Skirball

Grammy Award nominated songwriter, record producer and bandleader Derek Trucks is one of the most critically-acclaimed guitarists and the youngest musician to be included in Rolling Stone's list of the Top Hundred Guitarists of All Time. Known for their blues roots and Southern rock style, The Derek Trucks Band has taken their latest album, entitled Already Free, well beyond to incorporate the larger sounds of rock, soul, jazz, Latin, and Indian music.
 

"The most awe-inspiring electric slide guitar player performing today." -The Wall Street Journal
 

The Derek Trucks Band
Derek Trucks, Bass, Lead and Slide Guitar
Todd Smallie, Bass and Vocals
Yonrico Scott, Drums, Percussion and Vocals
Count M’Butu, Percussion
Kofi Burbridge, Keyboards, Flute and Vocals
Mike Mattison, Lead Vocals
 

There are moments in music when a young artist establishes himself and an exciting new presence comes alive. For Derek Trucks, that time is now. Trucks has taken his exceptional slide-guitar abilities and his extensive experiences and woven them into a story that marks him for greatness.

Trucks was acquainted with Rock's royalty from a very early age. He was on stage at 9 years of age, jammed with his own group at 11, and formed the core of The Derek Trucks Band at 15. The young player even sat in with the author of "Down in the Flood", Bob Dylan, that same year. He was asked to join the Allman Brothers Band as a permanent member five years later in 1999, an offer he accepted after careful consideration and assurances that he'd be able to also pursue his own work as a bandleader.

On Already Free, which he produced himself, Trucks has written original songs and reinvigorated old ones, introducing a profound new vision. In his music one hears blues, soul, jazz, flourishes of world music from afro-beat to qawwali, and even the advanced tonalities of the modern European masters. This complex, but unmistakable, personal style has been his calling card. In the past several years Trucks has been a member of Eric Clapton's band, performed on Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival Emmy-winning DVD, opened a tour for Carlos Santana, and appeared on the cover of Rolling Stone. With The Derek Trucks Band, he's also toured the world, all of it adding up to the moment when he steps forward on Already Free.

Destiny definitely dealt Derek Trucks this hand. "Sometimes I think that the fact I was raised by two people who looked at music as religion has a lot to do with who I am," he says, "probably even more than having an uncle who was in the Allman Brothers Band," referring to drummer Butch Trucks, who brought him to jam with that legendary group before he had even reached his teens.

Derek Trucks' encyclopedic knowledge of different musical genres ensures he knows a great track when hears it, as borne out of the smattering of covers that pepper Already Free. One of the cover ideas came from iconic guitarist Carlos Santana who took a liking to Trucks when the two toured together. Santana has since said, "I can see the future in Derek Trucks. He has the heart for it, and I will gladly give him the keys that God gave me." But Santana went one better and suggested that the Derek Trucks Band cover Spooner Oldham and Dan Penn's "Sweet Inspiration," which singer Mike Mattison takes to new edgy heights with a vintage soul growl.

The backbone of The Derek Trucks Band – its core members – have been with Trucks for years. "Musically, it's always been wide open in this band," Trucks says, "and I feel like this particular recording process was such a liberating experience for us. It's the feeling you get when you know you're doing the right thing or you're on the right path. I think underneath the struggle, and in the constant push, there's this feeling that you're already home."