FRANK BLACK RELEASES HONEYCOMB

Frank Black has released his first solo album since 1996’s Cult of Ray and the album, titled ‘Honeycomb’ was recorded in just 4 days in a Nashville studio due to his reunion tour with The Pixies. In recording ‘Honeycomb’ Black enlisted the studio help of not only legendary session players Steve Cropper, Spooner Oldham and David Hood, but also of his ex wife Jean Walsh. Although the two were divorcing at the time and Black has since remarried and had a son, the two still get along so well it wasn’t hard at all singing together about the their failed relationship. We caught up with Black who is still in the midst of one of the summer’s hottest tours with The Pixies to find out about his studio time and collaborating vocally with Jean.

‘Honeycomb’ also contains a version of “Song of the Shrimp”, a tune best known from Elvis Presley’s Girls Girls Girls movie and was influenced by Bob Dylan’s classic album ‘Blonde on Blonde.’ Black also talked about the attitude of Dylan being a great influence on his songwriting.

“Fine, fine. We weren’t in the studio together. Through the magic of studio wizardry we were brought together. Not because we were estranged, although we were divorcing but logistics. I was in Nashville, she was in Los Angeles.”

Black just finished one of the hottest tours of the summer with the reunion of The Pixies. But if you missed The Pixies performing live this past summer, Rhino Entertainment recently released a CD & DVD highlighting the 2004 Austin City Limits Music Festival and The Pixies are on both the CD and the DVD, with their live performance of ‘Debaser.’ The CD features performances by 16 different artists while the 2 Disc DVD features videos of 24 performances, including eight songs not featured on the CD. Black also recently announced he will be covering Iggy Pop’s classic ‘Repo Man’ for the American Laundromat Records release ‘High School Reunion: a tribute to those great 80’s films!’. ‘High School Reunion’ will be released this fall, and features contributions from Matthew Sweet, Kristin Hersh (covering the Pixies!), John Strohm (Blake Babies, Lemonheads), The Bennies, The Caulfield Sisters, and many more.

“Well you know first there was the Beatles in my youthful record collection and then the first guy to come along after the Beatles was Bob Dylan, I think. Yeah, he’s influential like probably to most people. He’s influential I think to me, what I tune into isn’t the ‘Blowin’ in the Wind.’ It’s not the great poet. Yeah, he’s a great poet. We all know it. But he has an attitude a sort of presence, you know.”