Derek Trucks has revealed that the Tedeschi Trucks Band has completed a new album and has been drip-feeding tracks into the setlist each night, with 17 songs tracked at the band’s newly refurbished studio.
Speaking ahead of the release of Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited (Live At Lockn’), the concert album that collects the band’s star-studded 2015 Lockn’ Festival set with the great Leon Russell, Trucks says the new album is being given an Atmos mix, with the songs split into a full-length and an EP.
“Yeah, we rebuilt our studio earlier this year,” says Trucks. “We’ve been working on it for maybe a year-and-a-half, just kind of doubling the footprint and really dialling in the control room and making it a world-class space. And so when we finished that, we spent some time writing, and we had just another amazing collection of tunes.
“Everybody contributed. The core of the band, our drummer Falcon [Tyler Greenwell] and Mike Mattison wrote some incredible tunes – and Gabe [Dixon, keyboards/vocals] and Susan [Tedeschi, vocals/guitars]. And I had a few.
“We just went in and ended up with more songs that we knew what to do with again! [Laughs] But it was was really fun, and I think it’s the best collection of tunes we’ve written in this band to date.”
There are no titles as yet. No release date confirmed. But if you have had the privilege of catching Tedeschi Trucks Band on tour these past few weeks, where they have been tearing across the US with Gov’t Mule, you might already have heard some of these songs.
![Tedeschi Trucks Band & Leon Russell – “Feelin' Alright” [Feat. Dave Mason, Anders Osborne] - YouTube](https://img.youtube.com/vi/TFFi56h_4ew/maxresdefault.jpg)
Trucks says they’ve been playing them live and they crowd already thinks they know them.
“I’m really excited about it. We finished mixing it. We just did the Atmos mix a few days ago and just been listening to the master the last few days, and started playing some of the tunes live, and that’s always a good indicator,” he says. “Like, the maiden voyage of all these tunes, they felt like they’ve always been there, and that’s a good sign when you don’t have to force them in.
“We probably played five or six of the new ones live, and it’s fun watching people think they know the songs, and they’re like kind of singing along, but no one knows the words, but they think they do. [Laughs] But I think that’s a good sign, too, if it feels you feel like you knew it.”
![Tedeschi Trucks Band & Leon Russell – “The Letter” [Feat. Susan Tedeschi] - YouTube](https://img.youtube.com/vi/0BFISKz-jaw/maxresdefault.jpg)
TTB’s set with Leon Russell was a seminal moment in the band’s history. The original idea was they were going to do a show with Joe Cocker, celebrating the 1970 Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour. But Trucks says they had second thoughts. It was a good idea but he didn’t know Cocker at the time. Maybe they weren’t the right band to do it. Then Cocker got sick and passed away in December 2014. Having played with and known Leon Russell, who was the musical director on the original tour, they put the feelers out about a tribute show.
I was like, ‘Look, if Leon’s into piecing that band back together, I think that’d be amazing way to do a Joe tribute. But I didn’t think there was a 10 per cent chance Leon would want to do it
“We knew Leon pretty well at this point. We had done shows with him and had a pretty great connection,” says Trucks. “I was like, ‘Look, if Leon’s into piecing that band back together, I think that’d be amazing way to do a Joe tribute. But I didn’t think there was a 10 per cent chance Leon would want to do it.”
There was a few tunes on there where you could just kind of feel that Mad Dogs energy in it
Trucks would be right to have concerns. Mad Dogs was a tour that became legendary and notorious in equal measure, one with a formidable pop-cultural legacy but there was a lot of interpersonal fireworks. Cocker accused Russell of taking over. What people in the band were taking was arguably the bigger problem; this was an age of excess.
“It was a bit too crazy,” said Cocker, speaking to Classic Rock in 2022. “I was saddest about some of the ladies who died, like big Emily Smith. Anyway, once it was over, Leon and the rest all left, probably the next day, and moved on to the Rolling Stones and Derek And The Dominos, and they kept on partying.”
After all that, perhaps it was understandable that Russell would think twice about being musical director again. But handing the project over to Trucks and TTB was an experience that changed the band. It allowed them to take on more ambitious projects – none more so than 2022’s I Am The Moon, a quadruple album that was released in four episodes with an accompanying film.
“I think we just had more faith in everybody in the band, in each other,” says Trucks. “It made us realise that a big project is not too much to tackle.”
Not only that but some of the freewheeling feel and – for the lack of a better word – vibe of the Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited set informs the music that we will hear on this as-yet-untiled forthcoming TTB album.
Trucks says these collaborations – with Leon Russell and many of the veterans of the 1970 tour, with BB King, Eric Clapton, his time in Allman Brothers Band – stick with them. They have all expanded their musical sensibility.
“There was a few tunes on there where you could just kind of feel that Mad Dogs energy in it, just the way the tunes [are], the balls-out, everything, everybody pointing in the same direction and flying,” he says. “There’s some of that stuff that sticks with you. Yeah, I mean, that’s the beauty of collaborating and I think one of the things that we’re incredibly fortunate with is our history.
“We’ve gotten to play with a lot of our heroes, and not just on the surface but, like, really digging in, and having memorable, important musical moments with them, whether it was, you know, 15 years with the Allman Brothers – I mean, that stays with you! That never leaves.
“The time with Leon, or the time on the road with BB King – we were out with him for months at a time – those are things that you dip into. And you want to honour their legacy, in small ways and big ways, keep them in people’s minds if you can.”
You can read the full interview with Trucks coming soon to MusicRadar. Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited (Live At Lockn’) is available to preorder, out 12 September via Fantasy Records.
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