Biography
Though primarily celebrated for his performances on screen, Jeff Bridges—son of the actor Lloyd Bridges—has also pursued paths as a vocalist, instrumentalist, and composer of songs. In 2000 he issued his debut collection, Be Here Soon, a carefully crafted set of pop, rock, and country numbers that he wrote or helped write. Bridges’s profile in music grew substantially after he portrayed the fading country performer Otis “Bad” Blake in the 2009 film Crazy Heart, a part in which he supplied his own vocals and contributed original material to the accompanying soundtrack; the same performance earned him an Academy Award for Best Actor. Blue Note Records brought out his follow-up effort, the self-titled Jeff Bridges, in 2011, with production handled by T-Bone Burnett. He subsequently expanded his live schedule with the Abiders—the ensemble named for his role as the Dude Who Abides in the 1998 cult classic The Big Lebowski—whose lineup featured Bridges on vocals, guitar, and keyboards alongside Chris Pelonis (guitar, keyboards, vocals), Bill Flores (pedal steel, guitar), Randy Tico (upright and electric bass), and Tom Lackner (drums, percussion). Performing under the banner Jeff Bridges & the Abiders, the group played a series of summer dates at the Red Rock Casino in Las Vegas in 2014; those shows were captured in full and resulted in the fourteen-track live album produced by Pelonis and issued later the same year.