Counting Crows’ Adam Duritz Did a Surprising Thing After Becoming Famous (Exclusive)

In 1993, you’d be hard-pressed to turn on the radio and not hear a song from the band Counting Crows, which was led by the charismatic, dreadlocked Adam Duritz, who also wrote the majority of the group’s songs.

But despite the popularity of catchy tunes like “Mr. Jones” and “Round Here,” from their debut album August and Everything After, the band was still polarizing — some embraced the Crows, while others thought they were lame.

In the new HBO documentary Counting Crows: Have You Seen Me Lately? (Dec. 18, 9 p.m. ET), filmmaker Amy Scott explores the band’s rise to fame, including Duritz’s lifelong mental health struggles, which worsened as he became a rock star.

Scott also covers the surprising thing Duritz did after the debut album became successful and the band completed a massive world tour: He decided to become a bartender.

“Once I was a little recovered, ’cause I needed some recovery time, it was magic and gave me this world to write about that was f—ing fascinating,” Duritz says in an exclusive clip from the doc, about the year he spent pouring drinks for celebs at the Viper Room in L.A.

“Everyone was famous,” he says of the club’s patrons in those days. “Even though I was famous, who cares? There’s Jack Nicholson…. I had Mexican food with Allen Ginsberg one night. We watched Adam Ant together. I mean, what more do you want out of life.”

In the clip, he notes that the experience behind the bar gave him inspiration for the band’s follow-up album, 1996’s Recovering the Satellites.

“I couldn’t wait to make a record. lived a completely different life that year than I ever lived before in my life,” he says.

“I had been on the road. I’d toured the world. I was a rock star. And then I moved to Hollywood and I met all these really cool people, and I wanted to write about it. And I thought, ‘I’m going to write the f—ing greatest rock and roll album.’ ”

Director Amy Scott tells PEOPLE her fascination with the Counting Crows began in the ’90s.

“I’ve always been drawn to artists who refuse to sand down their edges, even when success is asking them to,” she says. “Counting Crows exploded at a time when indie music was becoming mainstream, but they never quite fit any mold. Adam Duritz, in particular, is a songwriter who insists on emotional honesty over polish, even when it makes people uncomfortable. Counting Crows remind us of a time when vulnerability and messiness were part of the deal.”

She also says the ’90s were an interesting time in that bands could at once be loved and loathed.

“I was also aware of the tension around their success,” she says.

“The ’90s were fascinating in that way. Popularity was a betrayal. I think what fascinated me then — and still does — is that Counting Crows didn’t try to course-correct. They leaned harder into sincerity. That made them polarizing, but also lasting.”

As for Adam Duritz’s romantic success (he famously dated both Jennifer Aniston and Courtney Cox, as well as Mary-Louise Parker and Emmy Rossum), Scott says he’s got oodles of charm.

“What surprised me first was how funny, sharp and self-aware Adam is — and how voracious he is as a reader and a cinephile,” she says of why he was such a celebrity magnet. “He’s constantly referencing books, films and poets. He is smart, cool, funny and sings on a stage in front of millions of people. What was the question again?”

Counting Crows: Have You Seen Me Lately? premieres on HBO and HBO Max Dec. 18 at 9 p.m. ET.