Chris Robinson

Robinson was born in Marietta, Georgia, just outside Atlanta. He is the son of Nancy Jane and Stanley "Stan" Robinson. Along with his brother Rich, Robinson formed Mr. Crowe's Garden in the 1980s, having been heavily influenced by The Faces and The Rolling Stones. They played a variety of clubs in and around Atlanta.

Robinson attended Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina. While some fellow students had posters of bikini girls lying on Porsches, Robinson decorated his dorm room with a Tom Waits poster and a Dream Syndicate poster: "...even at 18, I was into music."

In 1989, Mr. Crowe's Garden changed their name to The Black Crowes. They were signed to Rick Rubin's label Def American and released their debut album Shake Your Money Maker. With the success of their album they went out on tour to support it. They played several dates supporting ZZ Top. During this tour Chris was criticized for talking to the audience about his opposition to corporate sponsorship. This led to ZZ Top firing The Black Crowes from the tour.

Over the next nine years The Black Crowes went through many lineup changes and released six studio albums. In 1997, The Black Crowes headlined the second Furthur Festival, which had been spawned in the summer of 1996 by the remaining members of the Grateful Dead following Jerry Garcia's death in August 1995. In early 2002, it was announced that drummer Steve Gorman would be leaving the band and that The Black Crowes would be taking a break.

Robinson's first solo recording, "The Red Road", appeared on the soundtrack to the 2002 Goldie Hawn film "The Banger Sisters", confirming the singer's turn into softer material. A full-length debut, New Earth Mud, appeared in October and garnered very positive critical reviews. Written and produced with Paul Stacey and featuring collaborations with ex-Crowes Marc Ford and Eddie Harsch, the album allowed Robinson to hit the road as a headlining act. The band itself became known as New Earth Mud and earned a reputation for playing lengthy, jam-oriented sets across the United States.

New Earth Mud toured well into 2003, not only as a headliner but sharing the bill with such acts as Elvis Costello, Gov't Mule and The String Cheese Incident. During the later portion of the tour, the band introduced several new songs into their set in an attempt to build up an anticipation for their forthcoming second release. Robinson headed into the studio after the tour concluded, again with Paul Stacey as co-songwriter and producer. The end result was This Magnificent Distance, released in June 2004. The album was a bigger commercial success than its predecessor and showcased more of a "full band" sound.

Robinson parted ways with Paul Stacey and the rest of his band in early 2004, the reason for which remains unknown. In a very cryptic post on his official message board, Robinson said farewell to his original line-up and welcomed a new one, which featured ex-Crowes member Audley Freed on guitar and studio virtuoso George Reiff on bass. The band toured in support of This Magnificent Distance through the Summer of 2004, again gaining more critical and commercial attention for themselves. Another tour was planned for the fall of 2004 but was abruptly and inexplicably scrapped. Robinson instead remained out of the public eye aside from three appearances with Phil Lesh and Friends at the Warfield Theater in San Francisco.

Robinson did not perform publicly again until his February 2005 performance with his brother Rich at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas (a private event for people who work in the field of consumer electronics). He then joined Phil Lesh again for the Mardi Gras Spectacular concerts in San Francisco at the end of February, which also featured members of Railroad Earth, Particle and Galactic as well as former members of the Jerry Garcia Band.