photo: Alysse Gafkjen

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A few years ago, Nathaniel Rateliff was called in for a session when he found himself sitting with an old acquaintance.

“I randomly got asked to help a band co-write a song for an album that Brad Cook was producing,” Rateliff says of the chance encounter, which ended up setting the stage for much of the music he has made ever since then. “That first day, I walked into the studio and reconnected with Brad and it was like no time had passed for us. It was really nice and refreshing. And, by the end of our time together, we had determined that Brad was going to come in and help finish our next record.”

That album was eventually released in late 2021 on Stax as The Future, a deeply personal set of songs colored by the pandemic and bolstered by Rateliff’s dynamic soul-rock band The Night Sweats. The ensemble—whose current lineup also includes guitarist Luke Mossman, bassist Joseph Pope III, keyboardist Mark Shusterman, drummer Patrick Meese, and the horn section of Jeff Dazey, Daniel Hardaway and Andreas Wild—tracked the LP at the singer/guitarist’s Colorado home recording space Broken Creek Studio, beginning a fruitful partnership with Cook that continues to this day. Their latest collaboration is The Night Sweats’ fourth LP, South of Here, which was also released on Stax this past June. An open, honest look at the 45-year-old, St. Louis-bred musician’s life and struggles, the record is among Rateliff’s most revealing since forming The Night Sweats on the Colorado club circuit a little over a decade ago. South of Here also pays tribute to producer, musician and onetime Shins keyboardist Richard Swift, who worked closely with The Night Sweats before tragically passing away in 2018.

“Over the six years since Richard’s been gone, there have been songs that I have held on to that have reappeared. There are elements in there that are about him, and some that are about me, that are speaking to the same things that I saw in both of us when he was still around,” Rateliff says of the key South of Here track, “Get Used to the Night.” “So we touch on those same struggles. Some of the lines— like, ‘I used to stay home and writhe in my bed’—were definitely about having delirium tremens.”

Though Cook only entered The Night Sweats’ orbit somewhat recently, Rateliff— who first made waves playing in the more jam-associated rock band Born in the Flood and working under his own name with his stripped-down The Wheel combo—had actually known the producer since his days barnstorming the country with the roots-leaning indie-psych act Megafaun in the early 2000s.

“I’d met him and his brother Phil, and we’d see them here and there or at a festival,” Rateliff says. “I saw Phil Cook more frequently and, during the pandemic, Phil was giving me some piano lessons. But our little piano lessons also felt like therapy for both of us sometimes because we were going through similar things. I was talking to him about where I was at with The Future and he was like, ‘You should send some of this stuff to Brad—he’s producing now.’ I knew he was working with different bands and that he was even managing some bands for a minute, but I didn’t know he was producing. And then we ended up on the same session.”

South of Here quickly hit the Top 20 on the Billboard Top Album Sales chart, helping set up an extended campaign that will include The Night Sweats’ headlining debut at New York’s Madison Square Garden in March. This fall, the ensemble will also promote South of Here on the road with an act that’s trafficked in similar circles for years—My Morning Jacket.

“The first time I met Nathaniel was at Newport Folk,” My Morning Jacket drummer Patrick Hallahan says. “The festival put together a collaborative set of protest songs. I was in the band, and he was one of the singers. During the rehearsals, I got to chat with him a bit before we began, and he immediately felt like a kindred spirit—someone I had known most of my life. I wasn’t prepared for what happened when he took that first breath and let out that first note. It was there and then that I knew his music was as genuine as he was a human. They don’t come better.”

And, given that immediate bond, their upcoming run will likely feel like a family reunion.

“We started thinking about mixing things up since we weren’t supporting an album this year,” the drummer says. “A co-headlining tour was at the top of the idea pile, so we started thinking of people we love spending time with, who we’ve already established an onstage chemistry with. We wanted someone who our fanbase would accept as their own. Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night Sweats was an instant yes. I like to think that both of our camps come from a very honest place, with love at the helm of it all.”

