Rich Robinson

Socrates said that a life unexamined was not worth living, but sometimes life is going so well that you could forgive one for just going with the flow. But life will catch up with you in time, as it did for Rich Robinson. Before he was 25, he had fame as the guitar player for the Black Crowes, fortune, a beautiful wife and home; seemingly, he had it all. But in the blink of an eye, much of it was gone. How he managed to make it through with graciousness and his sense of self-intact is examined on his new solo album, Through A Crooked Sun.

OFFICIAL SITE  ::  FACEBOOK

“The sun was a fitting metaphor to examine my life, because in many ways what was going on both nourished me and blinded me at the same time,” says Rich. “I was living this life that was askew. My relationships with the people that were supposed to be my closest seemed damaged. My marriage was not a good fit for either of us and we weren’t facing up to that. Though I love my brother, the fact that my working environment can be challenging has been well chronicled. Nothing was working like it should have been, but by many people’s standards, it was a dream come true.” It would take an unexpected (at least by Rich) band hiatus, financial difficulties and most devastating of all, a painful divorce to push him to the point of re-evaluation.

The Black Crowes are still a vibrant, relevant entity, an experience he shares with his longtime bandmates, including his brother Chris. To refresh their individual energies, the band has gone on more frequent hiatuses, which has allowed Rich to explore musical ideas that might not fit the band dynamic, and also continue to hone his skills as a terrific visual artist (www.richrobinsonart.com). “The most exciting thing for me in doing my own album is that a lot of the things that I want to express lyrically, which are very personal, may not have space to be expressed in the band format,” says Rich. Through A Crooked Sun finds the musical gifts that have propelled a major career fully intact, but joined this time by a more sentient, holistic outlook: that of a father, a son, a husband, a spiritual being, a musician, fully integrated and more comfortable than ever in his body, mind and soul.