Sometimes it’s better when an artist is selective about when, and why, they step into the recording studio. In an era defined by frictionless streaming and increasingly accessible home-recording technology, many musicians flood the market with material that, in another time, would have been filtered out by a discerning A&R department. Quantity has become easy. Craft often less so.
Chris Berardo is an artist who remains deliberate. He records sparingly and with purpose, and the payoff is immediate: when Berardo releases a new record, you can trust it’s been earned. His songs are honed through relentless touring across multiple states, tested night after night in front of wide-ranging audiences before they’re ever committed to tape. That’s certainly true of his latest release, Wilder All the Time.
Drawing on the deep songwriting foundation he developed under the tutelage of the late, legendary Bob Crewe (the Four Seasons), Berardo delivers a collection that feels both seasoned and alive. These are songs about love, hardship, and perseverance; clear-eyed reflections on the human spirit’s ability to endure and, occasionally, transcend.
Produced by long-time Reckless Kelly member David Abeyta (Reckless Kelly, Cody Canada, Kevin Welch, Jamie Lin Wilson), the album features contributions from RK stalwarts Jay Nazz and Joe Miller alongside Berardo’s core bandmates Marc Douglas Berardo and Bill Kelly. Special guest appearances by Walt Wilkins, Lloyd Maines, and Bukka Allen further enrich the sessions. The result is a record brimming with energy and emotion, balancing Berardo’s signature sense of joy with a heartbreaking tenderness when the subject matter cuts deep.
Wilder All the Time also reflects the wide range of influences that have shaped Berardo’s sound, forged in part through his frequent appearances as a special guest with artists such as the Doobie Brothers, the Marshall Tucker Band, Dickey Betts & Great Southern, America, Richie Furay, Reckless Kelly, and many others.
Copper caught up with Berardo to talk about the making of the record, the surprisingly important role the tambourine plays in his live shows, his soft spot for holiday songs, and what lies ahead for an artist whose performances only seem to get…wilder all the time.
Chris Berardo, Wilder All the Time, album cover.
Ray Chelstowski: Wilder All the Time feels like a perfectly chosen title for your latest record. You’ve lost none of your intensity; if anything, the songs feel even more muscular. What were you tapping into creatively that led to that added edge?
Chris Berardo: Well, I appreciate you saying that and I’m happy that comes across. The title is taken from a line in the last song on the album, “Nothing Greater,” but it’s absolutely how I was feeling about life and my music at the time – wilder than ever and ready to go. It had been a long time between full albums but I felt like I had more of a desire to put the top down and just floor it than ever before.
I’d basically run out of reasons to hold anything back. I wrote the songs with that feeling in mind…you get enough life under your belt and if you’re lucky you hit a sweet spot where you feel like your skill level is finally matching your energy level and then you are ready to fly.
RC: When you set out to make this record, was there a sonic or thematic guidepost that helped steer you through the creative process?
CB: Yes, absolutely. I knew that I wanted something that was more like the big sound that me and the band made live, and I could feel that the new songs were coming to me with a little less country and a little more rock in the country/rock equation.
I’d been through a serious health thing and we’d lost our longtime drummer and friend to a sudden illness and a lot of real life intrusions had caused things to very suddenly sputter some, but when I was able to refocus there was a “nothing left to lose” mentality for me and I was determined to make something with zero concessions that I could stand behind, even if it was a bit of a departure from what I’d done before …
RC: You recorded the album at Cedar Creek Studio in Austin, Texas. What do you love most about that room, and how did it shape the final sound of the record?
CB: That was just a great experience, all around. Austin had been like a second musical home to me and the band for a while, and that vibe definitely made an impact on the whole process. Cedar Creek is a big, warm, wooden room that sounds great, where a lot of records that I really love were made, and it’s isolated on a big spread of land where you really feel like you can breathe and get super-focused, and it allowed for our Austin friends like Walt Wilkins, and the late, great Jimmy LaFave to drop in and hang out some and spread a little of their magic around (the legendary Lloyd Maines played some pedal steel on a couple of tracks). There were great dinners and long drink-fueled end-of-day hang outs while we listened to the day’s work and told stories and laughed like hyenas. It all made for a really soulful experience.
