Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular Music

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COUNTING CROWS

Rock group formed in San Francisco by singer/songwriter Adam Duritz and guitarist David Bryson, with Matt Malley, Steve Bowman and Charlie Gillingham. Duritz's parents had been working-class Russian Jewish immigrants; his father worked hard and became a doctor, they split up for ten years and packed him off to boarding schools. Steeped in unhappiness he became a rock star, only to find that celebrity feeds the demons. His songs are ultimately about chasing the elusive American dream, full of people who 'believe that you plug yourself into the system ... You can do all these things, but it adds up to nothing.' Yet he insists: 'Most of the anger in my songs is directed at myself.' He had worked on building sites, spent time in professional care after overdoing LSD; met Bryson (who owned 16-track Dancing Dogs studio in Emeryville); Bonnie Simmons sent a demo to T-Bone Burnett ('I'd known him for over 20 years and never sent him a tape, but it was the best demo I'd heard in years.') They were signed by Geffen in April '92; August And Everything After was prod. by Burnett, released Sep. '93, Duritz's voice containing echoes of all the great white singer/songwriters (Gram Parsons, Dylan, Morrison, Springsteen etc). The album debuted in the charts Jan. '94 and stayed for 200 weeks, peaking at no. 4. In two years after finishing the first album he said he had written only three songs, having had something of a nervous breakdown, feeling that he'd become a clich‚ and that writing songs was causing his problems. But he went back to work, and Recovering The Satellites '96 was less immediate but deeper, as a second album should be, the driving 'Children In Bloom', touching ballad 'Goodnight Elisabeth' coming closer to a sound of their own.