When I speak with Al Schnier, he is on his way (to quote one of his band moe.’s most famous tunes) down to Mexico to join jam band peers The String Cheese Incident along with a slew of others for a few days of musical revelry on the beach. The shows will be among the last of the year for the New York band and will hopefully wrap up a difficult period that has put their resilience to the test, to say the least. Over the last five years, the members of moe. have battled cancer (bassist Rob Derhak), the complete disruption of the touring industry (the lifeblood of any jam band) due to the pandemic, guitarist Chuck Garvey’s stroke, and a family tragedy experienced by Derhak last year. Each of these things could have sidelined most bands, but Schnier is almost teary when he talks about it being the unity of the band itself that has allowed them to persevere.
Throwing in the towel might have also meant that moe. wouldn’t have hit an impressive milestone: thirty-five years as a band. Known for their serious instrumental chops, offbeat yet catchy and melodic tunes that may only be rivaled in the scene by Phish, and a sprawling live show that can veer from psych to surf, Americana to jazz, to straight-up rock and roll on a dime, moe. has earned its place as one of the most consistent and fun live acts out there. It’s fitting that the band’s new album – their thirteenth full-length studio effort – is called Circle of Giants, considering that among the top-tier bands in the jam scene, they are among the most legendary. Circle of Giants is also their first recording with Nate Wilson, the Assembly of Dust keyboardist who filled in when Garvey was recovering from his stroke and has since become a permanent member.
From the muscular and fuzzy rock of opener “Yellow Tigers” to the sprawling cosmic country of the optimistic album closer “Living Again,” the band traverses their usually eclectic musical terrain. Wilson adds plenty of sonic textures on organ and even some eloquent piano work, complementing many of the jams that stretch out almost as long as they might when performed live. The theme of hope and pushing on to a new day consistently pops up throughout the album on songs like the massive opus “Band In The Sky,” the 70s pop of “In Stride,” the grooving Americana of “Tomorrow Is Another Day,” and harmonic“Ups and Downs” that plays like a triumphant anthem for the band. Ultimately, Circle of Giants captures moe. in their most collaborative state with plenty of creative energy left in the tank.
As the band heads into their thirty-fifth year with a new album and tour that kicks off with a two-night run in Portland, Oregon on January 30th and will find them hitting more intimate venues, Schnier is excited to reflect back on their journey, the making of Circle of Giants, the reality of touring, and how the jam band scene has evolved since moe.’s early days.
What was the creative process like for this album in terms of the songwriting and also in terms of the playing? What was it like having Nate Wilson in the equation?
Each album evolves a little bit from the preceding one. It feels like there’s never been any kind of radical shift where we throw everything out and do something incredibly different where we’re bringing in a third party to write songs for us or something. We are always sort of advancing the process and taking a step forward from where we were before. This record was not really different in that case. I guess the thing that makes it interesting is a lot of these songs were born out of Covid, so what we individually brought to the table was stuff that we had all been working on in this very isolated situation, [which was] a little bit different than in the past. We always know the songwriters in the band are always working on stuff on their own, but ultimately, it gets integrated into the band. Sometimes it’s just like a piece of a thing and we might start incorporating it into our live show and it’s not a fully realized song yet. In this case, we had a lot of really finished songs that individuals had brought in. The cool thing is, with Nate for example, he has really great songs that he brought in, but then we got to make them ours. He’s very open to our interpretation and adding or adding our voice to it. That’s the cool part of the process. You come in with what is essentially just a base template of a thing – I might have an idea of what I want to hear from the other guys, but they might have a better idea – and it’s always been our strength.
I noticed the album seems to have a lot of different genres you’re kind of getting into. What kind of stuff were you experimenting with and were there any specific artists or albums that were top of mind for all of you putting these songs together?
We’ve all spent so much time together touring this last year and really it’s great because, when the show is over, we wind up all hanging out together and sometimes listening to music until three or four o’clock in the morning, just having drinks and taking turns kind of DJing and turning each other on to different music. It’s great because we still all love music, and we still love doing that. So we spent a lot of time with each other listening to a lot of music in the last couple of years, and that’s been fun. It is crazy because, in some cases, it’ll be like you hear something that’s fifty years old, and you may have never heard it before. Like, I never realized that a particular artist had this part of their catalog, and in other cases, it’s Nate turning us on to some obscure psych rock band from Europe or whatever that basically sounds like something from the 70s.
For the songs on the album, you said some of the material was written during Covid. How old are some of these songs and have you been working them into sets?
