By David O’Neill
This is the second journey of the Kentucky quartet into their influences and it’s a cracker from start to finish. The opening track, ‘Big Legged Woman’ grabs you by the ears, shakes your head and says the roots of Black Stone Cherry from the first album have been rediscovered…THIS IS BLACK STONE CHERRY! Bluesy, punchy, rhythmic and raucous.
The raucous, growling vocals of Chris Robertson are nailed to the guitar playing of Ben Wells and Robertson himself and the rhythm section of Jon Lawhon and John Fred Young throughout ‘Big Legged Woman’: couple to that a smokey blues piano playing that takes me back to the Blues Brothers… breathless.
‘Me And The Devil Blues’ continues the upbeat feeling, and if anyone wants to know what these boys can do with the blues just get this in your collection. They slow it down with the laidback opening of ‘All Your Love’ before some 12 bar blues kicks in with the chorus, and the return to the slower groove of the opening for the verses; the addition of the electric piano adds to the feel.
‘Down In The Bottom’ adds a faster staccato groove driven by the drums of Young; the addition of what sounds like a Hammond organ in the background only adds to the feel of the song. ‘Early One Morning’ gets the slide guitar treatment from the off before the distorted rhythm guitar picks the track up to the breakdown. ‘Death Letter Blues’ continues in the same vein as the first five tracks.
Any one of these tracks should be performed live; I couldn’t choose one to go in the set but if they added it after any of the tracks from the first album, such as ‘Violator Girl’, they wouldn’t be out of place, and anyone in the crowd not familiar could be forgiven for thinking it could be a BSC original.
Blues magic… better than the first one
‘Black To Blues 2’ is released on Friday (1 November). You can get your copy HERE.
www.facebook.com/blackstonecherry
- All content © Über Rock. Not to be reproduced in part or in whole without the express written permission of Über Rock.