Chuck E. Weiss releases new album on April 15

Having Tom Waits and Johnny Depp as executive producers should help Chuck sell a few copies.

Red Beans and Weiss, the newest album from Los Angeles legend Chuck E. Weiss, will be released April 15 by ANTI- Records. This album marks Weiss’ first release since his 2006 album, 23^rd & Stout, which USA Today declared, “cuts across a colorful lyrical landscape that includes musty old saloons, 4 a.m. prank phone calls and hopeless searches for the junky “antique” dealers who once dominated the suburban boulevards of L.A. before strip malls replaced them.” 

Weiss has had the extraordinary fortune to record his latest album Red Beans & Weiss without the pressure of a time clock. He began recording in October 2012 with strong encouragement by his friends and mentors, Tom Waits and Johnny Depp, who are executive producing this album, which all consider to be Weiss’ best work yet. Check out "Boston Blackie" below.

Weiss began his career playing drums in hometown Denver, where he was discovered by Lightnin’ Hopkins and proceeded to tour and record with a surplus of legends, including Hopkins, Sunnyland Slim, Dr. John and Willie Dixon, who once said of Weiss something along the lines of, “Ain’t ya got ears son? That boy with the big old head be one of the best musicians in this town, this country even.”

Weiss remained in Colorado for a period of time and taught a class on the history of American music at The University of Colorado at Boulder before making a move to the West Coast. He became friends with Tom Waits in 1973 when they played at the same venue in Denver. In 1975, Waits recorded a couple of songs they had written together. Weiss traveled to L.A. for the recording and decided to stay. 

His early days in L.A. were spent as a cook at the Troubadour club where he eventually befriended Rickie Lee Jones in late 1977/early 1978 and was forever immortalized in her 1979 hit song “Chuck E’s in Love.” 

In 1981 Select Records released a series of demos/unfinished songs called The Other Side of Town. As a result of that release Weiss put together his band, G-d Damn Liars, who performed weekly gigs at a nightclub in L.A. that he and good friend Johnny Depp later converted into the illustrious Viper Room. Weiss has released two other albums, Extremely Cool and Old Souls & Wolf Tickets in addition to his 2006 LP of 23rd & Stout.