Alabama Shakes: 2025
Alabama Shakes (photo by Bobbi Rich, PR)
This FUV Live session is also available as a podcast, "FUV Live Sessions." We're elevating WFUV's long history of live sessions and interviews via a podcast that you can find on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Amazon Podcasts. New episodes drop every Monday.
Back in February, almost decade since the release of their Grammy-winning sophomore smash Sound & Color, Alabama Shakes announced their return as a trio: singer and guitarist Brittany Howard, guitarist Heath Fogg, and bassist Zac Cockrell.
Although they'd reunited in December 2024 for a benefit concert, the reunion tour, which kicked off in July, marked the official end of the group’s eight-year hiatus. That said, the band's break wasn’t a vacation, but a period of intense individual creation.
Frontwoman Brittany Howard had felt the need to strike out solo: to experiment alone, explore her emotions, and share the more personal stories that didn’t fit in a Shakes-shaped box. This was the artist discovering who she was, a personal and musical journey that resulted in 2019's Jaime, 2021's Jaime (Reimagined), and last year's What Now.
From What Now, Howard considered what was next. She wondered what Fogg and Cockrell were up to. (Fogg released a 2020 album as Sun on Shade, with Cockrell on board.) A group hang evolved into new music and tour talk. And just like that, the band — older and more mature, with new experiences and influences and a few kids between them — was back.
Alabama Shakes’ Forest Hills Stadium show in September marked two months of touring and about two weeks of “Another Life,” the band’s first single in ten years, released in August.
A few hours before the band hit the stage in Queens, I grabbed a short and sweet backstage interview with Howard, where we discussed quantum physics, the band’s new era, and Shakes shows as a form of celebration.
And celebration is, really, the best way to describe the tour, which wasn’t just a family reunion for the band, but also one for the fans. Crowds of long-lost cousins stoked to be back in a room with the Shakes, singing along to the hits, welcoming new songs with open ears and cheering so hard and for so long — with shouts of "I love you" flying from the audience — that at times, Howard seemed almost overwhelmed with emotion.
While “Another Life” is about the choices not made and the lives not led, it‘s clear that Howard, Fogg and Cockrell are right where they are meant to be — and that’s exactly what Howard wants for everyone as well.
"We’re out there like, y’all be who y’all want to be," Howard said. "Be good to each other, and I hope all your dreams come true."
Alabama Shakes sent on a trio of songs for this FUV Live session: "Another Life" (recorded at Red Rocks Park and Amphitheatre in July) and two from their Forest Hills set (“Gimme All Your Love” and “This Feeling”).
[Interview recorded 9/17/25 with associate producer Inna Volovich. Songs recorded, mixed, and mastered by Shane Haase. Produced by Meghan Suma.]
