In mid-January 2013, the band took some time off from the studio to play their annual three-night stand at the 40 Watt Club in Athens, Ga. The first night went great. Opening the show was an ad hoc band called Thundercrack doing Springsteen covers; the lead singer was the Truckers’ longtime soundman Matt DeFilippis, and the lead guitarist was longtime merch guy Craig Lieske. Lieske, the former manager of the 40 Watt, had become the band’s unofficial ambassador to the fans, if only because he charmed everyone who met him.
So it was devastating when everyone learned that Lieske had died in bed from a heart attack after the show. It was all the more difficult because the band had to finish the other two nights at the 40 Watt and then leave for a short tour with an empty bunk on the bus. It was during that tour, as the bus drove from Fort Worth to New Orleans, that Hood, sitting way in the back, scribbled down a song for Lieske called “Grand Canyon.”
“One of my fondest memories of my time with Craig,” Hood recalls, “was a trip to the Grand Canyon; he and I had spent a lot of time that day staring off into the glare of the distance. That memory unlocked the song, and I wrote it in 15 minutes; it took me longer to learn how to play it than to write it. I like the ascending and descending chord sequence that’s part of it, and I like the weird coda we added in the studio; it needed that kind of ending to pay homage to the improvisational music he did. I sang that song at his memorial service instead of reciting a eulogy.”
From an interview with Paste Magazine in 2014 ():
In mid-January 2013, the band took some time off from the studio to play their annual three-night stand at the 40 Watt Club in Athens, Ga. The first night went great. Opening the show was an ad hoc band called Thundercrack doing Springsteen covers; the lead singer was the Truckers’ longtime soundman Matt DeFilippis, and the lead guitarist was longtime merch guy Craig Lieske. Lieske, the former manager of the 40 Watt, had become the band’s unofficial ambassador to the fans, if only because he charmed everyone who met him.
So it was devastating when everyone learned that Lieske had died in bed from a heart attack after the show. It was all the more difficult because the band had to finish the other two nights at the 40 Watt and then leave for a short tour with an empty bunk on the bus. It was during that tour, as the bus drove from Fort Worth to New Orleans, that Hood, sitting way in the back, scribbled down a song for Lieske called “Grand Canyon.”
“One of my fondest memories of my time with Craig,” Hood recalls, “was a trip to the Grand Canyon; he and I had spent a lot of time that day staring off into the glare of the distance. That memory unlocked the song, and I wrote it in 15 minutes; it took me longer to learn how to play it than to write it. I like the ascending and descending chord sequence that’s part of it, and I like the weird coda we added in the studio; it needed that kind of ending to pay homage to the improvisational music he did. I sang that song at his memorial service instead of reciting a eulogy.”