Chris Robinson 



Chris and Rich are the only children of Stan and Nancy Robinson. Both of their 

parents were former singers, and spent years as partners in a local clothing 

business in Atlanta. Stan had a single in the spring of 1959 that hit #83 on the 

charts, "Boom-a-Dip-Dip," on Monument Records. He opened shows for well-known 

musicians, such as Sam Cooke and Bill Haley and [His] Comets. After four years 

on the road, and finding no fame, he retired from the music business to settle 

in Atlanta. In 1965 he met Nashville native Nancy Bradley at a hootenanny and 

soon they married. While growing up the boys were introduced to a m‚lange of 

musical traditions. With such a family background it seemed natural that a 

passion for music would emerge, though it was not outwardly encouraged. "It's 

such a hard ass life," said Stan. "Once it became apparent they were good at it 

and determined, we supported them, but we would have rather seen them become 

doctors and lawyers, of course." 

"I couldn't tie my shoe until I was nine, but I knew how to work the stereo," 

said Chris. He had a voracious appetite for music and would buy copious 

quantities of records. Rich didn't have to go to the store to buy his music, but 

instead would go into Chris' room and borrow the ones he wanted to listen to. 

"As my older brother, he would go through the phases before I did. I'd take 

those records he was tired of and get into them myself, because he would change 

phases every five minutes," Rich remembered. 

As a boy Chris was shy, the boy always hiding behind his dad's coat. By his 

teens, he'd developed a loathing of all kinds of confrontations, to the point 

that he couldn't even order pizza over the phone. Nowadays, even calling room 

service freaks him out. "I was a total geek at school. Tall, horribly thin. 

Couldn't fight. I was dumb in class, got low grades-D's and F's-but I was always 

really funny. I could always get out of a really bad situation with humor. By 

the time I was a junior, I was an angry person. I never understood the rules, 

still don't." Growing up in Georgia, where he remembers other kids making you 

drink Jack Daniels, and if you got sick "they'd beat your ass," Chris was forced 

to perfect the art of wit, safe in his knowledge he could always lay them out 

verbally. 

Chris could use his wit to escape a bad situation, but he could never escape by 

lying. "I was such a bad liar, I'd come home and my parents would ask if I'd 

been drinking and I'd be like 'Mmmmmm, nooooo, well ..... yes.' I was fucking 

useless, the worst fucking liar in the world. 'Who did this?' 'Erm...him? 

erm..,' oh no, you're GUILTY! Now I just believe telling the truth is easier 

than lying-you tell one lie, you have to tell 15 others and then remember who 

you told what to. You're never gonna win-it's easier to tell the truth." 

At 16 "I'd been kicked off the basketball team for-ha!-having an attitude 

problem, believe it or not. My dad was so mad he made me join this league of 

dropout kids who'd never made a team. It was actually fun, but the first game I 

played this kid gave me a concussion." 

A year later in 1983, at the age of 17, Chris got his first instrument. "Mom and 

Dad call it 'Black Christmas' when I got my bass and Rich got a guitar," said 

Chris. "We had a musical family. I always wanted to do this, [but] I was always 

chicken. I couldn't play a note. I couldn't play like Bootsy Collins, but I 

could almost play like Paul Simonon of the Clash, so we formed a little punk 

band in the basement. Rich started learning to play but I couldn't figure out 

the bass to save my life. I didn't have the motor skills to pick up the guitar 

and I also didn't want to have to carry all that shit. Rich traded it and his 

guitar for a better guitar." 

"We ran into these other guys and started playing, and we weren't good enough to 

play other people's songs, so we had to write our own. Maybe that's where we 

honed in on what we could do. As limited as we were as musicians we knew that 

you had to make this interesting. You have to get your point across, so you're 

working in a certain framework, and that's where I think the base started." 

"So the years went by. It was about a year and we played a couple club dates, 

Rich was about 15 or 16 and then it was like waking up one day and realizing, 

'Oh wow, I'm addicted to this, I'm a junky, it's in my blood.' We took it 

another step; [we were] getting better, brought in a few guys. The band changed 

every six months-constantly. Trying to get the sound I think we [achieved in 

Shake Your Money Maker]." 

