Black Rebel Motorcycle Club Celebrate Two Decades of Howling

Things were going a bit awry for the San Francisco-based Black Rebel Motorcycle Club in 2005. They were dropped by label Virgin Records after two releases (debut B.R.M.C. and follow-up Take Them On, On Your Own). Drummer Nick Jago was exhibiting some bizarre, substance-fueled behavior, and singer/bassist Robert Turner and singer/guitarist Peter Hayes didn’t always see eye-to-eye on song material.

And no one would ever accuse any of them as being happy go lucky, given their choice of wardrobe color (black, all black all the time) and the permanent frowns on their faces in all publicity photos.

But out of this chaos came the album that many point to today as their favorite, Howl. Though on initial listen, fans didn’t quite understand the chasm jump from the Goth/psychedelic/hard rock sounds of those first two releases to the footstomping country/gospel/folk/blues of Howl. Turner had even dropped the pseudonym last name for his real one—Robert Levon Been. He was no longer worried about the nepo baby association with his father, Michael Been, singer/guitarist of ‘80s group The Call.

“It was forged in the fire, that one,” Been says of Howl on the phone. “A lot of these songs were actually among the first we wrote. But we were too self-conscious and inexperience to pull them off at that time. We waited a few years. But we’d rather no one ever heard it then put out something that wasn’t reflective of where our heart was at. Those songs got extra time and care.”

Now, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club (or BRMC to diehards) are celebrating the record’s 20^th anniversary by playing all (or most) of it along with familiar and deep cut material over their entire discography. They rev into White Oak Music Hall on October 17.

“We were pretty nervous about the idea of looking back. We’d never done that, we were always facing forward. We didn’t want to turn to stone,” Been says. “It’s the hardest record to pull off live, so that keeps us on our toes and able to funnel our anxiety into performing it with some semblance of dignity. We’ve done a few shows, and we’re finally dialed in. We feel the pride in the work again.”

He also calls Howl a sort of “Hail Mary.” Thinking they might not ever get to make another record, they decided to go for broke. Been says every label they brought it to turned it down, though eventually RCA in the U.S. and Echo in the U.K. said yes. And completely “as is.”

Highlights of the album included the show, organ-drenched title track, syncopated “Shuffle Your Feet,” doomy lament “Devil’s Waitin’,” country romp “Ain’t New Easy Way,” heavenly “Promise,” guitar-picking “Restless Sinner,” and ethereal “Sympathetic Noose.”

In fact, BRMC recorded so much quality material that they later released the 6-song EP The Howl Sessions.

“Regret is not the right word, but almost every one of those songs on the EP should have been on the full-length album,” he says. “So we don’t consider them as second class citizens. ‘Grind My Bones’ and ‘Mercy’ in particular, I might have swapped those with two that are on there. But I won’t say which ones!”

Been’s father was part of their live journey, serving as soundman for BRMC for years. He died in 2010 at the age of 60 of a heart attack while backstage at Belgium’s Pukkelpop Music Festival. And this writer saw Been behind the boards during the band’s 2007 gig at Houston’s Meridian while on their Baby 81 tour.

The band paid tribute on 2013’s Specter at the Feast (now with since-2008 drummer Leah Shapiro) by covering “Let the Day Begin,” arguably the Call’s best known number. Been has also literally stepped into his father’s shoes for a series of shows with surviving members.

So, did he find doing the song cathartic at all?

“Um, that whole record was…writing that album…it was traumatizing. I didn’t want to write anything and it felt disrespectful to even start writing music again. The whole process was difficult,” he says.

“But with ‘Let the Day Begin’ I felt like it said ‘thank you’ to him in some way. And it was also one less song I had to write! It was a two-fer-one deal.” Been says there was also something life-affirming and positive about it along with gratitude and joy.

It’s been seven years since Wrong Creatures, the band’s last full-length effort. Though they’ve put out single tracks, an EP and live record. Been has also been scoring for film and producing other bands, and he notes that BRMC’s sometimes touchy interpersonal/musical relations are not necessarily a thing of the past.

“We are starting to piece ourselves back together and this tour is an attempt to see how we can kind of get on night after night onstage and working together again. So we’ll see what comes,” he says of any future music.

“We’re literally kicking the tires here,” he sums up, before chuckling ever slightly. “We don’t want a flat line of pain and lies!”

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club play at 8 p.m. on Friday, October 17, at White Oak Music Hall (downstairs), 2915 N. Main. For more information, call 713-237-0370 or visit WhiteOakMusicHall.com. $46.

For more on the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, visit BlackRebelMotorcycleClub.com

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