Lee Rocker Returns with “Gather Round”
Stray Cat’s Lee Rocker has just released Gather Round, which marks the rockabilly bass icon’s first solo album of all original music since 2007’s Black Cat Bone. The standup bassist wrote the new tunes during a six-week road trip last year from California to New York in an Airstream trailer with his wife, Deborah.
“We just hopped in and took off after the [pandemic hit], and it was an amazing journey during a horrible time. But looking back in a funny way, this record shows what I did this past year!” Rocker told the Houston Press. “And we had to go about making it in a completely different way. There’s the ‘Let it Rip’ way where you and the band are all together and bounce ideas off each other, but I was in the studio alone. It was a meticulous process, and a solitary one.”
Rocker got home and recorded all the parts himself before sending it to his band to do their parts in their home studios. Gather Round includes eight originals plus a cover of “Everybody Wants to Be a Cat” and The Band’s “Ophelia”. From the record’s opening bass line, the group takes you on a journey just as Rocker took in his Airstream. It has rockabilly, blues, country beats, jazz vibes, and plenty of Americana.
Check out the video for “Graceland Auction” where he dives in on his Elvis Presley collection:
Gather Round is available now on iTunes and Amazon MP3.
Gather Round Track List:
- Gather Round
- Graceland Auction
- The Last Offline Lovers
- Everybody Wants to be A Cat
- Pickin’ and Grinnin’
- Every Time I See You
- A Dirty Martini
- When Nothing’s Going Right
- Dog House Shuffle
- Ophelia
In his time with No Treble, Kevin has met hundreds of amazing bassists and interviewed icons like Jack Casady, Victor Wooten, Les Claypool, Marcus Miller, and more. He's a gigging bassist performing jazz in Northern Virginia and bluegrass with The Plate Scrapers up and down the East Coast. Kevin appreciates all genres of music, from R&B to metal and everything in between. Connect with Kevin on Facebook and check his performance schedule on his website.
