It’s interesting to watch artists navigate the complicated music business landscape decade after decade. I’m especially inspired by those who are not only still surviving but elevating their craft to new levels. Talent has no timetable. One of those talented rockers that comes to mind is singer John Corabi.
John may be best remembered by his time in Mötley Crüe, where he bravely took over for front man Vince Neil in 1994. He released a self-titled album with the band that is now looked upon as a solid piece of music. John’s soulful vocals and strong songwriting comes through on on the compilation which includes the single Hooligan’s Holiday.
Before Mötley Mania, John was the front man of The Scream. In 1997, he formed the highly underrated band Union with Bruce Kulick of Kiss. John Corabi joined the supergroup The Dead Daisies in 2015 and has made music with countless artists as a singer, songwriter, and guitarist.
John’s vocals are reminiscent of Paul Rodgers, Steve Marriott, and Rod Stewart. You could say his solid pipes allowed him to provide a great delivery of a song. He is also one of rock music’s nicest guys.
His forthcoming album and first-ever full solo album, New Day, is out April 24 on Frontiers Records. When it arrived in my inbox and he was on my Carr Stereo Podcast interview schedule, I was excited to catch up with this talented guy who had been on my radio show at WDHA since the early ’90s with his various projects.
I gave the stream of the album a listen, and it blew me away. Twelve tracks, including one cover of Sly and The Family Stone’s Everyday People. John teamed up with his old friend, mega-writer and producer Marti Frederiksen, along with a killer band of musicians. This ensemble included Charlie Starr from Blackberry Smoke, Richard Fortus from Guns N’ Roses, and Winger keyboardist Paul Taylor.
He also brought an arsenal of quality songs to present to the world. Recently, I caught up with John for an interview on my Carr Stereo podcast to discuss his New Day ahead.
*Editor’s Note: Answers have been edited for clarity and length.*
Terrie Carr – This new record that you have coming out on April 24 is your debut solo album. I actually did a little head scratch too, because I’m like, John’s not done a solo record yet?
John Corabi – I kind of have, but my first one was the unplugged record. There was really no drum or no keyboards. It was just me and a few friends with acoustic guitars, acoustic bass. If we needed rhythm, we just used tambourine.
TC– This is you and your friends and you’ve got this amazing group of people.
JC– Yes, first real full band, new material kind of record thing.
TC– Let’s start by talking about the title track New Day. The title track is just what we need these days. It’s so positive and makes me feel good. I listened to it the first time it dropped in my inbox, and I was like, Oh my God. This is such a positive, organically about the music kind of song.
It is an earworm, and I was sending it to friends telling them you’ve got to hear this new one from John Corabi.
JC– I had the riff for a minute, and I played it for Marti (Frederiksen). That’s one of those songs that took a minute to put together because it was like, “let’s do this!” Then we’d go away from it, listen to it again.
We finally found the music, and a great title. I sat down and started writing the lyrics. Honestly, I really can’t stand the way people are with each other nowadays. People are not nice, they are very critical. Everybody walks around staring at their phone. Staring at their computers just grumpy, caught up in all the BS that’s going on.
Go outside, dude, put your feet in the grass, enjoy life. I’m sure you can think of somebody off the top of your head. We all have one. There’s a friend or somebody that we know who just walks around mopey-faced thinking that the world is unfair and just did them wrong.
Honestly, it’s more about fixing yourself and looking at the glass half full and not half empty. I don’t know where the song or the lyrics came from. As I was writing it, I’m like, ok, this is really cool. It does have a positive message, but that wasn’t my intention. It just kind of happened that way. Yesterday’s gone. You cannot change it. Today is the day to rearrange it.
TC– You’re working with these incredible people. Including a guy whose name comes up when I’m talking to artists, and that’s Marti Frederiksen. He is like Mr. Music. He’s a great player, producer, and writer.
JC– I’ve known Marti since The Scream days. Marti was in a band called Outlaw Blood that opened a few shows for The Scream. My manager at the time, John Greenberg, knew him. Little known fact- the movie Almost Famous…..that was Marti singing and he did a lot of the writing for Stillwater (the fictitious band).
TC– Yeah, he was the Jeff Bebe character singing voice.
JC– Yup! He’s so easy to work with. I truly depend on Marti because he knows what’s going on up here in my head. He knows what I want to do. With this record, my biggest concern when I got offered this record deal- everybody starts looking for what box to put it in.
I hate when you do a song and it’s like Is it hard rock or is it Americana? Is it country or is it classic rock? Is it alt rock? What is it? Why can’t there just be one big box that says music?
I told Marty that I don’t like labels and boxes. Marti said let’s not think about it. Let’s sit down and just make the best record we can.
TC– People want to hear songs. You’ve always been a very song-driven artist with every project that you were involved with. Even the Motley record is a record that years later, people started to go a different guy, yes. But this record’s actually a freaking great record.
JC– It was swimming uphill right from the beginning on Motley.
TC– But it got recognized afterwards. Looking back at the Motley Crue record from 1994, people say that record is really solid.
JC– That’s all you can ask for. I was just saying to my wife that even more than the money, god forbid, let me knock on wood. If anything would ever happen to Paul McCartney, people are gonna go the guy was consistent. He was always consistent- he started great and he ended great.
That’s what it’s about for me. There’s some weird little desire of mine in my head for people. Whenever my time comes, they look at The Scream, Motley Crue, Union, or the solo stuff I’ve done. The Dead Daisies stuff I’ve done. Look at the whole body of work and say it was consistent. John was consistent. That’s all I can really ask for.
John’s forthcoming release, New Day, is more than consistent. It’s one of the best records I’ve heard in a while. John is hitting the road with his amazing backing band as a headliner and supporting his Philadelphia brother Tom Keifer (they are calling it the “Cheesesteak Tour”!).
Barrett Media produces daily content on the music, news, and sports media industries. Sign up for our newsletters to stay updated and get the latest information right in your inbox.
