In the early ’90s, a new Bay Area band called Counting Crows asked David Immerglück to join, and he turned them down. Even though he’d been friends with their singer, Adam Duritz, for years.

Oh, Immerglück still played on Counting Crows’ debut album “August and Everything After.” That multi-platinum 1993 disc was propelled by the band’s Van Morrison-esque sound and Duritz’s poetic lyrics and emotional vocals, as heard on era-defining hits “Mr. Jones” and ”Round Here.”

Previously, Immerglück had been a multi-instrumentalist with Camper Van Beethoven, at the end of that iconic alt-rock band’s initial ’80s run. So why after that did he decline to join his pal Adam’s clearly talented band?

“I’d love to ask myself that question,” Immerglück says now. “I don’t know that guy anymore. I mean, I’d been doing stuff with Adam for years before there was ever any Counting Crows. But for some reason something felt wrong in my gut, and I didn’t do it.”

Instead, Immerglück joined singer/songwriter John Hiatt’s band for four or so years. “That was like a masterclass,” he says, “in learning how to make records and learning how to play in bands and how to play live.”

He remained in touch with Counting Crows. If they and Hiatt were in the same down, Immerglück would sit in with the Crows. He also contributed to Counting Crows’ sophomore album “Recovering the Satellites,” featuring melancholic gem “A Long December.”

Immerglück, affectionally known as Immy, finally became an official Counting Crow for third album “This Desert Life.” That 1999 release boasted hip-shaking hit “Hanginaround.”

“Adam just sort of insisted,” Immerglück says, “that I come down and get really involved in that record. And then it was just sort of obvious. Like, why aren’t we in a band together? This is stupid. And that’s when I joined full-time.” He’s been with them ever since.

Along with Sheryl Crow and Black Crowes, Counting Crows form the holy trinity of ‘90s-famed Corvus-named rockers. Counting Crows’ discography also includes hits released this century, including Joni Mitchell cover “Big Yellow Taxi” and “Shrek 2” soundtrack hit “Accidentally In Love,” an Immerglück cowrite.

The band’s eighth album, “Butter Miracle, The Complete Sweets!,” dropped this spring. Their impressively stable lineup also features guitarists David Bryson and Dan Vickrey, keyboardist Carlie Gillingham, drummer Jim Bogios and bassist Millard Powers.

On Saturday, Counting Crows’ “The Complete Sweets! Tour” comes to Huntsville’s Orion Amphitheater. New Jersey rockers The Gaslight Anthem, known for anthemic 2012 single “45,” open the 7:30 p.m. show. Tickets via axs.com.

Immerglück grew up idolizing musicians like Jimi Hendrix and Peter Green era Fleetwood Mac. On a recent morning, he checked in from a hotel in Fort Lauderdale for a videocall interview. Edited excerpts below.

David, listening to new Counting Crows songs like “With Love, From A – Z,” they sound like they could be from the band’s early days.

David Immerglück: Yeah, other people have told me that as well. I mean, we are Counting Crows, so we should. We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel or work with the latest … We’re just continuing to do what we do.

Counting Crows is a funny band. It’s loved and loathed in equal measure. Although we’ve been around so long now that the love is strong. But especially in our hometown it was not cool to like Counting Crows because they got so successful and some of my best friends can’t stand Counting Crows. And that’s fine with me.

Some of my family members. My little brother makes fun of me all the time about Counting Crows, you know, and it’s just funny I don’t take it personally. But now for this particular record, some of the haters are coming out and just saying, like, I hate to admit it but this record’s really good. And it just kind of cracks me up.

It helps that Adam’s voice has held up well.

That does help. It’s really quite something. He’s on top of his game right now.

On the new album, he’s still writing really good lyrics too.

I thoroughly agree. Only getting better.

Looking online at setlists from this tour, I saw “Mr. Jones” is in the third slot. How long have you all been playing it that early in the show?

It’s moved around a lot. There were years there where Adam didn’t want to play it at all and we didn’t play it. That stopped about 10 years ago maybe. When we landed on having it early in the set, it sort of stuck there. Like, oh, this is the best place for this song because after that you can kind of do anything. And we usually put a weird one out right after it.

What’s the band’s approach to how many songs off a new album to put in a live setlist, so it feels good for the band and the fans? That’s an interesting dynamic to me with bands who have a lot of songs people want to hear, but also still make good records.

Our song catalog grows, but the amount of time we have on stage remains the same, so it gets trickier and trickier. This time out we’re playing five new songs every night because we love playing them. And, as a matter of fact, we haven’t had this kind of response from new songs since I can remember, honestly.

There’s certain staples that we always play, that we want to play and that fans want to hear us play. And then there’s certain parts of the set that we monkey around with every night. Those monkeying-around moments are a little shorter this time. There’s only a few slots that we’re like, OK, let’s play this tonight instead of that.

What do you remember about the first time you met Adam Duritz?

In my early 20s I had gone off to Europe by myself with the Eurail pass. It was sort of like a Bay Area Rite of passage. We all did this. You know, go get a backpack, get a Eurail pass, travel around Europe for a bunch of months. But I come back and the first thing I do is call my friend Dan. What’s going on? What’s happening musically? This is in Berkeley. “Oh, I’m playing in this new band and we’re rehearsing in my apartment. Come by and hang out.”

I did, and this band’s singer was Adam, then we met and were very friendly, and then that band played a gig like three nights later. I went to that gig and there was a party afterwards. We’re all getting, you know, smashed, and Adam and I start arguing about music. He was a big Bruce Springsteen fan. I was not. I was into Miles Davis and Captain Beefheart and things, just really crazy stuff. But Adam was very opinionated, and I liked that. He’s one of those people who’s very passionate about and well read about music. We just had differing opinions.

And then a couple days later at my apartment there’s a knock on my door, it’s like 12 noon. and there’s this guy I just met, Adam, and he’s got this pile of records. Bruce Springsteen’s entire catalog. Amoeba Record was five blocks away and he bought them and gave them to me.

He said, “Here. Listen to these and then we’ll talk.” He just gave them all to me. I’m like, wow, awesome, alright. We we’re still arguing today, 40 years later. And I like Bruce Springsteen now.