South of Here began thanks to your friendship with Brad Cook. What were your initial goals for the project when you first sat down to work on this set of songs together?

NATHANIEL RATELIFF: Brad had helped us finish The Future. We’ve been friends for a long time, but we were both curious about how we would work together in a setting that’s just the two of us. So I went out to his place in Durham, N.C., for 10 days in January 2023. It was really just to help get me organized. I usually have a lot of voice memos, demos and recordings that I’m not very good at keeping track of. So we just went through and cataloged everything, and we also worked on some songs as they caught our ear while we were going through all this stuff.

I also had a couple of new things that had been sitting around and, over those 10 days, we worked out seven or eight songs. Some of the songs ended up being on the new record, but I hadn’t intended to start a new record. Then my manager was like, “It would be great to have a new Night Sweats record next year.”

I had March off, so I took another 10 days and wrote close to 10 songs during that time and, combined with the stuff I’d done with Brad, I ended up having a pretty big chunk of tunes to work on. Then, Brad was on board to meet up at Sonic Ranch, and we spent all of May down in El Paso, Texas. The band just set up in the room—in a circle—and played to each other. Brad had been spending some time down there and was excited to show us the property, and he had a great team assembled when we got to El Paso. We had made The Future at my home studio. I love my band, but to have 10 extra people at your house—every space we move into becomes a green room. And I like my house to be treated a little nicer than the green room. [Laughs.] I can get a little too precious about my space and try to protect it.

How did Brad reshape The Future sessions?

NR: The first question he asked me was: “What do you want out of this record for the band?” And I was like, “I really want everyone to feel like they’re a part of it— that they will walk away from this record and be excited about it.”

Brad is a great communicator, and his ability to make people feel seen and heard is really one of the things that I love about him. Before Brad came in, we had a really good friend who was helping us produce. But I felt like I was in there voicing my opinion more than I should have been at the time. And that made the job of producer, for our buddy, a little too difficult. But Brad really helped us solidify the ideas that were there, that we got a lot of the way through with our other buddy.

While your lyrics have long been personal, you are more open and direct than ever on South of Nowhere. Was that a conscious choice?

NR: Brad just kind of coached me through each song. Normally, in the writing process, I will go away and come back with a mostly finished product. And over the years, my songs have been personal and about me, but certain ideas have been a little more vague. And he was like, “Take ownership over your writing, over the situations.” I just leaned even more into what I was feeling. I’m always coming up with words. And Brad was the first producer to say, “No, that’s not done.” I wouldn’t be discouraged by it either—I’d just go back and keep writing.

Sometimes you feel like you’ve reached a point in the song where it feels like you’re done, but it’s just because you want it to be done. You are not actually done. It was good to have that pressure, to try to elevate what I was doing and hone in on what I’m trying to write and say. When I’m writing, I’m hoping that there’s gonna be growth or release but sometimes growth is slow. So, I don’t always get the results I’m hoping for by just thinking about what I’m feeling.

The year before The Future, you released And It’s Still Alright, your first solo album since The Night Sweats truly broke through. What were you trying to accomplish with that record that made you feel like the songs should live outside your band?

NR: Before The Night Sweats, I was a singer-songwriter. I had a band, but I was a solo artist, technically. After The Night Sweats’ success, and especially after the second record we did [Tearing at the Seams], there was just a lot of things that I was experiencing—that I was going through— and I wanted to be able to talk about all that. And, at the time, I didn’t feel like The Night Sweats was a good vehicle for me to do that. For a minute, I was writing in a certain style—writing for the expectations of what I thought people wanted The Night Sweats to be.

I had made a plan to make a record with Richard Swift, who had made our first two Night Sweats records, and he and I were gonna make a solo record. And then, unfortunately, Richard passed away. So that first record under my own name ended up being a lot about Richard’s passing, my struggle with alcoholism and the divorce I was going through because, during The Night Sweats’ second record, I was separating from my wife. We had been together for 11 years, married for 10 years, and some of the songs touched on that situation, but I also felt it wasn’t really the time to talk about it in the way I wanted to.

