Touring musician Jackie Greene hits the Bing with new album in tow

You can look at Jackie Greene’s new album “Back to Birth” as either a shift in a new, more confident direction or a throwback to the old school rock ’n’ roll that first inspired him to pick up a guitar. Or maybe it’s a little of both.

“It’s a step forward into a more mature version of the kind of stuff I started with,” the singer-songwriter explained. “That’s why I called it ‘Back to Birth’: In a way it’s a return to the roots music I was influenced by early on, but in a way that a 35-year-old would look at it rather than a 21-year-old.”

Greene’s career is similarly multifaceted. He has long been a hired gun for several artists, touring and playing with the Black Crowes, Warren Haynes and the Grateful Dead’s Phil Lesh in recent years. He’s also released eight solo albums since the early 2000s, and Greene’s brand of earthy, rootsy rock recalls everyone from Tom Petty to John Mellencamp to Bob Dylan.

Since Greene began his career as a go-to touring musician, he also founded the side project Trigger Hippy with Joan Osborne and Black Crowes drummer Audley Freed. It was his stint with Phil Lesh and Friends, though, that Greene says prepared him for his ongoing gig as a hired gun.

“At the time, I didn’t know that much Grateful Dead stuff,” Greene said. “The next thing I know I’m in his band and singing his songs. I guess that was a crash course in how to learn quickly, because I had to. It was sort of sink or swim.”

“Back to Birth” was released just a couple weeks ago, and it’s the first record Greene has put out since 2010’s “Til the Light Comes.” Over the course of those five years, Greene has been writing and touring constantly, but he doesn’t feel like his musical personality has gone through any significant transformation.

“If there’s any sort of dramatic change there that anybody else sees, I don’t see it,” Greene said. “I’m living day to day, you know. I’m taking out the garbage. Someone might pick up that album from five years ago and say, ‘Wow, this guy’s totally different,’ but I don’t really feel that way.”

But if the musical approach hasn’t changed much, Greene said he has gained perspective on his career and has likely dropped some of his youthful pretenses.

“When you’re young, you sort of have to keep up with the Joneses in regards to what’s cool,” he said. “I think when you get to a certain age, you just don’t care, you like what you like. You know, there was a time when it was cool to not like the Eagles. I like the Eagles. I mean, who’s kidding who? OK, yeah, they’re cliché, but they’re damn great at it.”