Cross Canadian Ragweed feels at home on the road

After 15 years in the touring business, many musicians begin to shudder at the thought of cargo vans, equipment trailers, bus rides and hotel beds.

Cross Canadian Ragweed is a different story. The "red dirt" band from Texas by way of Yukon, Okla., plays between 200 and 250 live dates per year and will make a stop Friday night at Shank Hall, 1434 N. Farwell Ave.

"Some bands go on tour. We just go to work," drummer Randy Ragsdale said by phone before a show at a club called Buffalo's in Statesboro, Ga.

"A lot of people don't like to play as much as we do, but we're not afraid to work. That's what we asked for."

Ragsdale and his bandmates / boyhood friends Grady Cross (guitar), Cody Canada (guitar and vocals) and Jeremy Plato (bass) released "Happiness and All the Other Things" on Aug. 31, and will be featuring cuts from that and the band's nine previous albums (six studio and three live) during the show.

The band, which took its name from the names of the original members (except Plato), and counts the Allman Brothers among its influences, is known for its high-energy shows. The Shank Hall gig opens with Texas singer Seth James; there will be a $20 cover.

Here is a snippet of our conversation with Ragsdale:

OnMilwaukee.com: I talked to a band recently that was itching to get out on the road after spending nine months in the studio. You guys are on the road all the time. Do you look at studio time as a change of pace?

Randy Ragsdale: I think so. The studio is always exciting for us. We start talking about it six months before its going to happen. We're so used to playing live that it keeps things fresh. We kind of look at the studio as an instrument. We have a lot of fun there and it's always fun to come out and have new tunes to play.

OMC: Is it hard to switch gears between the stage and the studio? Or, does playing so many gigs allow you to work things out before you start recording?

RR: It can be hard to get out of a certain mindset. It's funny. Because we play so many shows, we end up doing new songs a lot. By the time the album comes out, six months later, the real diehards already know the songs.

OMC: How does this album compare with your previous releases?

RR: We took a bit of a different attitude this time. We kind of felt like there were no rules for this one and the way we recorded it was a little different. We didn't all focus on the same thing at the same time. We could be laying down a guitar or vocal in one room and there would be something going on with a different song in another room.

OMC: Is it hard to mix the new stuff into a live show when fans expect to hear their favorites? How do you keep things interesting for yourselves, but satisfying to the audience?

RR: The hardest thing to do is to be able to play for yourself. Take a band like Lynyrd Skynyrd -- nobody is going to watch them if they don't do "Sweet Home Alabama." We don't have a song that big, but there are a couple songs that our fans like -- I'd say a song like "Boys From Oklahoma" -- and we'd better play ‘em. We don't want to be that band that says "Here's a bunch of new stuff that you don't know, but that we want to play." We appreciate that we're able to do this for a living and that people are willing to pay money and come out and see us. We want people to enjoy themselves. So, we play a lot of songs and try to give them a good night.

OMC: You've played a number of shows in Milwaukee and Wisconsin. Does anything in particular stand out from those nights?

RR: We've had great times in Milwaukee. Wisconsin shows in general are always fun. The thing that stands out to me is that there are so many bars there. A lot of bars and a lot of beer! I've met some really cool people in Wisconsin, people who have become good friends. Whenever we play there, we always set the bus call as late as possible, because we know we're going to be at a bar hanging out with people and having fun.