[The Tearing at the Seams track] “Still Out There Running” was one of the songs where I was talking about that separation. That was the last song we finished for that record. But, in some ways, I didn’t wanna talk about it because it was so new and still happening. Even though things weren’t working out between me and my partner, I didn’t want to put a record out and blow all that up in her face.

Some of that I just held onto. I had to wait until I had more perspective and then I tried to give it some time and space out of courtesy for the time we had spent together. It just ended up being a lot in the course of making a record. If I didn’t figure out a way to control my alcoholism, then I didn’t think I’d be around much longer.

While we were trying to finish the second record, we were in the middle of a summer of endless touring. And then Richard was struggling at the same time, and we both sobered up and finished record two.

I thought we were gonna take some time and then make a solo record together, but then we lost Richard to his own darkness and his own struggles with substance abuse, and that solo record ended up being a lot about that.

You and Richard were close friends as well as collaborators and you both battled alcoholism before he sadly passed away. Did you find it helpful to lean on someone in the studio who was experiencing some of the same darkness?

NR: Richard and I were trying to be accountable to each other the best we could. We partied really hard together, we drank really heavily together, specifically on the first record. It was just one of those things—I could keep up. It’s hard, sometimes, because you feel like it’s just such a good time, but there’s a darkness lingering there. There’s this loneliness and isolation to alcoholism, too—that is the spirit of the substance itself and that kind of wins in the end. We talked a lot about our anxiety and our struggles—our emotional, mental health struggles—that we both shared. We were open and honest about where we both were, and I felt like we were on the same journey. Richard had sobered up again and was getting some help, and I got really busy with record two. And then, as my divorce and everything was happening, I was spread too thin and my accountability slipped a little bit. And so I certainly felt like, when you lose somebody and you’re having a similar struggle and you’re supposed to be the one who’s accountable to them, I could have done more.

When I got the call that Richard had been put into the hospital, I flew out immediately. I was on the East Coast, and I got on the first flight I could and flew out to see him. It was tough. He wasn’t very coherent at that point either. Like I said, we were very open and honest with each about our struggles and trying to support each other. But, in the end, for a lot of people, you are riding right on the edge. Maybe it’s being an artist or whatever, but you just get close to the flame and, sometimes, you’re too close.

You have continued to pay tribute to Richard through your music. The South of Nowhere single “Get Used to the Night” was even inspired by him.

NR: I had “Get Used to the Night” for And It’s Still Alright, but I didn’t end up finishing it. Over the six years since he’s been gone, the song has sort of held on and kind of reappeared. There are elements in there that are about him and there are some that are about me—still speaking to the same things I saw in both of us and those struggles, even if it is not about alcohol specifically.

I was writing “And It’s Still Alright,” which is on the solo album, after his passing. It was something I was working on and, when I went to make the record in Cottage Grove in Oregon, one morning, I just finished it at the breakfast table—it’s one of those things that feels like a blessing. That ended up being the title track, but that was never my intention.

You have also been open about your struggles with ADHD. You are such an engaging and energetic performer. Does that play into how you are able to create or command the stage?

NR: It doesn’t make me a great listener— I’ll tell you that. [Laughs.] I have a tendency to drift pretty bad and, generally, I’m drifting into something that’s musical. I’m not really sure how to deal with it. I’m pretty dyslexic as well. So there’s these things that I don’t know if I’d ever been diagnosed with—there’s these struggles. And, after a while, you start to see some of the characteristics of some of these things in yourself. It makes it pretty difficult for me to communicate sometimes.

This fall, The Night Sweats and My Morning Jacket toured together. It felt like a natural pairing given your career trajectories, but there is a deeper friendship baked in there too. What do you remember about the first time that you crossed paths?

