Says singer Chris Barron on the band's website: "We all have a very deep reverence for the blues. It's the music that really is the roots of all we do. Last year, when we were performing Pocket Full of Kryptonite for the 20th Anniversary, we wanted to play "deep cuts" in the encore. When we asked some of our fans over there which tunes they wanted to hear, to our surprise, they wanted to hear the old blues stuff. Well... we had such a good time playing it, and it sounded so good, that we toyed around with the idea of making a blues record."

Guitarist Eric Schenkman added: "We've always meant to make a blues record because we were originally a blues band, but we got known for a rock/pop record. So this past August, we went into Aaron's home studio intending to cut a live demo of a couple of our blues to test the waters with it...but we have so many original blues kicking around (old & new) that at the end of a great day of live recording, we had If the River was Whiskey."