“Shoe Boot,” the album opener and the first track the band laid down in the studio with Swift, feels like a woozy stumble down Bourbon Street.Įlsewhere, as it was pre-Night Sweats, blues run the game. The simpering “A Little Honey” glows like a slow dance with an old flame, it’s so warm and nostalgic. That’s not to say there isn’t fun to be had. Just as he’s come to grips with the power of “S.O.B.,” Rateliff eventually found satisfaction in writing a new Night Sweats album - in part by avoiding the pressure to write anything that resembles that hallmark track. “Regardless of how I feel about it as a writer, I’m going to sing that song for a long time, hopefully.” “The difference between ‘Anthem’ and ‘S.O.B.’ now, though, is I appreciate what ‘S.O.B.’ has done,” Rateliff said. Rateliff didn’t want it to be on the first record at all - Night Sweats drummer Patrick Meese and Richard Swift, the enigmatic producer behind both Night Sweats records, had to convince him to include it. Much like “Anthem,” a song Rateliff came up with on stage at a Denver concert that won him a $150,000 offer from Roadrunner Records that he subsequently declined, “S.O.B.” was written on a lark. What made its success harder to swallow was that, in Rateliff’s own estimation, “S.O.B.” isn’t a great song. “But that’s also not my responsibility as a performer.” ![]() “It was hard because, sometimes, it felt like, man, people just don’t get what I’m talking about,” Rateliff said. Set to a punchy rhythm, that traumatic experience became a hugely popular drinking anthem. The song was inspired by Rateliff’s bout with delirium tremens - a potentially fatal symptom of alcohol withdrawal that’s accompanied by shaking, hallucinations and, yes, sweating. The reaction was a cruel twist of entertainment-industry fate. Spiking the band’s rug-burning Sam & Dave routine with big folk ballads and Americana rock, it’s as much of a bawler as a brawler, toasting to the good times one moment and imagining setting “the whole thing on fire” the next. On March 9, Rateliff and company will release “Tearing at the Seams,” its sophomore effort. “I don’t really have any time for myself or a personal life,” Rateliff said, a trucker hat clamped down over his unkempt tuft of hair. Our conversation, 30 short minutes in a well-appointed office at 7S Management’s headquarters in Denver, came amid a stretch of promo appearances that’s had him doing up to 12 interviews a day for outlets around the world. But when you sign up to party on TV with giant CGI hamsters, those days are necessarily over. It wasn’t long ago that you could catch Rateliff for a curbside interview on any given day on South Broadway. Since the Denver-based singer-songwriter started performing with his spirited soul band, The Night Sweats, he and the band have played some 350 concerts with another 59 already on the books for 2018 - an aggressive clip for any outfit. Nathaniel Rateliff’s time is no longer his own. And Nathaniel shaved his head.Thursday, March 2nd 2023 Home Page Close Menu And I remember my hair started to fall out. In 2002, it was Pope's testicular cancer: "I was going through chemo, and we were rehearsing in the back of this house down the street. Nathaniel Rateliff and Joseph Pope III, with correspondent Anthony Mason, at the Hi-Dive in Denver. ![]() "You know, I think at times we used each other as a crutch to make it through, just kind of limp through whatever tragedy we were going through," Rateliff said. Mason asked, "What's it meant for you to have each other going through all this?" Pope has played in all of Rateliff's bands. But it's the first real memory I have of singing, like, What should we do with a drunken sailor?" Pope recalled, "I was in fifth grade he was in sixth grade, and we were in honors choir, and we didn't really know each other yet. The two had started collaborating musically back in Hermann. "Yeah, I would have my tape recorder when I worked in the yard," Rateliff said.
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