What does it sound like?:
George Drakoulias is responsible for much of The Black Crowes’ sound and their early success. He signed The Black Crowes to a new, Rock orientated label, Rick Rubin’s Def American Recordings, and produced their breakthrough albums. Hearing a texture of Rod Stewart in Chris Robinson’s voice, he introduced the band to the music of The Faces and Humble Pie and persuaded them to cover Rolling Stones’ songs. Their debut was released in 1990 just as Grunge galvanised the Rock market and sold five million copies in the USA within two years. The pressure was on for a follow up. The core band of Chris Robinson, vocals, brother Rich, guitar, Johnny Colt, bass, and Steve Gorman, drums, was supplement by two new members, Marc Ford, guitar, and Eddie Harsch, plus female backing singers, Barbara Mitchell and Taj Harmon. The album was recorded in eight days.
The sepia toned cover art, echoing The Band, promises a return to roots rock. The title reminds us that The Black Crowes are originally from Georgia. The Southern Harmony is an annotated hymn book, compiled by William Walker in 1835, that was often the only exposure people had to written music. It’s a shame, therefore, that there is nothing of real substance here. Thirty years on, this album, always verging on pastiche, has not aged well. It is charmless all the way through, a rigid 4/4, even when attempting a slow blues. There is little musicality, no decent riffs and the lyrics fail to capture the imagination. The voice has none of the artistry of Rod, the guitar is basic Ronnie Wood, there is no Keef swagger, no Charlie roll and nothing of the McLagan cheek. The girls’ backing could be transferred from one song to another without anyone noticing. It’s as though Drakoulias and the boys took seventies Rock apart, polished all the pieces, put them back together and lost its essence. The lack of progress from the debut is illustrated by the covers. Otis Redding’s Hard To Handle to Bob Marley’s Time Will Tell is a move from soulless to heartless. Nevertheless, back in 1992, when radio and TV were the main ways to hear new music, there was clearly an appetite for Rock, even in facsimile, as it shifted two million copies in America. The Robinsons have managed to lucratively plough this same furrow for many years.These days, the actual Faces and Stones are just the click of a button away on streaming platforms.
A three CD super deluxe box includes the album on disc one, just nine outtakes and B sides on disc two and ten songs from a sixteen song live set in Houston, February 1993 on disc three. There is a hymn book, sheet music and four lithographs of the brothers, often with their shirts off. A two CD version has a nine track “best of the box” on the second disc, cynically excluding the one sought after rarity, a studio version of Misery. There is a four LP equivalent of the box and you can buy just the remastered single vinyl. Both Super Deluxe editions are expensive. The feeling of being short-changed is palpable. There is plenty of room on CD to please fans with more. The Black Crowes are much more dynamic and convincing treading the boards. Why not the full live set? In the UK, there were two CD singles with six acoustic numbers recorded at Ronnie Scott’s as B sides. They would have been most welcome here.
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What does it all *mean*?
A reissue that is unlikely to win new fans and may well lose some old ones.
Goes well with…
Money to burn.
Release Date:
Out now
Might suit people who like…
Retreads
Miserable (2023 mix)
Now that’s a review!!! Fair and honest. And unpublishable outside a closed group, probably, unless the review copy came from a PR team you wanted nothing more from, ever again.
I hope I haven’t upset Bargepole! 😎
You’ll never work on this site again 😉
I actually quite like this album although I seem to be in a minority.
There’s a few more who like the album around here @Bargepole
I think Lodes asked whether you ever posted negative reviews Tigger.
That’s me sorted then!
A very popular band for a while that I never ever understood the appeal of. Pale facsimiles of a type of music that was huge 20 years earlier and adding nothing to it all.
If you fancy listening to something that sounds like the Faces or early 70s Stones then why not listen to the Faces or early 70s Stones (which I think was said pretty well in the review)
Agreed.
While I’m here, George Drakoulias gets a mysterious namecheck on Paul’s Boutique.
Nice to see Tigger putting the boot in for once 🤭
That’s the Def Jam link. Drakoulias was Rubin’s protégé when The Beasties were on the label.
Ahhh. Apart from Original Concept there that’s the only Def Jam reference on the album.
Have to disagree with your review, Tigger – think it’s a magnificent, swaggering beast of an album and a far more convincing take on rock classicism than, say, Primal Scream’s Give Out But Don’t Give Up (or indeed that album’s original Memphis sessions), and possesses a great deal more genuine fire and feeling than this year’s much lauded Stones release, Hackney Diamonds.*
*I predict that once the dust settles some more, this will seem a lot less impressive than initial reactions suggested.
To be fair Henry, one of those 70s Top of the Pops albums with a cover of Cindy Incidentally on it would be a far more convincing taken on rock classicism than Primal Scream.
I’m grateful for your comment. It is probably The Black Crowes at their best. The live tracks are performed much better, I’d argue.
I don’t think much of Give Out But Don’t Give Up either. I do like the Memphis Sessions but that is more likely because of the genuine Memphis musicians and producers. The Stones have been a terrible pastiche of themselves for decades. Aerosmith cover the same ground.
