Adam Duritz life and biography

Adam Fredric Duritz is an American musician, songwriter, record producer, and film producer. He is best known for his role as frontman and vocalist for the rock band Counting Crows, in which he is a founding member and principal composer of their catalogue of songs.


Adam Duritz was born in Baltimore, Maryland. Early on he moved to Boston, then El Paso, Texas, and Berkeley, California. Duritz has lived in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Houston, Amsterdam and, most recently, New York City. As a student, he attended Head-Royce School, the Taft School, the University of California, Berkeley and the University of California, Davis, but dropped out before earning a degree.


Before forming Counting Crows, he was lead singer for San Francisco Bay Area bands, Mod-L Society and The Himalayans. He was also involved in another San Francisco-based band, Sordid Humor.


He has collaborated with The Wallflowers (led by Bob Dylan's son Jakob Dylan) on
the album Bringing Down the Horse; with Ryan Adams on Gold and the song "Butterfly in Reverse" from Hard Candy; with Peter Stuart on Propeller and Daisy; with Live on V; and with Dashboard Confessional on the track "So Long, So Long" from
Dusk and Summer.

Duritz also contributed songs to the Josie and the Pussycats soundtrack that
were performed by the film's fictional title band.

Since coming to fame with Counting Crows, Duritz has maintained an unusually
open relationship with his fans. This has taken various forms including a diary
on AOL, and later a blog on the band's official website. He also reads and
responds to posts on the band's messageboard, and recently started a feature
called AskCrowsAsk where fans can email questions for band members to respond to. This relationship has not always been smooth; Duritz has clashed with some fans,
chastising those involved in flame wars by quipping on his blog, "Some of you
are [...] incredibly unpleasant people."

Duritz has made two attempts to get involved in the music industry as a record
label owner: in 1997, Duritz co-founded E Pluribus Unum, an independent label.
Before the label was purchased by Interscope Records in 2000, Duritz signed Joe
90, Gigolo Aunts, and Neilson Hubbard “ all of whom he took on the road to open
for Counting Crows.

In November 2006, Adam Duritz began production on Chicago pop-punk band Blacktop Mourning's debut record under the name "The Devil and Bunny Show" alongside Counting Crows guitarist David Immergluck. He later announced, on January 15, 2007, that he was launching boutique record label Tyrannosaurus Records. His debut artists include Notar and Blacktop Mourning. The label also re-released the sole album by Duritz's former band The Himalayans.

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