accomplishes that not only by leading through example and unspoken assumption but also by directing the group through eye contact and facial expressions on the fly.

“It can turn on a dime so you really have to be paying attention,” Mattison explains. “It would be interesting to create a dictionary of Derek’s non-verbal cues. There are good ones and bad ones. You don’t want to see this one…” He produces a slight scowl and a subtle negative nod of the head. “But sometimes you do…” he laughs.

“When the stage lighting has been bad, I’ve missed a few cues,” Lefebvre admits. “Nobody’s trying to trick anybody but Derek’s a real improviser and if it’s one of those nights where he’s changing things, that can happen. One night in Europe during ‘Sticks And Stones,’ he dropped out of a chorus early and I couldn’t see him cue it out, so I blew the cue. This happens, but that’s him changing it up.”

Greenwell affirms: “He’s directing the band with subtle movements, like a little guitar nod. And everyone’s focused—there’s a serious focus going on. By virtue of what we’re doing as a band, we have our good nights and we have our bad nights, but even on our bad nights, the focus and attention is as pure as anything I’ve ever been in. We trust in what Derek and Susan are doing here. Who’s putting together 12-piece bands these days? Only crazy people…”

For the first five years of Tedeschi Trucks Band, Derek and Susan held the roster firm at 11, but they added vocalist Alecia Chakour this past summer. (And no, musicians don’t come cheaper by the dozen.) Chakour visited the band at Swamp Raga along with Eric Krasno when they were touring in the region with Lettuce. (Krasno, while best known as Soulive’s guitarist, put in a stint with the TTB on bass between founding member Oteil Burbridge and Lefebvre). Chakour eased some of the vocal strain on Mattison and Rivers, who had been singing slightly above their natural registers. Chakour’s then-fiancé, now-husband Cochemea “Cheme” Gastelum was on the Wheels of Soul tour as part of Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, so it seemed like a fitting moment to amplify the joyful noise.

 “Having her voice really makes it sound more like a choir behind us,” Tedeschi declares. “Mike and Mark, on their own, have such big voices, and then Alecia has a big voice, and for the three of them to really project, they can be as powerful as a horn section or a small choir. So the combination of horns, singers and the two drummers is more like an orchestra because we have a lot more options musically. Alecia is just so sweet and she fits in. She knows how to be on the road with a bunch of guys, and so does Elizabeth. It’s not the kind of gig for just anybody. You really have to be a certain type of person and be gifted as well.”
The Elizabeth who Tedeschi references is the band’s new trombone player, Elizabeth Lea. The summer tour also marked the final shows with original trombonist Saunders Sermons and saxophone player Maurice Brown. “Maurice and Saunders are super talented guys, but I don’t know if the chemistry was ever 100 percent right,” Trucks reflects. “We live out here and we spend so much of our lives together as a band that if the chemistry isn’t happening, then it’s better to get it right. So, it was kind of a band decision and those things are never easy, especially if you’ve been together for a long time. But sometimes, for the health of the whole thing, you just have to make a move. In the end, it’s good for everybody.”

Lea—who has worked with Nikka Costa, Vampire Weekend and Dakah Hip-Hop Orchestra over the years, and also contributed to an Eric Clapton album which features Trucks and Bramhall, 2010’s Clapton—entered the fold through Lefebvre, who remembered performing with her on the West Coast. Johnson and Doyle Bramhall both suggested trumpet player Ephraim Owens (Erykah Badu, Mumford & Sons, Jimmie Vaughan). “Ephraim is a guy that we’ve known for a while and, in some ways, it was like the way it had been with Kebbi [Williams, the TTB sax player and lone brass section stalwart],” Trucks adds. “Before he joined, he was just somebody that I was going out of my way to see.

“I’ve definitely noticed a closeness in the band since the new lineup came together. That has definitely shifted. It’s hard when you’re trying to get 12 people on the same page—that’s an undertaking. But I feel that with this group of individuals, on a good night, everybody is just in it. That’s hard to do with a four-piece band, let alone 12 musicians, so we’re thrilled. When you look across the stage after the show is over, everybody’s talking about the same thing and everybody’s head is in the same thing. That’s what you’re after.”

The first performance by the current Tedeschi Trucks Band roster didn’t feature 12 players but well over two-dozen musicians. On Sept. 11, 2015, the TTB celebrated the late Joe Cocker and the 1970 Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour alongside original bandleader Leon Russell and other personnel from those shows, including Rita Coolidge, Claudia Lennear, Chris Stainton, Bobby Torres and Chuck Blackwell. (Dave Mason, Warren Haynes, Chris Robinson, John Bell, Bramhall and other guests also participated in the tribute.) The performance offered a stirring blend of raw emotion and crackerjack musicianship that continues to resonate for the TTB.