RC: Wilder All the Time was produced by longtime Reckless Kelly member David Abeyta. What did David bring to the process that felt new or different for you?
CB: A lot. I had basically always co-produced the records before, and I was determined this time to have another strong set of ideas to bounce off instead of just my own. I wanted an objective perspective on what me and the songs were, or could be, and surrendering some of that was not easy, but I knew it would be important – but it obviously had to be the right person.
I had a few false starts with talented producers but I just knew it wasn’t the thing I was hearing in my head. I had to bite the bullet on a lot of time and money that didn’t pay off, but it just started to make me more maniacally determined to get it to be the thing I wanted to say. I was always a huge Reckless Kelly fan, and we had toured with them over the years, and one night in an Irish bar after the show in Boston the idea got hatched about David producing. When the run ended and the dust settled for a week or so, we started talking about it, and he was very sensitive to the idea that I’d had all these false starts and that if we did it, it would have to really be for the right reasons.
We really hit it off on all cylinders and then just dove head first into the process, and then David had the big idea to bring together me and my DesBerardos guys, Brother Marc (Marc Douglas Berardo) and Handsome Bill (Bill Kelly) with three of the Reckless guys (David on guitar, Jay Nazz on drums and Joe “Joebass” Miller on bass) and so for me that became a dream line up. David was already one of my favorite guitar players anywhere and Reckless Kelly was basically my favorite band, so it felt like it’d be hard to go wrong! I knew that I would never be in danger of sounding like Reckless Kelly because they have a such a distinctive band sound and singer/songwriter (Willy Braun) but it felt like it would give my stuff the same extra muscle that I was looking for. That was the group for every song on the album, which we cut playing together in the room, and I think it gives the record a really cohesive band feeling.
RC: One thing that sets your music apart is how it flirts with the edges of other genres while staying grounded in your Americana core. “Broken Hearted Man,” for example, leans into the feel of ’60s soul without ever leaving home base. How intentional is that balance for you?
CB: Oh, yeah, absolutely. That song was one of the examples of trusting another idea because David had brought that feel to it when I wouldn’t have thought of it.
I was really just letting the songs come out of me without much thought about genre or anything like that. I was raised really early on the amazing and wildly eclectic New York radio like WABC, the AM station that would play the hits like James Taylor, The O’Jays, The Archies, Deep Purple, The Jackson 5, the Rolling Stones, Joni Mitchell, Yes, the Allman Brothers Band and the Temptations in a typical hour, all back to back…and later the important FM station WNEW, and it made me love all kinds of music and prize the song first before worrying about the genre. It also made it hard to pinpoint the kind of music I most wanted to make because I wanted to be everything! But I am happy to let all those influences seep into the cracks and hopefully become something that’s my own.
RC: Walt Wilkins is the perfect counterpart to your vocals. How did you come to bring him in for “Underachiever?”
CB: Well, Walt is my friend and one of my favorite humans. I was a big fan of his from when I first started coming through Texas and nosing around the Austin scene. He is absolutely one of the best, pure voices around, and in my opinion the best songwriter of all the great Texas guys, and I will gladly stand up on Steve Earle’s coffee table and tell him that!
David loved the idea of making “Underachiever” into basically a duet, and Walt came down to Cedar Creek and laid his soulful thing on us in exchange for just an afternoon of beer drinking and hard laughs. It’s a wild barroom stomper of a song and we all just let it fly.
I wouldn’t recommend trying to stand toe to toe and sing in a room with Walt Wilkins to the timid, but I am so happy that I did!
RC: For those who may not know – who is Wanda Leigh (of the song of the same name)?
