The dynamic duo of vocalist / guitarist Adrian Smith (Iron Maiden) and vocalist / guitarist Richie Kotzen (The Winery Dogs, Mr. Big, Poison) – collectively known as Smith/Kotzen – will release their second album, Black Light / White Noise, on April 4th via BMG.
Categorizing these ten songs as a whole is no easy task as Adrian and Richie perfectly mix blues and rock with a modern flair. There’s also touches of R&B and jazz present. It seems like there’s no boundaries when it comes to writing within this project. “Well, yeah, we’ve got a pretty broad canvas to work with,” begins Adrian. “Richie’s and my influences – although we do have some common ground – are quite different. He’ll tell you about his influences. He’s played jazz and all sorts of stuff; far more technically accomplished than I have. But I take, for me, it’s about the spirit of ‘70s kind of music. The freedom and the blues elements. Trying to use that as inspiration, and then Richie and I try to take that to another level. You make them into songs, rather than just endless riffs. We’re both actually quite song orientated.”
Combining two song titles – “Black Light” and “White Noise” – to create an album title, Black Light / White Noise, I don’t think that’s ever been done before. “Well, I played the album, when we mixed it, to our manager, and the first thing he said afterwards was, ‘You’ve got to call the album Black Light / White Noise.’ It just stuck really. I thought it was a great title. It’s got the contrast. It’s two strong titles. So, it was our manager’s suggestion.”
Speaking of mixing the album, Jay Ruston (Steel Panther, Anthrax, Corey Taylor) mixed Black Light / White Noise. However, the self-titled debut from Smith / Kotzen (released in 2021) was mixed by Kevin “Caveman” Shirley (Iron Maiden, Aerosmith, Dream Theater). Adrian explains the change in personnel. “It’s kind of a technical thing really. I love Kevin’s sound, and he’s brilliant at what he does. But he tends to strip everything down and start from scratch again. Whereas on this album, I think we’d taken it to the point where we were really happy with the way it sounded; we didn’t want to change it too much. And Jay works with Richie a lot on his solo stuff. They have an understanding because Richie records all this at his studio, so it was much easier to give it to Jay, who lives very close by. And Jay’s got a great sound. He didn’t change it drastically, that’s what I’m trying to say.”
Adrian and Richie handled all vocals and guitars on Black Light / White Noise. The bass duties were split evenly between Richie and his wife Julia Lage (Vixen), doing five songs each. When it came to the drums, “Richie plays most of it,” reveals Adrian. “Bruno (Valverde, Angra) plays on two, and there’s a guy called Kyle Hughes who plays on one track. Because it’s Richie’s studio, he’s got the drums set up there; everything’s set up. It’s just the two of us. There’s no producer. I can come over and work during the day. We write, and then in the afternoon I’ll put a vocal down. So, what tends to happen is, we’ll put an idea down and Richie will just lay a drum track down. Quite often, we’ll just keep the drum track, cause he’s a pretty good drummer.”
Comparing the creation of the self-titled Smith/Kotzen album to Black Light / White Noise, Adrian offers the following, “Well, the process was pretty much identical. I live part of the year in Los Angeles; Richie lives there. We got together, beginning of 2023, started writing the album. Then finished it off in 2024. I’d say the only difference is, I think this album is a little bit more up, and a little bit heavier than the first album. A bit more focused. Richie and I have been doing this a little while now, and our relationship is kind of developing. So, I’d say this album is a little bit heavier.”
Speaking of heavier, the song “Blindsided” from Black Light / White Noise features the thickest, chunkiest riff on the album. “Yeah, I think that’s probably one of my favorites,” admits Adrian. “I just like the intro. It’s a riff I had, and Richie came up with the concept of ‘Blindsided’ – someone does something out of the ordinary and it takes you by surprise.” Lyrically, Adrian shares how he identifies with that song. “I think we’ve all been taken by surprise as someone does something – I mean, that’s life, isn’t it. Sometimes things come at you, and you don’t see them coming. You have to pick yourself up and get on with it.”
Smith/Kotzen has released a pair of videos for the two title tracks. During the “Black Light” video shoot, Adrian and Richie’s guitars were covered in fluorescent paint. Was potential damage to the instruments a cause for concern? “Well, the guy who did the photos for the album, John McMurtrie, he came up with the idea of the black light and the fluorescent paint. We bought a couple of guitars – I play a Strat and Richie plays a Telecaster. He had them all sprayed up with this stuff. Of course, they’re completely unplayable. He actually bought real Fenders as well; we paid for that. But we’re going to raffle those off. It was just a bit of fun. It worked out well. And the video for ‘Black Light’ is one of the best ones we’ve done. It’s a really cool video.”
The other title track, “White Noise”, contains the lyric, ‘I’m gonna drink my Jack, bring back my poise.” However, Adrian abstains from indulging in Old No. 7 sour mash. “No, not me. I don’t know about Richie. But I don’t drink the hard stuff any more really. A glass of wine now and again is my tipple.”
“Life Unchained” has such a beautiful beginning. Then it unexpectedly shifts into hard rock overdrive. “We did the album in two halves. When we came back to write the second half of the album, we sat down and thought, what do we need? I just wanted to do a balls to the wall kind of rock song. But it would be nice to have a melodic intro, so we put that on the beginning. Then it goes into a stomping song. Having said that, when it gets to the chorus, something else happens again. Richie came up with the idea of a life unchained. That’s a cool song.”