A little bit here and there. One of the songs on the record is a song of mine that I can’t even tell you how old it is. It’s gotta be twenty years old. We kicked it around probably around the time we were working on Wormwood or The Conch and actually played it live for a little bit. It was in rotation and then we just kind of shelved it. We just weren’t feeling it. It didn’t mesh with the other stuff that we were doing. In the last couple of years, we had started playing it again – this song called “Living Again” – and it’s been in regular rotation for a while. I personally had not intended to put it on the record. I wasn’t thinking about it. I thought we were just kind of leaning on new songs. We have an abundance, like it’s an embarrassment of riches how many new songs we have. I mean, Jim [Loughlin] and Rob have written entire albums during this period, so there are so many songs that we have that we just couldn’t get to them all. I didn’t think that we would consider putting a 20-year-old song on there, and Rob came up with that idea, and he was just like, ‘that song kind of fits perfectly in with the vibe of everything that we’re doing.’ It’s kind of cool, too, because it’s like this rare sort of song that never really made it to a record before to be kind of cool to include it. That song happens to be old, but some of the songs are three or four years old. We have been playing them individually, but not as the band. Some have not been performed live at all at this point, so they really run the whole spectrum.
Obviously, the band has been through some really heavy shit in the past handful of years. Can you talk about some of these things and how you guys persevered through them?
I mean, I’m going to cry talking about it, but I’m so grateful for these guys because you’re absolutely right. We’ve been through so much shit and it’s just like the hits keep coming, like what the actual fuck. But the other thing, too, is if not for these guys, if not for our crew, our band, our families, whatever, we would not make it through those things. It would be too much for anybody to endure and it’s just made us all stronger and closer and better ultimately. So there’s a little bright side to it all. It’s not up to me to put a meaning on it, but I will say I’m very grateful for the people around me and I’m grateful to be with these guys.
Yeah, and even if none of that stuff happened, 35 years is impressive. Is there a secret to that kind of longevity as a band?
We are very fortunate in that we like each other. We’re decent to one another and everybody really respects each other. If you don’t have that, it doesn’t work. It doesn’t matter how good somebody is at their job. It doesn’t matter how talented somebody is. It’s just not going to work, and that’s been proven time and time again. Even with brothers, it just fails repeatedly, and in our case that’s the thing we figured out. Particularly with the band, it’s one thing, but even with our crew, we found that it’s more important that we have that chemistry and really good people with us first and foremost, and the job part will come around. I would say it’s not really a secret, but that’s been the thing that’s worked for us. If you actually like each other’s company and you respect one another, it makes doing the job, which can be really shitty at times, so much easier because you have each other to get through some of those days.
What do you think of the current moment in the jam scene with acts like Billy Strings and Goose and King Gizzard all kind of blowing up?
What do I think about it? I mean, it’s phenomenal. I’m fascinated with it. You know, watching it come from within, but also from outside, and I’m blown away by it. I’m such a dork when it comes to the music industry and the inner workings of it all. It’s like being like a baseball nerd, wanting to get into the weeds about stats or whatever. I’m the same way about the music industry. It’s great for everyone, it’s great for the scene. One piece of it that’s a little bit disheartening is, how well that thing can do to any of those bands that you mentioned, and yet the rest of it, [moe.] included, everything has been different since Covid. It’s not just our industry, it’s everything. You could be talking about anything that people are sort of electing to do, whether it’s travel or dining or anything. People are electing to spend their time and money differently than they used to. It could be for things that used to be your favorite things that you would plan a year out, except for those hot and in high demand. Everybody has a different approach where they feel less compelled, I guess, to plan in advance to do anything. I don’t know what it is, but it’s sort of a reset. Everybody’s mind is sort of to live more in the present, which is not necessarily a bad thing overall in terms of humanity, but it’s not really great for us. You want people to buy tickets in advance because that always makes everybody a lot more comfortable about how your show is going to do.
We hear a lot about the economics of touring now or the lack thereof and just how challenging it is in that post-Covid landscape, whether it’s like the cost of trucks and transportation to labor costs and all this stuff and then people not buying tickets in advance. What’s the moe. touring operation like now compared to past years? Has it changed?
It has and you’re absolutely right. We talk about this all of the time. In fact, two days ago, we had a long, intense conversation about turning the whole thing upside down and rethinking our business model entirely because it doesn’t work anymore. The math doesn’t work anymore. Buses cost three times as much as they used to, and our airfare costs so much. If we look at those line items in terms of our expenses, we are spending so much more money than we used to in order to be an operating touring band, yet our ticket sales have not increased three times in price. We can’t do that, our fans would rebel against us. It’s also not cool. We’re not going to start charging $100 per show. It’s absurd, but I feel like some of those sectors have just gone up and up and up and up and get away with it somehow, and everybody’s willing to pay those prices. We have to figure out something different. We can’t keep spending our money on those things, so we’re going do something different. I’m trying to figure [out how] we can make [touring] more affordable so we can at least net some money at the end of the tour and not try and pass that cost along to our fans.
Yeah, it’s tough. It’s a fine line and then there’s the whole dynamic pricing and all that crazy stuff with Ticketmaster, so it’s like how do you strike a balance?