Once graduated from high school in 1984, Chris went to Georgia University and 

Wofford College in Spartansburg, South Carolina, both for a semester, majoring 

in English "to appease Mom and Dad." Music was still in his blood, and [school] 

didn't work out very well. Soon enough he was back home living with his parents. 

The day finally came, though, when "Dad came in my room one morning and said, 

'Look, Jack Kerouac, you want to be a rock star, you can sleep in the backyard.' 

In other words, if I wanted to live a free lifestyle, I was gonna have to do it 

somewhere else." Chris, who had recently befriended Steve Gorman, decided that 

perhaps their "sensibilities" were more compatible, and they moved in together. 

[written by Gail A. Heidel.] 

Sources: 

"The Black Crowes Go Higher," from Musician, February 20, 1991 

Rolling Stone, May 16, 1991 

"King Of Amorica," an interview with Chris, by Gina Moms; 

Select Magazine, December 1994/January 1995 





Rich Robinson 

"I have the same birthday as Bob Dylan. I grew up in the South. My Dad used to 

always play guitar for Chris and I when we were kids. I always listened to a lot 

of folk and bluegrass with my dad, because he knows how to play it for real. My 

dad was mainly a songwriter and singer. He went by his name, Stan Robinson, and 

had a folk band called the Appalachians. He had a few songs in the Top 40 (and 

entered the charts in 1963 with an acoustic version of "Bony Moronie"), toured 

with Phil Ochs, and he was on the "Alan Freed Show" and "American Bandstand." He 

used to play at the Ryman Auditorium at the Grand Ole Opry. [He also did some 

off-Broadway drama, began the Atlanta Renegades football club, and, while still 

singing, played semi-pro football]. My mom is from Nashville, and she used to 

sing, so she knows all the old folk and country songs. Sometimes I'll hear a 

song and recognize it from my mom singing it." 

"When I was 14 or 15 I started picking up my dad's favorite guitar, a really 

nice 1953 Martin D-28. I played it when Dad wasn't looking. To keep Chris and I 

from playing that guitar, he and mom bought me a little shitty Lotus Strat copy 

for Christmas and got Chris a bass. We played with our cousin, he was the 

drummer. We were into punk rock back then. There was a band in Atlanta called 

Neon Christ, so I had a Neon Christ sticker on my guitar. I didn't have the 

patience to try figure out someone else's songs, so I started writing music and 

Chris started writing lyrics. That's how the whole thing started. We didn't 

decide to be in a rock 'n roll band, we just assumed it. [Dad and Mom] totally 

stayed out of it. Our parents were big on letting us do what we wanted to do. 

Dad was protective at first because he didn't want us to get hurt, but always 

supportive." 

"The first stuff showed we'd liked the Cramps, the Dead Kennedys, the Effigies, 

Fear, and all those bands. It was punk-rocky, but we always had a pop thing 

going too. We liked the punk phase, but everyone goes through it, and it runs 

its course. And then with R.E.M. being big, and coming from the South, you heard 

a lot of alternative radio-real alternative, not 80 million listeners like it is 

today. It was what alternative is supposed to be: the alternative to commercial 

mainstream music. There were all these college stations that used to play bands 

like Rain Parade, R.E.M., the Three O'Clock, the dbs--who were big fans of the 

Long Riders, and Let's Active-[early R.E.M. producer] Mitch Easter's band-who, 

though they were supposedly an alternative band, used to do Zeppelin covers live 

like 'The Rover' and 'Dancing Days.' We also started listening to Big Star and 

Alex Chilton around then." 

"Nick Drake is one of my all time favorites. He's kind of what got me into open 

tunings, because he's just so.low. Especially his guitar tone and his picking, 

the subtleties that you can only pick out on acoustic, which is how I write." 

"I started with a double-dropped-D tuning, and I gradually tuned the A string to 

G, and it all started from there. Nick was the guy who got me into that. Then I 

started listening to blues and started seeing different ways to tune down. I 

like Lightnin' Hopkins and Furry Lewis. [Furry's] blues made me feel so good. 

It's just him and an acoustic. Lightnin' makes me feel good too, but he's a 

little meaner and less folky. You know 'Prodigal Son' on the Stones' Beggar's 

Banquet? Elements of that are definitely Furry's thing. Even his chord 

progressions make me smile, whereas someone like Mississippi Fred McDowell's 

kind of bums you out. McDowell's actually my favorite guitar player, but Furry's 

one of my favorites for his overall thing." 

