Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King is the seventh studio album by Dave Matthews Band (DMB), which is scheduled to be released by RCA Records on June 2, 2009.[1]
It will be the band's first studio album since 2005's Stand Up and the first release since the death of saxophonist LeRoi Moore. Guitarist Tim Reynolds will play on the album, marking his first recording with DMB since 1998’s Before These Crowded Streets. Rashawn Ross will make his first appearance on a DMB studio album since joining as a regular touring member in 2006 as will Jeff Coffin, who has taken Moore's role since June 2008. The album is being produced by Rob Cavallo (the Goo Goo Dolls, Green Day, Alanis Morissette, My Chemical Romance).[2][3] The first single on this album has been made available on their website.
The album will be the second major release by Dave Matthews Band with a vinyl edition.[4] Before These Crowded Streets is the only other album to have been released on that medium.
Beauford described the word "GrooGrux" as not only a nickname for LeRoi Moore, but also a nickname for himself, Tim Reynolds, and former collaborator Tim Wicks. Beauford said the made-up word was used to describe the "vibe" and "energy" of their "wild-sounding rhythms" they made when they started playing music together. Beauford also mentioned that Matthews, bassist Stefan Lessard and violinist Boyd Tinsley were now graduates of "The GrooGrux Academy."[12]
Matthews said the origins of "Big Whiskey" came from a chance encounter with a local New Orleans drunk during a photo shoot for the new album. When the band was shooting promotional photos outside of Preservation Hall in the French Quarter of New Orleans, they encountered a local man playing harmonica who was asking tourists for money so he could buy "a big whiskey." Lessard gave Matthews a $20 bill to hand the man, who walked off in celebration. Trumpet player Rashawn Ross then suggested the phrase for the title of the album, which Matthews liked because people wouldn't have to call the album by the more difficult to say "GrooGrux".[13
Big Whiskey has been hailed by Rolling Stone as the group’s "heaviest album yet, both musically and emotionally," which went on to note: "Throughout, Carter Beauford beats out elaborate, propulsive groves; bassist Stefan Lessard lays down Flea-style funk bass lines; violinist Boyd Tinsley plays cresting, intense runs; and Matthews mirrors Moore’s saxophone lines with scatlike singing." Billboard, in a cover story on Dave Matthews Band, praised Big Whiskey as "its best album yet… Highlights include the funk-rock rave-up 'Shake Me Like a Monkey,' the stirring ballad 'Lying in the Hands of God,' the swampy rocker 'Alligator Pie (Cockadile),' radio-friendly fare like 'Why I Am,' which features playful horns over a solid rock riff and a hooky chorus, and 'Funny the Way It Is,' which parlays a subtle intro into a soaring, syncopated anthem."
