Darius Rucker, frontman for Hootie & The Blowfish, Mike Mills, Bassist for R.E.M., and Steve Gorman, founding Black Crowes drummer, have formed a new supergroup named “Howl Owl Howl”. The band has posted the following:
Drawing on three of the most impactful careers in American rock, Howl Owl Howl is a brand-new band with an old school rock & roll soul – and an elusive musical creature, rarely seen in the wild.
Founded by Grammy-winning Hootie & the Blowfish frontman/multi-Platinum country star Darius Rucker, REM co-founder/Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Mike Mills, and The Black Crowes co-founder/ former drummer/ lauded media personality Steve Gorman, Howl Owl Howl rekindles the spirit of the authentic rock band. Infusing roots rock with an open-minded alternative flair – plus a fluid rhythm section and the barrel-chested vocal rasp of an iconic frontman – it was born from friendship and the pure joy of collaboration, and powered by the world-class instincts of true originals. After moving in the same orbit through their hard-touring ‘90s heyday, the three founding members are far from done making noise.
“It feels great to be singing with a rock band again. It’s like buddies getting together, but also getting to play with your idols,” Rucker explains. “The stuff we’re writing is so different than anything I’ve tried to do before.”
“You never can explain band chemistry,” Mills adds. “We all like each other. And we all admire each other musically. All those things come together and if it weren’t fun, we wouldn’t be doing it.”
Some 30 years in the making, an upcoming album captures the group’s wide range of sonic influence in melody-driven freeform style. From punchy garage rock and jangle pop to throwback soul, blues, and beyond, self-penned songs veer from deeply personal to colorful and quirky, for a set steeped in the rebellious passion and forever-young philosophy of rock … yet designed in a different phase of life.
The band traces its beginnings back to 2019, when Gorman pulled the longtime friends together for a Nashville benefit show. Then in 2021, they began working in earnest. With no idea considered off limits, each member contributed to original songwriting in a series of loose, freewheeling studio sessions, building a sound moment by moment. Their combined experience went to good use, and the refreshing result grew well beyond any just-for-fun expectations.
“The concept from day one was, ‘Let’s just write a bunch of songs together and see what we think, see if there’s anything cool that comes from it’ – there was no grand design beyond that,” Gorman says. “And then we all hit this realization of, ‘This is actually really good! I think we’ve caught something.’”
“Writing these songs – it feels great to get to do it the way we did it back in the day,” Rucker agrees. With more maturity and humility – but the same swagger each member brought to their genre-defining first act – the near-mythical group will hit the road in late 2025; a new era started for all the right reasons. Howl Owl Howl has been a rewarding leap of faith, the group says. And the excitement is real.
“I hope people listen to this and realize it’s just three old rock & roll friends that started hanging out,” Rucker explains.
“We all truly dig the record. We knew it would be fun and we knew it would be cool and all those things, but this is beyond that,” Gorman adds. “This is a record we would feel when we were much younger. This is a record we’d be proud of in any of our other bands.”
Visit https://howlowlhowl.com/ for more info on the band.
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