CB: I always like to say that I think “Wanda Leigh” is one of those songs that should probably mean different things to different folks…
I guess for me, I had an image in my mind of a woman, probably down South, who is maybe feeling lonely and thinking that life might have passed her by a little, that maybe things haven’t worked out like she’d dreamed about. Not so long ago, people would escape the day to day with a book or movie or the radio, but I kind of pictured her up all night staring at the computer screen, riding the Internet and trying to get a glimpse of another life, maybe even looking for a little human contact out there somewhere in the dark…it probably comes with its share of disappointments, but she still has The Hope…
Or maybe she’s someone else you know…
But I hope whoever listens will think of Miss Wanda Leigh kindly, wherever, and whoever, she is.
(Note: I once ran into someone on the aforementioned internet named Wanda Leigh, same spelling, and shot her a note about the song. All signs say she was utterly uninterested.)
RC: Handsome Bill Kelly lays down some of the hottest Bradley Barn–style licks on the record, then seamlessly shifts into rock-rooted chords that give songs like “Take Me Back” their punch. What does Bill bring to the band that elevates your sound in this way?
CB: Bill Kelly is money in the bank, man…as solid as a musician and a person as you’re gonna find. He’s the multi-instrument guy that is one of the distinctive parts of the sound: electric, acoustic, mandolin (he actually mostly plays a mandola), and singing background. He’s also a great songwriter with his own batch of well-received records and he’s just really a musician’s musician, as they say, and often a lone voice of sanity on the road (well, semi-sanity).
I’m lucky to play my music with these guys, because, also, Brother Marc (Marc Douglas Berardo), who plays most all of the acoustic on the album, is absolutely one of the best acoustic guitar players anywhere. He can fingerpick with the very best and then turn around and be the driving rhythm guitar in the rock band, often within the same song…a really special player, and the vocal blend we three have is a lucky stroke that makes me happy.
RC: On Wilder All the Time, you include a dedication to your dad, and your brother is also a working musician. What did your parents encourage, or simply allow, in your home growing up that helped make this troubadour life feel possible?
CB: Well, yeah, Marc is a working musician to say the least – he’s an award-winning singer/songwriter with a slew of beautiful albums to his credit and a touring schedule that makes it harder and harder to steal him away to play with the band. So there must be some DNA going around from our folks.
Our mom is an amazing singer with a voice like Streisand, who did some cool things early on but just didn’t choose to pursue it, but she definitely helped nurture the musical joy for me around the house.
And my dad was just an absolute force of nature who instilled the idea in me, and I bet in Marc, too, that all big and wild ideas were absolutely legitimate and that you could heave yourself into the world fearlessly. And yet they both made sure that you knew you could come home whenever a scheme collapsed and you needed to regroup and heal up. It wasn’t always smooth sailing, but they were always supportive and also able to identify that there was no talking me out of a life of fairly reckless insanity!
RC: You have a real gift for opening a show. You grab the room quickly and get the crowd fully primed for what’s coming next. What’s your secret to winning over an audience that didn’t come in just for you?
CB: Thank you. I’ve really always taken a lot of pride in that. It’s like its own sport in a way.
I’ve been lucky to have played a lot of shows with the folks who were legitimately among my musical heroes, so first off, you get to see up close how the great ones handle their business and why they’ve been successful for so long. But being a real fan, I think can translate to an audience who may not know you at all, because we try to let them know that we’re as excited to be there as they are, and we’re all sharing something special. We like to say, “Hey, we got in for free!” And I think that honesty makes things flow.
And no matter who the headliner is, I still always remember that they are allowing us to play these songs for an audience that they’ve usually spent a career cultivating, sometimes 40 years or more, and that’s a privilege. But I’ve been really lucky to have mostly worked with the people I’d be most likely to pay to see.
In the end, we’re all just voices and songs and instruments on a stage, so you try to remember that you’re there because you have something to offer. We’re here to spread the joy, folks!
RC: I suspect the tambourine has something to do with that. You make it more than just rhythmic sparkle – it’s almost an entertaining foil on stage. It’s been a steady partner of yours for a while now. How did that become part of your signature?
CB: Ha! Thank you…I’m like a young Tracy Partridge!
It’s definitely something that is fun for me and I think adds to the sound when done right…and it’s not as easy to do right as it looks.
Chris lets it fly. Courtesy of 360 Degrees.
