Album Review: Dave Matthews Band, "Weekend on the Rocks"

December 1st, 2005

by Jim Harrington

It didn't take a genius to come up with this idea: Take one of the world's best live bands, put it in one of the country's most beautiful concert settings and let the tape roll.

It shouldn't surprise anybody that "Weekend on the Rocks," the Dave Matthews Band (music)'s two-disc document of its four-night stand this past September at Colorado's gorgeous Red Rocks Amphitheatre is an absolute winner.

Having attended three of the four shows, this critic can attest that the producers did a good job in compiling a representative sample of the long "Weekend."

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The Wine World's No. 1 Rock Star: Dave Matthews

October 1st, 2005

By Gerri Hirshey - October 2005

Rocker and gentleman farmer-vintner Dave Matthews is on a mission to promote sustainability, starting with the vegetables, grapes, cattle and chickens on his property in Virginia wine country.

"I like food," says Dave Matthews, "but I like good food. I just think the quality of the food we eat is in a desperate state." As members of the Dave Matthews Band straggle into this state-of-the-art recording studio deep in the Virginia hills, 15 minutes outside Charlottesville, the boss sips extraordinarily good Kona coffee while unspooling the tale of his conversion from junk food road warrior to gentleman organic farmer-vintner.

Before anyone arrived at the studio—the musicians are racing to complete Stand Up, an album that will reach No. 1 immediately after its May 2005 release—the wonderful aroma of vegetable soup filled the corridors, courtesy of a beatific young woman who cooks for the band. "We eat like kings," Matthews says. "And we drink some really good wine." A bottle of Merlot from Matthews's Blenheim Vineyards sits on a counter, prompting a studio wit to declare, in plummy Orson Welles tones, "We shall release no album before its time."

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Billboard Honors DMB With Humanitarian Award

September21st, 2005

In recognition of its numerous charitable works, the Dave Matthews Band will be presented with the Humanitarian Award during Roadwork '05: The Billboard Touring Conference and Awards in New York.

The group, which donates millions to non-profit organizations around the world through its own Bama Works Foundation, was among the many acts to aid victims of Hurricane Katrina, raising nearly $1.5 million by adding a fourth show to a recent run of sellouts at Colorado's Red Rocks Amphitheatre. Additionally, Dave Matthews participated last night (Sept. 20) participated in the Big Apple to the Big Easy hurricane relief concerts in New York.

Farm Aid, New York City public schools and parks, San Francisco Bay Area charities and victims of the Southeast Asian tsunami are among the many beneficiaries of the Dave Matthews Band's philanthropy.

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Farm Aid 2005: One Sweet World

September 18th, 2005

Chicago Sun-Times - by Dave Hoekstra

Willie Nelson has been on the road again and again on behalf of Farm Aid. Someday that road will end, which is why Dave Matthews has become a key member of the Farm Aid Board of Directors. Advertisement

Matthews and his wife Ashley were more than welcoming to myself and photographer Paul Natkin last spring when we visited their home in Seattle for the book Farm Aid: A Song for America (Rodale, $35, hardcover). In the course of a three-hour conversation in their backyard, Ashley (granting her first print interview ever) and Dave were deeply articulate and highly educated about eco-farm issues. Matthews is clearly in for one long haul, which makes for "One Sweet World" for the American family farmer.

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The book of Matthews, Music, meaning and the DMB

September 8th, 2005

By Mark Brown, Rocky Mountain News

Dave Matthews sounds terrible.

That's not a musical criticism; rather, he's battling a killer cold on the way to a show in Albuquerque while at the same time reflecting on life, death, God, fate, hurricanes and his own search for answers.

Maybe, he says, it's his own search that has connected fans to him - enough for the Dave Matthews Band to fill Red Rocks for the next four nights running, including Monday's hurricane-relief show, which was expected to sell out even with many tickets priced at $1,000 each.

While some find answers in religion or nature, some of his early ones came through music, he says.

"I was amazed by music as a kid, always. And by art of all kinds, but music was an instantaneous thing. It amazed me since I can remember. That's what drew me to it," he says.

"I'm always wondering, 'Why?' I'm fairly confident that the answer is 'Because.' I sort of juggle those things. Maybe someone else will find some solace in the lyrics of a song."

Tackling big questions

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Fonzie Plays It Cool

By Brian Fox | September 2005

Stefan Lessard Shows His Street Smarts With The Dave Matthews Band

Stefan Lessard might have grown up in the scholarly college town of Charlottesville, but the University of Virginia isn’t where he got his education. For the past 15 years, Lessard has developed under the tutelage of his bandmates in the Dave Matthews Band. The “Doogie Howser” of the band, Stefan was only 16 when he enrolled in DMB University. Since then, he and his bandmates have released 13 multi-platinum albums and thrilled millions of rapt fans with their freewheeling, jam-heavy live performances.

As a teen, Lessard took music study seriously, playing upright bass in youth orchestras and jazz combos. But when the time came to take it to the streets with charismatic singer/songwriter Matthews, Stefan jumped at the chance. “I developed everything I have from being in this band,” Lessard says. “I’d had only a bit of instruction before I was thrown in, and ever since then I’ve been trying to keep up.”

