Vernon Reid on MC5, Wayne Kramer, and Living Colour’s Next Album

Kyle Meredith With...

Vernon Reid of Living Colour joins Kyle Meredith to talk about his feature on the final MC5 album, Heavy Lifting, as well as his side projects and what's next for Living Colour. Listen now.

Reid has always been a guitar powerhouse, and his contribution to MC5's “Can’t Be Found” channels exactly what you’d expect: energy, intensity, and thoughtfulness. Reid describes his connection to Wayne Kramer, the MC5 frontman who passed away earlier this year, as deeper than just rock music.

For Heavy Lifting, Reid says, “Wayne told me to just do me. And that’s what I did.” His guitar parts, full of high-octane tones and a few “high octave overtone madness” moments, are Reid at his most raw, creative, and unapologetically honest. He admits that the initial takes were the ones used, a common tale among great artists: sometimes the magic happens early, before overthinking sets in.

Living Colour, meanwhile, is celebrating their 40th anniversary, and even starting on new music. Reid talks about their evolving comfort as a band: “We’ve learned to get out of the way of what we create together. It still means something to each of us, and I think our audiences feel that.”

Listen to Vernon Reid of Living Colour chat about all this and more in the new episode or watch it on YouTube. Please take the time to like, review, and subscribe to KMW wherever you get your podcasts, and keep up to date with all our series by following the Consequence Podcast Network.

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