When me and Brother Marc first started playing together as a duo we played in every bar with neon in the window almost every night for hours at a time, and I guess I started lobbing in with the harmonica and the tambourine. I’m not a harp player in the typical blues style, but I have my own thing and it’s something I love to do…and the tambourine became a good way to dial up the extra energy for that fourth set at 2 a.m.!
I’ve been doing it ever since and I guess if you’re gonna hold a thing in your hand you might as well heave it around and throw it into the air and have some fun with it. There have been some super high tosses and catches over the years that will always stick in my mind.
RC: You clearly have a soft spot for the holidays. I’m not sure what I enjoy more: your holiday songs, or the videos you create to bring them fully to life. What draws you to that season creatively?
CB: Well, I’d been thinking for a while that it would be a nice thing to have a fun holiday song that could be played every year, but I kind of put it off because I just couldn’t seem to get motivated to write a song about candy canes or reindeer or a blues song with Santa lyrics inserted. Those are great but I just kept feeling like we’ve got that covered already.
But a few years back my dad was suddenly having some serious health issues and as we got to the holidays he’d gone into the hospital and we were slowly starting to understand that he might not be going home again, which was, of course, completely heartbreaking, and somehow the holiday season all around at the time just seemed to make it even tougher to face.
I’d had a song idea sitting around for a while that I’d been playing on the piano and it all of a sudden just fit – so it became “This Year,” which is just about trying to be thankful for the moment and cherishing the memories. It all goes faster than you think.
It’s more of a song that just happens to be set at the Holidays, in some ways, than a traditional Christmas song, because the idea is always true, but that time of year can really help us to focus up on what’s important …
Then, while I was at it, I had always wanted to record a version of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” just because I think it’s such a beautiful song. David Abeyta produced both of the singles and we gave this one a bit of a traditional jazz reading. It’s a joy to sing and while I don’t know how I measure up to Sinatra or Chrissie Hynde or my mom’s take on it, it makes me happy to have mine in the mix.
We spent a great day in New York City at The Cutting Room, one of my favorite venues to play, and knocked out both videos with director Will Speno, and to tell you the truth, that day is now in there among my favorite Holiday memories. So it worked for me on a couple of different levels.
I’m happy that those will always be around.
RC: Blue Elan Records and 360 Degrees both seem like ideal homes for an artist like you. What makes that partnership feel like the right fit?
CB: Well, yeah, I’m lucky because in my experience it’s pretty rare to find a good fit.
Blue Elan are kind of the way the labels used to be, or at least proposed to be – they’re real music folks and they make you feel supported. The head honcho, Kirk Pasich, really knows music and is one of the most artist-friendly guys I’ve come across in this racket. At the time that I signed with them I had a major label deal in my pocket, but I’ve been around the track enough to know the ups and downs of that, and when I was introduced to the Blue Elan folks, and their roster of some of my very favorite artists, it just felt very right to me.
360 is the last of a breed, in many ways. It’s run by Ann Henningsen, who started the company by helping me out with some T-shirts, then ran all the merch, then started doing the booking, the management, and then branched out to working with a lot of other cool artists. They know how to run every aspect from the bottom up and that’s rare these days. It’s truly all about the music, which a lot of people [pay lip service to] but is only rarely really true.
360 has been working with major artists for years now, like John Fogerty…I’m happy that they still have time for me!
RC: Finally – what’s next?
CB: Well, we have the second video from the album coming out on Valentines Day. It’s a lyric video directed by Mary Scholz for my song “Take a Little Love,” and I think it’s really kind of beautiful. There will be more videos coming. I think there are definitely more songs on this album that I’m excited to shine a light on.
I’m hoping to get back to a heavier touring schedule soon. We have a show on April 2 in New York City with our label mates, the very cool Rose’s Pawn Shop.
Then soon I’ll be able to really dig in and concentrate on raising the money for my Broadway-bound one man show “Don Rickles: Behind the Laughter.” I’m already getting fitted for my Tony Awards tux.
Header image courtesy of Tod Wolfson.
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