Chris Robertson from Black Stone Cherry joins me on Talkin’ Rock. They’ll be hoping on the ShipRocked cruise starting February 4 through the 10th. 

Their latest album, their eighth, dropped last fall called Screamin’ At The Sky. He tells me that he feels fortunate that they can put out new music and people still care, “You can’t really ask for much more than that” 

Chris told me about growing up in the middle of nowhere, in Edmonton, Kentucky. He said growing up he was surrounded by country music, as his father and grandfather were both bluegrass/country musicians. He said music videos helped craft his love of music. “I was a kid in the MTV generation, so all through the 90s you had great rock and roll being playing on TV.” He told me about the first video he recalls watching. 

Being from Kentucky, I’m surprised it took this long, but they’ve got their own bourbon now. They’ve teamed up with Three Chord Bourbon to develop their bourbon. He said management approached them with the idea. “It was a no-brainer for us.”

Chris just came back from Los Angeles for NAMM, and he told me about his new signature guitar called The Sarge. He said that way of life is ok for a few days, but he’s a country boy through and through. 

Black Stone Cherry is also playing Zakk Wylde’s Berzurkus concert in mid-September in Pennsylvania. As far as playing live and touring, it’s something he still loves to do. “I love it because it’s new faces all the time, it continues to build.” Yes, BSC is a road-dog band and that’s ok with Chris. “We love it. We truly love playing music.”

He surprised me with a band he named as far as a “massive” influence on his band with roots in the Detroit area. That was a shocker.