Crown Lands - Odyssey Vol. 1 Concert Livestream - Part 1
Crown Lands - Odyssey Vol. 1 Concert Livestream - Part 2
Classic rock. It’s not just for the guys who grew up in the ’70s and ’80s anymore. Thanks to the massive, global success of Greta Van Fleet, not only are the labels out looking for the next big thing, the kids are too as evidenced by Greta Van Fleet’s sold-out 2022 tour. One of the bands that has benefited from all of this is Crown Lands, a Canadian duo featuring Kevin Comeau (guitars/bass/keyboards) and Cody Bowles (vocals/drums), who served as one of the opening acts on the fall dates of Greta Van Fleet’s tour.
While the duo’s early sound was blues driven, as they’ve evolved, more and more prog rock influences have started to surface. And, if Greta Van Fleet is this generation’s Led Zeppelin, then Crown Lands is this generation’s Rush, something that Comeau will readily admit.
Crown Lands’ newly released third album, Fearless, has the audacity to open with “Starlifter: Fearless Part II,” an epic 18-minute, multi-part exploration through time and space and it’s perhaps the most glorious opening track of any album you’ll hear in 2023. Given the band’s influences, it would have been the most glorious opening track of any album released in 1974 as well.
Who was responsible for introducing you to the first music you listened to?
KEVIN: Cody’s dad was a drummer so Cody started playing drums when the was like 1-years-old, just banging on pots and pans. They quickly got Cody one of those little drum kits so Cody’s been at it truly his entire life. My parents were really into classic rock. My dad was more into the singer-songwriter folk world, he’s an amazing folk guitar player so I got into music by way of Bob Dylan, John Prine, and Paul Simon. My mom was a big Eagles fan. On road trips, it would be Queen and Creedence Clearwater Revival.
When I was about 11, that’s when I started going out on my own and finding music and the first band that really captured my interest was Green Day because of Mike Dirnt’s bass playing. Bass was my first instrument and the first time I really registered what a bass was was the bass break in “Holiday” by Green Day on their American Idiot record. My dad bought me a bass and taught me how to play “All Along the Watchtower” the first night because it’s just three chords. I was sold. That was it. Everything else in my life melted away and music completely took over.
Then I started getting into The Clash and The Misfits. As a bass player, you keep asking, “Who’s the best bass player?” So I got into The Who because of John Entwistle, discovered Rush because of Geddy Lee. Everything kind of took a huge turn when I was about 14 when I discovered Rush. Then it was like, “Who influenced Geddy?” and I got into Yes because of Chris Squire. Then I fell into King Crimson and Genesis and Pink Floyd, just went down the prog rock rabbit hole. That symphonic, storytelling classic prog rock is what really compelled me the most. That’s what I found the most inspiring. It’s very similar to Cody. Cody’s favorite band is Rush. My favorite band is Rush. When we met, about 8 years ago, Rush came up very quick and we bonded over them. And we’ve just been acting like two idiots ever since.
It’s funny that when you say you got into Rush when you were 14 because that was around the age I got into Rush, but I’m 20+ years older than you. It’s amazing that Rush has transcended time. There’s no time limit on that band. It’s sort of a rite of passage for teenage boys to get into Rush.
KEVIN: It’s true! As a musician, there’s always a kneejerk reaction against virtuosity. People are like, “Oh, music is not like athletics.” But, for a lot of us, it kind of is. I think that Rush just demonstrates that they are three of the greatest musicians of all time. They are not just technically proficient, but the way they write and arrange music, it’s just so unique. It’s still fresh to this day, whereas records that may not have resonated the same way when you were 14, if you were into the heavier proto-metal stuff like 2112 or Hemispheres, now you might like the more mellow songwriting of Presto and Roll the Bones. That’s the great thing about Rush, they were around for 40 years and they gave us 20 studio albums and there’s not one bad album there. It’s all varied, but it’s all them. It’s all just true, honest music. I think that’s something I aspire to do as a creator, never stop evolving but also honor what excites me as a musician. Rush is that for me. They are just so special.
In the U.S., Rush broke in Cleveland. The radio station WMMS was an early supporter and played them before any other station. I have to imagine the rust belt states are a good market for Crown Lands.
KEVIN: For sure. It’s so prohibitively expensive to tour the States as a Canadian band now thanks to the work permits. It goes through the Department of Homeland Security to come through as a musician. It’s about $12,000 every time you want to cross that border. It’s tricky, you have to really plan out your touring very well if you want to do it right. For that kind of reason alone, we haven’t really gone down to the States very often.
We did tour the States last year with Greta Van Fleet though. That was great. I think we’ve seen a huge shift in our audience because of that. I have to commend them for opening so many doors for that young generation of kids who are 14 or 15 that are discovering music just the way we did. There’s all this new and exciting music they can find, bands that are ushering in what’s being called the New Wave of Classic Rock. The kind of music that captured my imagination when I was a kid was the music basically from ’72 to ’82. It’s exciting to see it being accepted by this younger generation. Prog and classic rock wasn’t really cool to a lot of my peers and my friends whereas now I’m seeing all these kids that are ravenous for it. I think there are a lot of kids getting into us and then their older brothers or their uncles will be like, “You like that? Check out In the Court of the Crimson King by King Crimson or check out Close to the Edge by Yes.” I think that’s really exciting that we’re going to be a door-opening band for a lot of people discovering this really rich world of clever rock music or, hopefully, they’ll just stop with us. “Yep, this is it.” Hopefully we’ll be for someone what Rush did for us and hopefully we’ll inspire somebody else to keep carrying the torch of writing stupid, 11-minute guitar riffs.