“We learned a lot because it’s a similar setup,” Mattison observes, “and how they did the arranging was so effective. For the first few years, we’d just throw everything at it, and there were times that the horns and the harmony voices were trying to do the same thing, so we were missing an opportunity to really treat it orchestrally. Learning that material and seeing how they pieced it together has helped us. Everyone was also so present and accomplished and just nice. The singers had an old-school sense of performance and professionalism. Plus, the stories they would tell were hilarious because that was the peak of debauched hippiedom.”

On this last point, Trucks affirms: “Sometimes I walked into a conversation and wondered, ‘Should I be hearing this?’” He cracks up at the memory and then offers a serious reflection. “I don’t think it turned out the way it should have for them originally, and I’m not sure they realized how important that record was for a lot of people. So that was a little bit of redemption and it was pretty special. It had a bit of that feeling when we did the last show with the Allman Brothers, but this was different because it hadn’t happened for 35 years. Everybody in our band put in a lot of effort before anyone showed up because we just wanted it to be right.”

Although Leon Russell may have seemed stoic and reserved from the audience’s perspective, those around him have indicated it was the most animated he had been in years. Russell took a deep liking to the group and subsequently penned some compositions for Tedeschi.

She expresses her admiration for the spirit and intent of the entire original collective and then singles out Russell. “I was really excited to hear him do ‘The Ballad of Mad Dogs and Englishmen’ at the end. He just decided to do it and it wasn’t rehearsed. He didn’t tell anybody, and it was just a beautiful, special moment. That was really exciting and emotional. And hearing Claudia go up and do ‘Girl from the North Country’ with Leon was another special moment. She just wanted to please him, and he just wanted her to be happy, and it was just so cute to see the love and respect for each other and how much fun they were having.”

The performance also carried additional significance as the 1970 road show is embedded in the Tedeschi Truck Band’s DNA. “When we were talking about putting this band together, Susan and I got the Mad Dogs movie on DVD,” Trucks recalls. “We watched it at home, and I thought: ‘Now that would be fun!’ There was something about the whole scene. I had been thinking about the Dominos and Sly, but that’s when it dawned on me: ‘If we’re ever gonna do the traveling circus, now is the time.’”

The circus has come to Providence, and the festivities are about to commence.
Before he enters the fray, Trucks concedes that he did have one major fear prior to surgery. “The tumor was smashed against one of my adrenal glands, and I wondered how it would affect me if the surgeon had to take the gland out. I know you have two, but what if, in the heat of the moment, I need to hit Star Wars warp speed and it doesn’t kick in. It would be like, ‘Son of a…’ But when I woke up in the recovery room, the surgeon came in and he was pumped. I could see in his face that he had nailed it. I could tell he is a total badass, and anytime you’re a badass, and you get challenged and you crush it, it’s a good feeling. It was a relief just seeing his face, like he hit a three-pointer with one second left. And maybe it’s psychological with all that stuff being behind me, but I also think there’s something about this band coming together in this moment, because the shows have just felt so inspiring.”

Johnson shares the perspective from his own particular vantage point: “The drummer’s seat is probably the best seat in the venue, as far as I’m concerned. I’m able to see things up close but hear the whole sound of the band too. I’m not only focused on the bass playing or the guitar or the keyboard—it’s everything. The vocals, the horns, I take it all in, it’s one sound. A lot of the time, I’m just getting in the zone but, on occasion, I’ll step outside of myself and realize, ‘This is pretty amazing.’ Everyone is putting in the time and being present. That makes me really proud to be part of something like this. It’s very important. I’ve never been a part of something that means so much.”

When asked if he has any advice for any fellow musicians who might want to take a 12-piece band on the road, Trucks quips, “Sell your house, sell your car and ready the divorce lawyer!” Then, he adds, “Seriously though, if there’s a sound in your head and it makes sense to do it, then I say go for it. The world is full of people playing it safe— we need more good crazy out there. I look across the board at so many groups, and even festivals, and you can tell that they’re doing this for the money, period. So it’s nice to see things where I know that’s not the case.

“When I see a band like The Wood Brothers, they are doing this because this is what they need to be doing—it’s the music they live and breathe. They could all be doing other things, but they’re doing this because it’s legit and real. That’s the stuff that we need more of. It’s such a cynical world we live in—if somebody wants to put a 12-piece band together, and they are crazy enough to do it, then I say all the more power to them.”