Right, but that’s the thing. If you’re Bruce Springsteen or Pearl Jam or Taylor Swift or Billy Strings, like if you have that kind of demand that gets those ticket prices and what the market will do, is really fascinating, but if you’re moe., the ticket prices are pretty well fixed. We know what we can sell the ticket for and what are fans willing to pay for it and they know what they’re going to get, and that part is great. It’s a pretty favorable exchange for everybody involved. It’s just the part where it costs us a shit load of money to put that show on, and we’re trying to figure that out.
I noticed this upcoming tour has some smaller venues in it. Did you kind of route out this tour to intentionally play more intimate venues and give people that experience?
It is, and again, I feel like if you can figure that out, we can go into a room that’s 1,500 people and do pretty well in that room versus a room that’s half the size and maybe do two nights. As a fan, I wanna see my band in a smaller room more often than not. And economically, it can work out just as well for us. We don’t need to get hung up on what it means and what it looks like. Too often, there’s this notion in our world [that] you have to sort of keep moving on to the next bigger and better venue and sort of push that thing, and that is not necessarily sustainable. It’s not good for business, it’s not necessarily good for your fans. I understand that you’re trying to build, and if you’re selling out those rooms and the money makes sense, that’s great, but if it’s diminishing returns, [we’d] rather create experiences that are more meaningful for everybody.
Can you reflect on how the jam scene is different now from your days coming up in the 90s in terms of the culture? Obviously, social media has affected everything, but just for you, like what have you experienced?
When we started as a band, it was on the heels of like how I became a Deadhead in the 80s, which was by trading tapes with friends and getting handmade pamphlets in the parking lot from other people, which is essentially like the whole punk DIY thing where people are creating scenes. This is before Relix was even a real magazine. It was such a cottage industry that sprung up around that. When we started, we did all of those things – we made our own newsletter by hand and drew the whole thing and wrote all the content and then went to Kinko’s and shipped all this shit out. It was the same thing with all of our music, everything was home spun, we used to screen print our own T-shirts. Everything was done by us and it was so hands-on, it was face-to-face with our fans. It was social and they were engaged with one another and it was just wild to see that engagement. We had tapers who were trading shows with one another, and that was back in the day when people started mailing that stuff, just for postage or whatever. For the cost of burning a CD and postage, they would trade stuff and ship things around the country, and it was a great way of just spreading the word about our band. We were going around and hanging up fliers on telephone poles and had a street team that was out there and handing out fliers at other shows, and everything was so like boots-on-the-ground.
Then the Internet sprung up and we had one of those early forums. It was a really interesting time versus what you have today. I see young bands, like what Daniel Donato and Cosmic Country do, for example. They’re posting something new online every day, engaging their fans. They’re hard-working, touring all the time, and it’s the same thing, they just have a very different reach and different means of doing it. They can create music videos every day. We could never make a music video back in the early 90s unless we had a giant camera, and that would’ve been insane. It’s just a different thing, but I think unless you have that sort of rare thing where you have the exponential rise, people still have to work hard and do a lot of that work, and it’s good to see a lot of young bands doing that. There are a lot of them out there and I applaud and encourage them.
You seem to enjoy playing with a lot of those guys. I feel like you, in particular, sit in with the young guys any chance you get.
I do. I love to see it and I’m excited about it. I’ve played with Cosmic Country a bunch. I just adore those guys and they are phenomenal musicians and good human beings. We talk about music, but we also talk about the business part of it too, and I just think they’re so smart and they have a great future in front of them, and I don’t wanna see them fuck it up.
Well, hopefully they don’t, because they’re awesome.
Yeah, I’m a big fan and I’m just so so happy for them. I wanna see it go well. I just played with a band called Dogs In A Pile recently. Such a good band and just really sweet, and it’s great to see.
Do you have a favorite era of moe. or period that you feel was transformational?
One of my favorites is when we did the Further Tour and it was transformational. It was one of my favorite memories and the tour was the summer of ’97. We were essentially the opening band on this tour with Rat Dog, Mickey Hart and Planet Drum, Bruce Hornsby, Hot Tuna, The Black Crowes, and Arlo Guthrie. It was just such a cool thing for me as a fan to be on tour with all of these guys, but it opened our eyes to touring at a professional level like that. We spent a whole summer on the road with all of these guys and got to play music with them every night too. To this day, we are still friends with most of those people, which is amazing to think that the guys in the Grateful Dead are somebody we’ve become peers with ultimately 25 years later. The funny thing is, we did that tour in our RV. We had owned this RV and already put 150,000 or 200,000 miles on it. They were all in tour buses and it was a big tour. We were following it around in an RV with a trailer. We were such little kids on this thing, but it was great. We learned so much on that tour and never looked back.
NOTE: Interview has been edited for length and clarity