From: https://bigtakeover.com/interviews/interview-kevin-comeau-crown-lands
While the duo’s early sound was blues driven, as they’ve evolved, more and more prog rock influences have started to surface. And, if Greta Van Fleet is this generation’s Led Zeppelin, then Crown Lands is this generation’s Rush, something that Comeau will readily admit.
Crown Lands’ newly released third album, Fearless, has the audacity to open with “Starlifter: Fearless Part II,” an epic 18-minute, multi-part exploration through time and space and it’s perhaps the most glorious opening track of any album you’ll hear in 2023. Given the band’s influences, it would have been the most glorious opening track of any album released in 1974 as well.
Who was responsible for introducing you to the first music you listened to?
KEVIN: Cody’s dad was a drummer so Cody started playing drums when the was like 1-years-old, just banging on pots and pans. They quickly got Cody one of those little drum kits so Cody’s been at it truly his entire life. My parents were really into classic rock. My dad was more into the singer-songwriter folk world, he’s an amazing folk guitar player so I got into music by way of Bob Dylan, John Prine, and Paul Simon. My mom was a big Eagles fan. On road trips, it would be Queen and Creedence Clearwater Revival.
When I was about 11, that’s when I started going out on my own and finding music and the first band that really captured my interest was Green Day because of Mike Dirnt’s bass playing. Bass was my first instrument and the first time I really registered what a bass was was the bass break in “Holiday” by Green Day on their American Idiot record. My dad bought me a bass and taught me how to play “All Along the Watchtower” the first night because it’s just three chords. I was sold. That was it. Everything else in my life melted away and music completely took over.
Then I started getting into The Clash and The Misfits. As a bass player, you keep asking, “Who’s the best bass player?” So I got into The Who because of John Entwistle, discovered Rush because of Geddy Lee. Everything kind of took a huge turn when I was about 14 when I discovered Rush. Then it was like, “Who influenced Geddy?” and I got into Yes because of Chris Squire. Then I fell into King Crimson and Genesis and Pink Floyd, just went down the prog rock rabbit hole. That symphonic, storytelling classic prog rock is what really compelled me the most. That’s what I found the most inspiring. It’s very similar to Cody. Cody’s favorite band is Rush. My favorite band is Rush. When we met, about 8 years ago, Rush came up very quick and we bonded over them. And we’ve just been acting like two idiots ever since.
It’s funny that when you say you got into Rush when you were 14 because that was around the age I got into Rush, but I’m 20+ years older than you. It’s amazing that Rush has transcended time. There’s no time limit on that band. It’s sort of a rite of passage for teenage boys to get into Rush.
KEVIN: It’s true! As a musician, there’s always a kneejerk reaction against virtuosity. People are like, “Oh, music is not like athletics.” But, for a lot of us, it kind of is. I think that Rush just demonstrates that they are three of the greatest musicians of all time. They are not just technically proficient, but the way they write and arrange music, it’s just so unique. It’s still fresh to this day, whereas records that may not have resonated the same way when you were 14, if you were into the heavier proto-metal stuff like 2112 or Hemispheres, now you might like the more mellow songwriting of Presto and Roll the Bones. That’s the great thing about Rush, they were around for 40 years and they gave us 20 studio albums and there’s not one bad album there. It’s all varied, but it’s all them. It’s all just true, honest music. I think that’s something I aspire to do as a creator, never stop evolving but also honor what excites me as a musician. Rush is that for me. They are just so special.
In the U.S., Rush broke in Cleveland. The radio station WMMS was an early supporter and played them before any other station. I have to imagine the rust belt states are a good market for Crown Lands.
KEVIN: For sure. It’s so prohibitively expensive to tour the States as a Canadian band now thanks to the work permits. It goes through the Department of Homeland Security to come through as a musician. It’s about $12,000 every time you want to cross that border. It’s tricky, you have to really plan out your touring very well if you want to do it right. For that kind of reason alone, we haven’t really gone down to the States very often.
We did tour the States last year with Greta Van Fleet though. That was great. I think we’ve seen a huge shift in our audience because of that. I have to commend them for opening so many doors for that young generation of kids who are 14 or 15 that are discovering music just the way we did. There’s all this new and exciting music they can find, bands that are ushering in what’s being called the New Wave of Classic Rock. The kind of music that captured my imagination when I was a kid was the music basically from ’72 to ’82. It’s exciting to see it being accepted by this younger generation. Prog and classic rock wasn’t really cool to a lot of my peers and my friends whereas now I’m seeing all these kids that are ravenous for it. I think there are a lot of kids getting into us and then their older brothers or their uncles will be like, “You like that? Check out In the Court of the Crimson King by King Crimson or check out Close to the Edge by Yes.” I think that’s really exciting that we’re going to be a door-opening band for a lot of people discovering this really rich world of clever rock music or, hopefully, they’ll just stop with us. “Yep, this is it.” Hopefully we’ll be for someone what Rush did for us and hopefully we’ll inspire somebody else to keep carrying the torch of writing stupid, 11-minute guitar riffs.
From: https://bigtakeover.com/interviews/interview-kevin-comeau-crown-lands
