Onstage Friday night at Atlanta’s Chastain Park, Blackberry Smoke’s Charlie Starr sang about home in the slow-burn rock ballad “Azalea,” a track off the group’s latest album Be Right Here: “Maybe it’s not out there/Maybe this leads nowhere/Home will always be right here.”
For Blackberry Smoke, home is Atlanta. Since forming in 2000, the Southern rock outfit has grinded it out across the country and around the globe as one of the premier acts of bluesy country-rock. But onstage at Chastain, it was about circling back to where it all began — to founding member Brit Turner.
The beloved drummer and humorous heart of Blackberry Smoke died March 3 after a courageous battle with glioblastoma, a form of brain cancer. He was 57. At the time, the band had just launched a nationwide tour for Be Right Here, which included Turner’s final recordings and contributions.
“I think about him every day, every show, every set list,” Starr tells Rolling Stone backstage beforehand. “He was just ingrained so deeply in all things that we do. Every aspect of it. Not just the songs and playing the music, but it was his drive in the early days that kept the band going.”
In the hours leading up to the gig at Cadence Bank Amphitheatre, Starr is sitting on the band’s bus parked behind the venue. He takes one particular seat in the kitchen area of the vehicle, which was Turner’s prized position while on the road.
“This is his seat,” Starr grins. “And I don’t let anybody else sit here ‘cause I don’t want anybody’s strange butt sitting here.”
When asked about the state of Blackberry Smoke, and how the band moves forward without its anchor, Starr’s eyes begin to water. “He was my favorite drummer and my best friend,” he says. “[Tonight], it’s not closure. Nobody wants that. He’s a part of us forever.”
Wiping away tears, Starr laughs when thinking about Turner — his brother-from-another for over a quarter of a century. “We spend more time laughing about things he said now than we do crying. His thing was humor,” Starr says. “He was important to a lot of people, not just me.”
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Throughout the homecoming concert honoring Turner, a large projection screen behind Blackberry Smoke flashed images of fast bikes and even faster cars, along with collages of the vast American West and greater Southern Appalachia — all things that Turner loved.
Periodically, the screen would also broadcast tributes from an array of musical legends. Billy F. Gibbons, Warren Haynes, members of the Zac Brown Band, and Jamey Johnson all paid their respects to Turner and the band. “They were doing exactly what I wanted to do,” Johnson said in his remarks. “Just rocking their ass off.”
For the encore, Blackberry Smoke returned to the stage to roll through some of Turner’s favorite classic-rock hits with some special guests. Butch Walker, a longtime friend of Turner’s and an Atlanta native, crushed Van Halen’s “Dance the Night Away,” while Jackyl’s Jesse James Dupree howled through AC/DC’s “Have a Drink on Me.”
“Butch was at our first rehearsal. He’s seen everything from the beginning. Then, Jesse produced our first record and took us on the road for the first month of our career in 2001,” Starr says, connecting the dots.
But the cherry on top of the two-hour tribute came from Cheap Trick guitarist Rick Nielsen, who appeared for a rowdy, blow-it-all-out take on the group’s classic “Surrender.” It was a way to nod to one of Turner’s very first live shows, Cheap Trick at Atlanta’s Fox Theatre in 1979.
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With the tribute to Turner now in the rearview mirror, Blackberry Smoke will return to the road, to both play their songs for fans and also further the legacy, legend, and lore of Brit Turner.
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“You look at the Allman Brothers. When Duane died, they played his funeral. I used to think, ‘How could they do that?’” Starr says. “And now I know — it’s all they knew how to do. In a way, Brit was like Duane, where he was the one saying, ‘Get your ass onstage and play.’”
Setlist:
“Sanctified Woman”
“Good One Comin’ On”
“Hammer and the Nail”
“Waiting for the Thunder”
“You Hear Georgia”
“Pretty Little Lie”
“Hey Delilah”
“Let It Burn”
“Like It Was Yesterday”
“Dig a Hole”
“Sleeping Dogs”
“Azalea”
“Shakin’ Hands With the Holy Ghost”
“Whatcha Know Good”
“Run Away From It All”
“Ain’t Got the Blues”
“Up in Smoke”
“One Horse Town”
“Little Bit Crazy”
“Dance the Night Away” (with Butch Walker)
“Have a Drink on Me” (with Jesse James Dupree)
“Surrender” (with Rick Nielsen)
“Ain’t Much Left of Me”
