Robben Ford Announces ‘Pure,' His First Instrumental Studio Album Since 1997

Robben Ford performs live in concert at the Sony Hall in New York City on May 1, 2019
(Image credit: Debra L Rothenberg/Getty Images)

Robben Ford has announced Pure, his first instrumental studio album since 1997's Tiger Walk.

Featuring Nate Smith, Toss Panos, and Shannon Forest as special guests, Pure is set for an August 27 release via earMUSIC. You can check out a sneak peek of the album's first single, "White Rock Beer… 8 Cents," below.

"Pure is unlike any recording I’ve ever done," Ford said in a press release. "I’ve always been a traditionalist in the way I’ve worked in the studio: bring a great band into a great room with a great engineer, track songs for three to five days, do any overdubbing necessary, then mix and master.

"I started Pure in that same way," Ford continued. "But, somehow the influence of other musicians on the music, which is inevitable, always felt a little off. It became clear to me that I had to shape this new music myself from the ground up. 

"My engineer and co-producer, Casey Wasner, proved invaluable in making that happen and most of the music you’ll hear in this recording was accomplished by the two of us working together in his studio, Purple House – getting the right shape and feel to the music, then adding bass and drums after the fact.  

"Having worked in this way, I feel that Pure is perhaps the most complete representation of my personal musical vision: previous recordings having been products of a period of development that lead to the music presented here. It’s been very satisfying to have shaped my own compositions so thoroughly and to deliver something so completely my own.”

You can check out the cover art for Pure below. To preorder the album, point your browser this way.

The cover of Robben Ford's upcoming album, 'Pure'

(Image credit: earMUSIC)
Jackson Maxwell
Associate Editor, GuitarWorld.com and GuitarPlayer.com

Jackson is an Associate Editor at GuitarWorld.com and GuitarPlayer.com. He’s been writing and editing stories about new gear, technique and guitar-driven music both old and new since 2014, and has also written extensively on the same topics for Guitar Player. Elsewhere, his album reviews and essays have appeared in Louder and Unrecorded. Though open to music of all kinds, his greatest love has always been indie, and everything that falls under its massive umbrella. To that end, you can find him on Twitter crowing about whatever great new guitar band you need to drop everything to hear right now.