NR: Time escapes me a little bit when I was drinking—I get things a little confused in my timeline. So I remember we did One Big Holiday, and I assume I had met Patrick and Jim [James] before then, but I don’t really remember. Newport one year was the first time that I really connected with Jim. Patrick was an instant brother, and we had a real family feeling. I love their music and Jim’s solo work as well. So just being able to talk to them when we see each other, there’s a kinship there for sure. They’ve been around for a really long time and I have so much respect for them. Usually when I see them, we talk about our lives and what we’re dealing with. To have friends that you’re close with that are having similar life experiences—particularly in the music world, where nobody really writes a book on the wisdoms and the pitfalls of the music industry—is really special. Nobody talks to you about what it’s like when people start to recognize you and how you move through the world differently and what people expect of you. So it’s been helpful to bend their ear and ask for their wisdom and advice on things.

Speaking of special connections, you have performed with Bob Weir a few times in recent years. Did the Dead’s music shape your own creative approach and how did you end up on stage with Bobby for the first time?

NR: Being a teenager in the ‘90s, I was a skater who listened to the Grateful Dead and I played music on my own. So, there was a weird world of what I was listening to—a lot of the Dead and then Nirvana’s Bleach and Fugazi. I first got into them when someone loaned me a copy of [the compilation] Long Strange Trip. However silly or cheesy that is, it was a great introduction to their catalog. And then from there, I dove in even more. I was a huge fan of Jerry. Living in Missouri, I almost went to the show in St. Louis, right before the Chicago shows, just before he passed. This was also a pretty similar time to when Kurt Cobain lost his battle with his own demons. So I remember being pretty torn up and impacted by it all.

With Bob, I saw him around and never connected with him. And then I just put myself out there. He was gonna be in Denver [with Wolf Bros], and I had known Don Was from a few different projects. He’s been the MD [musical director] on a lot of these big shows. He was playing with Bob, so I reached out, and my manager knew their camp, too. So we threw caution to the wind, and then Don called me and we started chatting and they invited me to sit in. I was a little nervous because I hadn’t really had any one-on-one time with Bobby at that point. But we worked on a couple of the songs, like “Me and My Uncle” and “Tennessee Jed.”

When I called Don, I asked him if I should just be prepared to sing because I was working on these tunes on the guitar as well. When I showed up, Bob was like, “It’d be pretty good if you played guitar, too.” Luckily, I had done my homework and jammed along.

Bob also performed with The Night Sweats in December. What was the preparation for that show like?

NR: We were doing a benefit for The Marigold Project at The Guild Theatre in Menlo Park, outside of San Francisco, near where Bob lives. We put out the invite for him to come and he said, “Sure.” We were going back and forth about what to play and I suggested “Slow Train Coming.” We threw out a couple of other ones like “Me and My Uncle” because that one’s so easy. The band was coming off of a break, and lot of the guys in the band didn’t know a lot of the Dead’s music.

Bob shows up for soundcheck, we go through a few songs and I was like, “Man, this is sounding good. Is there anything else you want to do?” I was thinking about some of the John Prine stuff. The first time I actually met Bob was at a John Prine tribute at the Ryman. I also met Ramblin’ Jack Elliott that night— he wanted to go watch the show from the audience and everyone was like, “You can’t do that,” but he put his hood up and just went out there to watch anyway.

But instead of a John Prine song, Bob was like, “Why don’t we do one of mine? Maybe ‘Dark Star?’” And in my head, I was like, “I don’t know if there’s a more iconic song that sums up the Dead.” And then at the same time, I was just like, “I don’t know, there’s no way we can touch that one.” So I was like, “How are you playing that these days, Bobby?” He was like, “You know, actually, I got a better idea. Why don’t we do this one—it’s called ‘The Other One.’” How cool is that? We ripped on that one, Bob was stoked and I found out that my booking agent— who has been with me since the beginning—was a secret Deadhead.

I love hearing Bob’s stories and shooting the shit with him. I shared a Cheech & Chong-sized joint at Willie’s birthday with him.