Back Together Again And Hitting The Road

Nearly three decades in the business, blues-rock stalwart Ben Harper has gathered together his usual suspects, performing across the States, Canada, East Asia and Europe including a trek to Australia in November, but not before completing the latest album Call It What It Is due in April via Stax Records, the primary reason for having delayed their original March dates.

"Man, I'm broken-hearted about that, I'm telling you. But I couldn't let this album out into the world until it was done, done. My apologies about that," confesses Harper, who learned from longtime legend Neil Young never to rush nor compromise your work. "You know there's a famous story about a Neil Young record and him not liking how it sounded, so he bought every single one of them back and re-did it and re-mastered it and put it back out. I didn't want to go down that road, man.

"I don't take one fan for granted. Ever," stresses Harper who further illustrated a servitude to his fans, insisting to present only the genuine article and not push the "status-quo industry standard" of generic responses.

"I could say something in this interview and it would cost me 20 fans, you know? I come from the heart, I shoot from the hip. I'm not trying to duck and dodge, I could give you an interview script I wrote. I'm not gonna do that to you or me! But I mean, for 20 years I'll do three-and-a-half hour meet-and-greets, I'll sign anything and everything. 20 years of that, man. 'Cause we've never been radio darlings."

"We're grown-ass men but we had to — not prove to each other — but to show to each other. We had a lot to express."

Coming off an hiatus lengthened from 2008, following their last album, the Grammy nominated Lifeline, Ben Harper and The Innocent Criminals spent time separated like there was no time to lose. While Harper worked with Charlie Musselwhite, Ringo Starr and with his own mother on Childhood Home — the latest off his discography — guitarist Michael Ward recorded with Gogol Bordello, and keyboardist Jason Yates with John Mayer and Citizen Cope. According to Harper it was a cathartic period apart for the band, much to the benefit and enrichment of Call It What It Is.

"Everybody was in the thick of it in the time-off. Like, nobody has one day or one note to waste when it comes to their musical experience so we were just hittin' it and we were all able to just bring that back into the studio and mix it up. Everybody had just come so damn far… And not only in music but as people. I'm still the same asshole but they have gotten much, much nicer."

And with that, Harper was hesitant to wax-off objectively in presenting the band's position and progression since Lifeline dropped. "You should never wax poetic on your own maturity without sounding a bit wack, right? But… We're doing an interview, who's the interview about? Me. So you have no choice but to expound. So, If I can take a distant, objective view, I think we landed with the ball way further down the field. And that's from both the musical and personal experiences we've had in between the time we stopped playing together and picking it back up. And, I think we've grown a lot and that's growth projected into the art, into the music, into the song.

"We're grown-ass men but we had to — not prove to each other — but to show to each other. We had a lot to express. And, the best part about it was we didn't have to mend any fences 'cause we had done that in like year one after we split. The fact that we can get everybody together, back on the same page to do this is so open-road for this band."

Back to the bitumen, the first show was a night at The Fillmore in Frisco last year, which for Ben was an emotional one. "Walking out on that Fillmore stage for the first time back together in that many years it was emotional. It was emotional," he laughs. "I had to fight back a lil' somethin'."

As if to make up for having to wait another eight months for the tour to take off, Harper promises their first show since 2007 will be second to none. "They will be the best shows we've ever played. That's just all there is to it. We will put on the best show we have played in the history of this band."