Turning 50 is a momentous occasion for anyone, but for guitar virtuoso“I had a lot of material that I’d never released and didn’t know where it fit,” says Kotzen, who got the idea during a solo tour in 2019. “A huge portion [of the project] was songs I’d written but never finished — songs with guitar riffs and guide vocals and nothing else, or completed tracks with no lyrics.
“During the late ’90s and early 2000s, being associated with Poison was a nightmare,” he admits, noting that most major labels had “moved on” to rap and alternative rock. “The labels had tunnel vision and couldn’t figure out how to market me. So it was a difficult time for me, not because I didn’t make a good record with Poison [1993’s], but because of the perception of the gatekeepers in the music business. They just couldn’t see past it.
In the video, which marks his directorial debut, Kotzen himself plays a down-and-out musician who remembers better days. “The video concept is what lead me to release this song first,” he says. “The song really tells a story, and in the last few minutes, it goes on such a journey compared with the typical approach of arranging a song.”50 for 50
That stylistic scope shines through on the album, although -- aside from recording 50 songs for 50 years -- there isn’t a musical or lyrical theme connecting the tracks. “It’s really about each composition as its own entity, and each has an important voice helping to define who I am as a recording artist,” he says. “My very first record didn’t even have vocals, so for this record, I found three pieces of instrumental music that focused mostly on the guitar.