MANCHESTER, NH – There are few bands that possess the ability to infect whoever is listening with unbridled energy quite like New York City’s Living Colour. The quartet of lead vocalist Corey Glover, guitarist Vernon Reid, drummer Will Calhoun and bassist Doug Wimbish have been causing this sensation with their music for the past 40 years. With this being said, folks around Manchester will get the chance to experience this for themselves as part of a Sunday night special on January 28. That’s when these rock icons will be performing at Angel City Music Hall for what should be an ideal way to conclude the weekend. It’s going to be starting a bit early at 7 p.m. with Boston nu-metal act Inverter kicking things off.
Glover and I had a talk ahead of the show about having a mutual love for both music and theater, his approach to singing, his thoughts on collaboration and Living Colour’s plans for a new album.
Rob Duguay: Before becoming the frontman for Living Colour, you were an aspiring actor while notably having a minor role in the Oliver Stone Vietnam War era film “Platoon.” Were you more into films than music when you were growing up or did both creative mediums have a big part in your upbringing?
Corey Glover: I was doing both, I was singing and I was acting. It was pretty much whatever I could get work for, that’s what I was doing. I didn’t discriminate, whatever was paying I was playing.
RD: Were you in both the drama club and the music program when you were in high school?
CG: Yeah, I was doing both. I was in a theater troupe when I was younger. I was also in the all-city high school chorus so it’s like I said, I was doing both.
RD: What made you realize that music would be a better artistic outlet for you than acting?
CG: I would say that music chose me. Like I said, whatever was paying I was playing. Whatever was more immediate, I would do it. While music is currently my full-time job, it wasn’t always my full-time job. When we were starting out as a local band in New York City, I was going out to do auditions for cereal commercials.
RD: Oh, wow. That must have been a unique situation to be in. You’ve been heralded for your approach to singing and your range with numerous people considering you to be one of the best rock vocalists of all time. What do you consider to be the main catalyst for the way you sing? Did you grow up listening to a lot of soul records by singers like Wilson Pickett and Marvin Gaye?
CG: Sam Cooke, Jackie Wilson and Michael Jackson, all those people I’ve tried in some ways to emulate. When I heard [Carlos] Santana for the first time, I was very inspired to try to emulate the kind of things him and his band were doing.
RD: Before you perform, what do you do to prepare so you don’t risk blowing out your vocal cords? Do you find someplace quiet to do a lot of harmonizing to train your voice?
CG: It’s a process of warming up and warming down, it’s preparing the voice to sing. Talking is close to singing, but it isn’t singing. Singing is a little more sustained, but I usually warm up before a show by listening to some scales, stretching out my range to see what works, what doesn’t work and where my voice is that day. If I don’t have a lot of high range in my voice that day, then I’ll figure out different ways of getting the song across without having to hit those notes. It’s a matter of knowing your instrument.
It’s like if you pick up a guitar, you have to know what it does and what you can do with it along with knowing what your limits and your expectations are. A Living Colour show has lots of ups and downs, so you have to be ready and prepared for that.
RD: I totally see what you mean. Outside of Living Colour, you’ve collaborated with the likes of the London Metropolitan Orchestra, Dokken guitarist George Lynch for the rock group Ultraphonix and the New Orleans jazz-funk act Galactic among others. When you enter into a collaboration with another band or musician, do you have a methodical approach to it or is it more malleable where it depends on who you’re pursuing a project with?
CG: I come to the table with an open mind, that’s basically what you have to do. You have to be ready for whatever comes that way. Whatever George Lynch is up to at that particular time, we work at it and the same goes for whomever you’re working with. When they come up with something, you go from there. It’s whatever is required, if people have an expectation of what they want from me then I have to try to live up to it and sometimes exceed it.
RD: I think you do a pretty good job at it. After the upcoming show at the Angel City Music Hall, what are Living Colour’s plans for the first half of 2024? I heard that you guys have been in the recording studio, so can we expect a new album sometime soon?
CG: We’re going to be working on an album while doing some shows on our own and some shows with Extreme. We’re going to do that and then we’re going to stay in the studio until we come up with something we like. We’re going to take it as it comes, whatever works.