Amid an international tour, and just a few days after the band’s performance at Philadelphia’s Live 8 concert, Stefan—or Fonzie, as he’s nicknamed—sat down to talk about the band’s new album Stand Up, how he works with producers, and what it’s like to play alongside singer/guitarist Matthews, drummer Carter Beauford, and touring keyboardist Butch Taylor, the core players in one of the most successful pop bands in history.

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Dave Matthews Not That Into Himself Anymore

August 24th, 2005 | Issue 41•34 | The Onion

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA—Dave Matthews, the 38-year-old singer and guitarist for the multi-platinum group The Dave Matthews Band, announced Tuesday that he is no longer into himself.

"I used to be a hardcore Dave Matthews fan," said Matthews on the porch of his Virginia home. "I had all my records and posters. I was so blown away by everything I did—especially my live performances. I remember me and my buddies used to drive for hours just to go to one of our shows."

Matthews, who formed the Dave Matthews Band in 1991, is perhaps best known for the hit songs "Crash Into Me" and "The Space Between."

"Me and my band are still okay, but I feel like I've grown out of us," Matthews said. "Back when I was in the college charts, we were about all I listened to, but I guess I'm at the point in my life where my music just doesn't speak to me."

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Dave Matthews: Stand-up guy

August 19th, 2005

By GENE STOUT, SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER POP MUSIC CRITIC

Your neighborhood rock superstar isn't going anywhere, except `heaven's amphitheater

Dave Matthews' Seattle fans can relax. The rock superstar isn't leaving town.

"I don't have any plans to leave, and we haven't put our house on the market," Matthews said cheerfully this week.

"My wife is done with school, but we're attached to the city. So as far as I know, unless there are some changes that my wife has not informed me of, we have no plans to leave."

Matthews, a native of South Africa who grew up in Virginia, moved to Seattle a few years ago when his wife, Ashley, came here to attend medical school. Despite speculation that Matthews would move away after she got her degree, Matthews said the couple have formed a bond with the city and have many friends here. And the couple's twin daughters, Stella Busina and Grace Anne, were born here in 2001.

"When I'm not working, we spend most of the year (in Seattle)," the singer-guitarist said in a phone interview this week.

"But we do visit (Charlottesville) Virginia. We have a lot of roots that we put down there. But it seems like our family started here in Seattle, so this is my home now. That's how I feel about it."

Matthews has become a big fan of the city, which fits his temperament and political views.

"Absolutely, that's one of the big reasons I like it here," he said. "It doesn't have a vicious quality to its political beliefs. But it's still strong-willed.

"I just feel that for so many reasons, this is a really unique American city."

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Sure, Dave Matthews gets a little emotional, but that's the best part

August 15th, 2005

San Francisco Chronicle - Joel Selvin, Chronicle Senior Pop Music Critic

When Dave Matthews sings, he gets so worked up, veins bulge on his neck. His songs start slowly, but invariably end with his band crashing huge waves of sound behind him, while he pours on the passion.

What exactly he's so worked up about is not all that easy to divine, but there was no doubting the connection he made with the more than 55,000 fans that thronged both his appearances this weekend at SBC Park, not sold out, but still easily the biggest shows of the lackluster summer season.

Blending some of the world beat explorations of Paul Simon and Peter Gabriel with the elasticity of the Grateful Dead, the Matthews band has become the only major new rock act to emerge in the past 10 years that can sell out stadiums. All this has been accomplished almost entirely on the band's own terms, without great support from radio or many concessions to the so-called conventional wisdom of the record industry.

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He's with the Band

July 20th, 2005

Ben & Jerry's, Dave Matthews Band and SaveOurEnvironment.org Announce Winner of Take a Stand with Dave Matthews Band Contest to Lick Global Warming

Be prepared to envy Joshua Glasheen of Lowell, MA because he has scored the coolest summer gig ever. As the winner of the "Take a Stand with Dave Matthews Band" contest - a national search by Ben & Jerry's, Dave Matthews Band and SaveOurEnvironment.org for an "Enviro-Roadie" to go on tour with Dave Matthews Band to mobilize the public to take action to fight global warming - Glasheen has earned the right to say "I'm with the band."

As the Enviro-Roadie, Glasheen will be the official ambassador of Ben & Jerry's, Dave Matthews Band and SaveOurEnvironment.org's Lick Global Warming campaign and will join Dave Matthews Band for 23 tour dates from July 16 to September 7. He'll host an interactive exhibit designed to educate people about the issue of global warming and inspire them to take action. He'll also hand out samples of Ben & Jerry's new flavor - Dave Matthews Band Magic Brownies - and maintain a blog on http://www.lickglobalwarming.org/ detailing his adventures on the road.

Josh was far and away the best candidate we interviewed," said Noelle Pirnie, Integrated Marketing Manager at Ben & Jerry's. "His passion for Dave Matthews Band's music and Ben & Jerry's ice cream combined with his enthusiasm and drive for effecting change and involving people in the fight against global warming impressed all of us."

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