The way Adrian and Richie trade vocals back and forth within the songs is seamless. As a listener, you don’t even think of it as a duet. Quite simply, Smith / Kotzen has two lead vocalists that are even keel. Determining who sings what part… “It’s not difficult at all really,” says Adrian.” It’s almost unspoken. Quite often, I’ll bring in a verse, I’ll sing it, and we’ll record it. And Richie will say to me, ‘Just sing what you feel, and I’ll fill in the blanks.’ Richie usually ends up – cause he’s got more range than I have – he’ll end up putting a chorus on it. That’s 80% of the time. Sometimes it’s the other way round. But I like the idea of having two vocalists, it’s a different thing. I loved the Deep Purple days of the two singers. It’s not a usual thing, it’s fairly unique. I think that’s maybe what sets S/K a little apart from what everyone else is doing.”
Track seven on Black Light / White Noise is a song called “Wraith”. The definition of the word Wraith is, ‘a ghost or ghostlike image of someone, especially one seen shortly before or after their death.’ What inspired that subject matter? “Well… I had the idea for the verse for that song and the intro; I wanted a song with that feel. Richie came up with the idea of Wraith. I don’t know where he got it from, because I had to look it up. I wasn’t sure what it was. I had the lines in the verse, ‘Just around midnight I heard a silent scream.’ That kind of horror film lyrics. I think the concept of Wraith was kind of appropriate.”
On the first Smith/Kotzen album, Iron Maiden drummer Nicko McBrain played drums on one song. Was there any thought given to having any of the other members of Maiden make a guest appearance on this album? Or did you not want to repeat that? “No, I didn’t really think about that. I think my wife mentioned it on the first album – ‘Why don’t you get Nick to play on something?’ Cause Nick and I, throughout the years, have always been good mates, and we’ve done various little bits and pieces together musically. So, I just thought I’d reach out to him and see if he fancied smashing a drum track down on the song called ‘Solar Fire’. And it was great! But this album, we sort of kept it more in house.”
Were each of these ten songs newly written for this album, or did you pull some leftovers out of the archives? “No, they’re all fresh ideas. The first thing we put down was a song called ‘Muddy Water’, which Richie had pretty much finished in demo form. He played it to me, and I was blown away! That’s got to be the opening track on the album. It was 90% done and then we sort of finished it off. Then I had a riff for a song called ‘White Noise’, and a verse. Then Richie came up with the chorus. So, we had two songs, and I thought, if this is anything to go by, this is going to be a really strong album. We wrote the album sort of around those two songs.”
Smith/Kotzen has released two videos from Black Light / White Noise thus far, will there be a third? “Yeah, there will be. We’re just finalizing what song we’re going to do. It’ll probably be a lyric video at this point, cause Richie and I are on different sides of the ocean.”
The final track on the album, “Beyond The Pale”, is by far the longest at almost seven-and-a-half minutes. It’s kind of a sad song lyrically. But musically, that’s such an emotional guitar solo; it’s like your instruments can actually speak for themselves. “Yeah, Richie kind of got into his Prince vibe a bit there, I think. We thought we needed a big ballad kind of song, so we came up with that. We weren’t sure about putting it on the album, cause the rest of the album is so rocky. But again, we just listened to the album and something was missing. We put that one on the end, and it was just perfect for the end of the album. It’s very reflective. It’s a little sad, it’s a little regretful. I’m sure everyone can relate to that. Maybe they’ve been in a situation and let things go too far, and they were irretrievable. That’s what that song’s about really. Hopefully people can relate to that.”
Adrian will be on the road with Iron Maiden from May to August. Smith/Kotzen releases Black Light / White Noise at the beginning of April. Are there any tour plans for Smith/Kotzen in support of this album? “I think we’re looking at the first quarter of 2026. It looks like Richie and I will both be free then. I’d absolutely love to play these songs live. I think they’d translate really well to the stage. So, hopefully beginning of 2026 we’ll get out and play some shows.”
It’s interesting that you would release the album now, without being able to tour for ten months potentially. Did you ever think about holding it closer to when you could get on the road to support it? “Uh… I hadn’t thought of it until you just brought it up actually. Maybe you have a point. I don’t know. We’d been sitting on this album for a while, so we wanted to get it out, get it released. We want it to be a living, breathing thing, and it is because we have played it on stage (March 5th at The Grammy Museum in Los Angeles). It did work and it was great fun. There’s an audience out there for it. But we’ll get out there, don’t worry.”
Adrian and Richie both seem to be such natural songwriters. The question must be asked, are you always writing? Later this evening, does the potential exist for you to come up with a song idea, or do you just write when you know you want to put together a record? “Well mainly, the heavy writing, if you’ve got a deadline for a project or you want to finish something, that really sparks you into action; it galvanizes you. Having said that, I try and play guitar everyday just to keep my chops up. At some point during the hour or two that I’m playing, I will record something. You get an idea, and you get sidetracked, you start writing. But yeah, you’re kind of always writing really.”
Are you always playing guitar in front of your computer or your phone? You’re never out in the garden where there’s no technology available? “Even if you’re out in the garden, you can sing something into the phone, can’t you. I’ve got hundreds of ideas on my phone. There’s a funny little story, actually. About seven, eight years ago, I was on the road with Iron Maiden. And we do runners from gigs. In other words, we get straight in the car after the last song, and we go straight to the airport. We usually fly off somewhere else. But on this occasion, we had to take our stage clothes off by the side of the road on the way to the airport in a garage. So, we’re all getting changed in the dark; it was summer, so we were outside the car. I get on the plane, and I’ve lost my phone. It’s got all my ideas on there, and I’ve got no lock on it. A couple of weeks later I get a message through our office, and a guy’s found my phone. I was so embarrassed cause it’s got me sitting there in me underwear in a hotel room with me guitar, just putting an idea down on video. This guy had found the phone, and he sent it back to me, bless him! So, every time we go up through near Seattle, he comes out to the show. Now I’ve got a lock on my phone.”
(Photos courtesy of Piper Ferguson and John McMurtrie)
Source: bravewords.com
