By any account 2020 was a bad year but for guitarist Richard Smith it was worse than for most. He was fighting a battle against stage three cancer of the throat that included radiation, chemotherapy and taking part in a clinical trial of a drug that involved four hours a day of intravenous infusion. He was left with an eight-inch scar on his neck from the surgery but twelve months on he is cancer free.
Right through the process, whenever the doctors asked him if he was strong enough to continue with the treatment, Richard would simply say “Let’s Roll” so it is totally appropriate the that he should take this mantra as the title of his first US single in five years. Co-written with Billboard chart-topping guitarist Adam Hawley (who also produced the track) and featuring sax-man Jeff Kashiwa ‘Let’s Roll’ is a very west coast, very LA kind of a number from a very west coast, very LA kind of a player. In fact Richard remains a full professor at USC Thornton School Of Music while ‘Let’s Roll’ is in effect a sneak preview of Richard’s forthcoming 13th album, ‘Language of the Soul’ that is expected to be released later this year.