While still in his "punk-rocky" period Rich went to five different prep and 

public schools before graduating. "My parents thought I wouldn't get bored if I 

changed scenery," Rich said. "It never helped." In recalling the early days [of 

the band] he said, "I just remember going to school, hanging out throughout the 

whole day, doing a little work here and there, going to lunch, and then leaving 

school, going to get my equipment-my guitars and stuff, putting them in the back 

of my car, going to soundcheck at 6:00, playing until 2:00 in the morning, going 

home to Mom and Dad's house, waking up and going back to school the next morning 

at like 8:00. I did that for three years. From the time I was 15 until the time 

we went on tour when I graduated. It was kind of a weird thing. It was always 

normal to me, but I guess I realized other kids didn't do it. [At the gig] 

they'd make me hide in the back so cops couldn't come and arrest me for being 

underage and being in there." 

Despite being known as "the Young Rich Robinson" in the Crowes' early days, Rich 

always seems to have had a wisdom beyond his age. Not only was he a songwriter 

and performer with the band, but until Pete Angelus became the band's manager in 

1990, Rich also took care of all the band's managerial responsibilities. 

"We had like 50 songs before we even started writing Money Maker. We did demos 

for A&M a bunch. The first song we wrote that was a full song was called 

"Umbrellas." It served its purpose. From there we went places and wrote better 

songs, luckily." 

"[Our song writing partnership] has always been the same. Chris has books and 

books of lyrics laying around everywhere. He always writes lyrics and words and 

lines and poems. And I'll write a song and pretty much complete it, and bring it 

to him, and he and I will work out melody, and then work on other parts. That's 

always how it's been. He's always had lyrics and sometimes he'll make up new 

lyrics, sometimes he'll think the song warrants some old lyrics. It's always 

been the same, but it's always been different." 

[compiled and written by Gail A. Heidel & Christopher B. Eddy] 

Sources: 

- interview with Rich transcribed from the "Hotel Illness" single, 1992 

- edited from an interview with Rich by James Rotondi; Guitar Player, January 

1995 

- edited from Rolling Stone; May 16, 1991



 

Steve Gorman 

Steve was raised in Sevema Park, Maryland until the age of 10, when he moved to 

Hopkinsville, Kentucky. He remained in Kentucky until the age of 21. He is the 

youngest of 5 brothers and 2 sisters. He is married and has two daughters. 

Steve began drumming in his school band in the fourth grade, playing the snare. 

He was originally asked to play the bells, but he "couldn't handle the bells." 

His first album was Two Years On, by the Bee Gees, which he won as a door prize 

at one of his brothers' basketball games. It wasn't until he was given the 

Beatles records Meet the Beatles, Help, and Rubber Soul all at once, that his 

musical fire was sparked and, as Steve said, "That's all she wrote." 

Ringo Starr is Steve's number one favorite drummer, but he has said he can "cop 

something useful from almost anyone. You have to figure out your role in your 

own band. I'm a fan of musical drumming. John Bonham, I really liked his feel, 

Charlie Watts, Jody Stevens, there's so many." 

Steve continued to play music. At Western Kentucky University, as a freshman, he 

began playing a friend's drum kit. In college he played only three gigs in three 

years, all of which were at his school's New Year's Eve party. 

Steve began to get serious, and in February of 1987, at the age of 21, he took a 

friend's advice and moved to Atlanta, Georgia. To make ends meet he worked at a 

record store in Little Five Points. He met Chris through a mutual friend, James 

Hall, and they quickly became best friends and moved in together. Steve and 

James' group, Mary My Hope, shared a house and rehearsal space with Mr. Crowes 

Garden. Chris and Rich became unhappy with their second drummer, Jeff Sullivan, 

who later joined Drivin' and Cryin', and fired him because of a "rocky 

relationship." Without a drummer, Steve was asked to sit in for the recording of 

their A&M Records demo in late 1986/early 1987. "So we went up there and after 

the first night," said Chris, "and it was like 'Steve, you're kinda in the band' 

and he's like, 'Yeah, I know.'" It was very informal, but he was in, becoming 

the first member of the present Crowes line-up to join the Robinson brothers. 

