THE BLACK CROWES LAUNCH JANUARY 12 RELEASE OF BY YOUR SIDE SPECIAL PERFOMANCE ON DAVID LETTERMAN

Look for THE BLACK CROWES–"The Most Rock n' Roll Rock n' Roll Band in the World," according to Melody Maker–to launch the January 12 release of their Columbia Records debut album BY YOUR SIDE with a Late Show With David Lettermen performance (Monday, January 11), a national Album Network live world premiere radio broadcast (Wednesday, January 6) and a special small club appearance at New York City's Bowery Ballroom (January 11). This will be the final small club performance by the band–CHRIS ROBINSON, vocals; RICH ROBINSON, guitars, vocals; STEVE GORMAN, drums; EDDIE HARSCH, keyboards; bassist SVEN PIPIEN; and touring guitarist AUDLEY FREED–until their theater tour starts in the U.S. on February 12 (dates TBA).

All this excitement gets underway January 6 when Album Network broadcasts a two-hour radio program live from the group's rehearsal studio in Atlanta. The special, set to air from 10:00 PM to Midnight ET, will consist of the world premiere of tracks from BY YOUR SIDE plus a live performance by THE BLACK CROWES in front of radio contest winners and fan club members who'll ask the band questions about the new album and tour. The event will also be heard live over the Internet at www.blackcrowes.com. On January 11, THE BLACK CROWES will tape the Late Show With David Lettermen, followed later that night with a performance at the intimate Bowery Ballroom in lower Manhattan.

This news comes in the midst of THE BLACK CROWES' triumphant return to radio with the set-up track "Kicking My Heart Around," which vaulted to #3 in only its second week on the Billboard "Rock Tracks" chart. With BY YOUR SIDE, the band have returned with glorious guitar sounds by RICH, bracing vocals by CHRIS, an array of no-fucking-around grooves by drummer STEVE GORMAN and bassist SVEN PIPIEN and finely-honed keyboard stylings by EDDIE HARSCH, topped off with sassy soul-sister vocal backing. What holds it all together: the solid and gripping songs of CHRIS and RICH, the best ones they've ever assembled.

Check out "Kicking My Heart Around," an angry song about a busted-up romance with an awe-inspiring slide guitar rave-up by RICH and a sizzling harmonica solo by CHRIS. Or "HorseHead," with its sinister guitar lines and cautionary lyrics about hard drugs, not to mention the joyous recklessness of "Go Faster" (where CHRIS sings, "Just one question I might ask ya/It might sound like a disaster/Can you make this thing go faster?"). Elsewhere, THE BLACK CROWES get inside the playful hedonism of the rhythmically driving "Heavy." "Only A Fool" is built on an unrelentingly funky Stax/Volt groove. And the bittersweet "Welcome To The Good Times"–with the terrific horns of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band–is about the hard-fought battles that are necessary to wind up with some dignity in this lifetime.

"We've taken everything we've done over the last 10 years and put them into these songs," summarizes RICH. "We've taken some backroads along the way, and that's given us the training to become a more interesting band. It's enabled us to reach this point."