[based on an interview with Steve by Jenna Skopp, written by Christopher B. 

Eddy.] 





Ed Harsch 

Eddie was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where he was raised through his 

teens. He remembers that in his earliest years there was always a piano in the 

house, although by some strange parental logic, he wasn't allowed to begin 

playing until the age of five. Even before he had permission to play, Ed had the 

music jones, and has been devoted to the instrument ever since, though he now 

owns a guitar, bass, and drums. 

The first records that he owned were the singles for "Hot Fun in the Summertime" 

by Sly and the Family Stone and "Hot Smoke and Sassafrass" by Bubble Puppy. A 

friend named Boris gave Eddie his first LPs, Electric Ladyland by Jimi Hendrix 

and Live at the Fillmore East by the Allman Brothers Band, and he "was in love!" 

These recordings must have done a lot to inspire his classic organ-based sound. 

Referring to his favored equipment, Ed joked, "It's as un-state-of-the-art as 

possible. It's all stuff that was new in magazines when I was growing up!" 

Eddie developed his talent by learning the favorite songs of the day-[songs from 

groups] like the Monkees, the Stones, and the Guess Who-and playing with the 

neighborhood kids, in groups like Trigger Ledge and Yahoo Swampmaidens. His 

first gigs were at community centers and school functions, such as eighth grade 

graduation, where Rik Emmet, future guitarist of Triumph, also played. 

It's interesting to note that Ed went to school with kids that eventually ended 

up in famous groups like Rush, Steppenwolf, and Triumph, and it's in this 

budding musical climate that he grew up. Ed explored all kinds of musical 

styles, playing [everything from] the FM staples of the day like the Doobie 

Brothers and Supertramp, to heavy jazz, such as [the] Mahavishnu Orchestra. 

Music became his passion, and he never graduated from school. 

He moved to Edmonton, in Western Canada, for a year, to get a "real job" in the 

oil business. In the only year of his adult life that he spent not playing 

music, he built up lots of muscles and grew to an uncharacteristic 180 pounds! 

At 22, he moved back to Toronto and played with a local group called PhD; a 

clever abbreviation for the members' surnames-Peterson, Harsch, and Differ. 

During what Eddie remembered as a very depressed time his band broke up, his 

girlfriend kicked him out, and he moved home to live with his mother. He would 

pass the time in the park, getting drunk with his friend Mike. 

Eddie met the Chicago blues legend James Cotton-who learned the harp from Sonny 

Boy Williamson and toured with Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters-and got the call 

from his manager soon after to join [Cotton's] band in 1981. Over the course of 

six years he toured 45 weeks of the year ("Like one long tour") and recorded 

three albums, his favorite of which is Live at Bitty Mulligan's, recorded in 

1986. Those records are currently out of print, but highlights are compiled on 

two Alligator CD releases, named High Compression and Live from Chicago: Mr. 

"Super Harp" Himself. One highlight for him was when they were opening up for 

Muddy Waters, who would call for Ed every night to come up on stage and play 

with him. He settled in Detroit, which was simply the halfway point between 

Chicago and Toronto, where he picked up a local gig for good bread and could 

"stay around his girl." 

Eddie played with another blues legend, guitarist Albert Collins, from 1989 to 

1990. He recorded the album Iceman (Pointblank/Virgin Records) with that group 

at the historic Manor Studios in England, but thinks that the record is actually 

"terrible." 

Meeting the Crowes was a cosmic accident, and Ed wasn't even familiar with them, 

thinking that they "must be a 'Country/Roots Rock' band." "It's kind of a weird, 

twisted story. Two different acquaintances (Reeves Gabreis from Tin Machine and 

$ Maker keyboardist Chuck Leavell) told me about the band simultaneously." 

Technically though, it was Chuck who introduced Ed to the band in December of 

1990 at Centre Stage in Atlanta, Georgia. It was a momentous occasion for the 

Crowes, who were filming a live video for "She Talks To Angels," and it was also 

the evening that they found out that Shake Your Money Maker had been certified 

platinum. Within two weeks, Eddie was taken under the Crowes' wing and joined 

the band just in time for the ZZ Top tour. 

[based on an interview with Eddie by Jenna Skopp, written by Christopher B. 

Eddy.]