By the nineties, I expected more from Rock acts. Pixies, Husker Du, Sonic Youth, for example, have different takes on classicism, adding extra grist. The White Stripes went further back to the Blues for their inspiration and twisted it into their self imposed limitations. The Black Crowes were aware of grunge, Chuck Berry, Muddy Waters etc but chose to ignore them. They forged a sound but it wasn’t their own. Top marks for commercial nouse, though.
I disagree with your views on T.S.H.A.M.C. album @Tiggerlion but everything comes down to opinions and I therefore respect your opinion
But is going “back to the Blues for their inspiration and twisting it into their self imposed limitations” a good thing? BTW I’m a fan of The White Stripes
Like I said it’s all down to opinions and in my opinion The Black Crowes went on to record many fine albums as The B.C.s and Chris Robinson Brotherhood, Magpie Salute and Rich Robinson solo. Unlike those bands you mentioned Pixies, Husker Du, Sonic Youth who were imitations of each other influenced by industrial noise and IMHO were not very good. There we are again opinions, we all have them right and wrong
With regard to the SDE I agree it’s a total rip off, I’ve ordered the 2CD set for £12.99 which I consider a bargain
Actually, I’d take more issue with your view of Pixies etc than Tigger’s of the Black Crowes – really can’t see how they’re imitations of each other. And they were operating in a completely different context to the Black Crowes. It’d be like comparing the Velvet Underground to The Rolling Stones.
Also, back to Tigger’s comment re Crowes’ lyrics (no one gets away from a comeback here), “Sometimes Salvation” contains one of my favourite openers:
To lessen my troubles
I stopped hanging out with vultures
And empty saviours like you.
But each to their own.
Opinions and I’ll stick with mine while respecting yours
I welcome the debate. That couplet is sound advice but I barely noticed it.
The White Stripes were inspired by Blues and Garage, kept the composition and arrangements simple and the production lo-fi. They had to because there were just two of them. When they had exhausted all the variations within this set up, they split up. The restrictions they set themselves provoked moments of genius, so yes, a good thing. The last great guitar band? Maybe (I do love Spoon).
Tigger shows his teeth! Tee hee! I really did enjoy you putting the boot into this over-priced rip off.
I thought Remedy was sensational, bought the album, liked it but felt it didn’t live up to the single.
As for them being better live, I saw them once, ironically supporting The Stones and they were pretty awful. Stones blew them off the stage even at their advanced age (1995, so they would have been early 50s!)
Excellent review. I have this album and ought to love it but I just don’t, probably for the reasons you mention. Somehow it just grates on my ears after a few tracks.
Just goes to show, eh? I really really like this album, bordering on love it.
Magnificent, swaggering beast is a very nice way to describe how I think of it.
Generally agree with Tiggs for this one …except for Hotel Illness which I think is fantastic. The rest, pretty meh and a disappointment after the first album
One of only two BCs albums I own.
Can’t remember the last time I played either one of them
and in no great rush to give ’em another outing any time soon
Still, Chris Robinson has a great voice.
There may have been the Rod, Marriot thing to kick it off but he def has his own sound.
“I don’t like them much, I only have two of their albums…”
“My name in Jaygee and I am a Crowaholic.
I finally reached rock bottom and realized I needed help one December afternoon on the Afterword blog….”
The box looks like a rip off, so thanks for the heads up.
That said, I absolutely love this album – the only wrong note is the Bob Marley cover. I saw them on the Southern Harmony tour and they were a powerhouse, the best rock’n’roll band I’ve ever seen. I love the fact that the guitars are panned hard left and right, and the late Eddie Harsch adds a lot of gospel to the sound, nowhere more than the slow-burning Thorn in my Pride. Yes, it has nods to their classic rock influences, but Steve Gorman is much more Memphis in his feel than Watts or Kenney Jones and there’s a loose soul influence that no other band were doing nearly so well at the time. I shall be getting my well-played copy out and sticking it on full blast.
Now that’s what I call a riposte!
I own that.
Haven’t played it in 25 years.
Same here. Mind you, I’ve not played the Pearl Jam album I bought at about the same time for more than 30 years.
We would all probably have hundreds of albums we haven’t played in years. Doesn’t mean they aren’t good records.
Never been a fan of this band – overblown US bullshit – no tunes and no ideas of their own.
Wouldn’t have thought there would be much of a market for this over here.
You’ve never been a fan but you tell us they have no tunes or ideas of their own. Upon what do you base this profound knowledge, you’ve never been a fan so I doubt you’ve listened to a single album all the way through. You display the ignorance and arrogance of an idiot
The last nine words were written in jest, I stand by my initial statement
Definitely “not much of a market for this over here”, it’s Vera Lynn and George Formby all the way for us Limeys.
Turned out nice again…
No one wants any oversexed black crowes over the white cliffs of dover.
Oh dear, the harmony and companionship
inherent in this thread seem to have gone south
RayX makes a valid point.
I cant understand the hostility towards the band or the record. It’s a good rock n roll record with a pretty damn good bourbon and cigarettes voice up front.
A dull reply, but… yeah, it’s alright, innit? Not in my top 10 albums, possibly not top 100, but definitely top 5,000 (i.e. I liked it enough to buy it).
Which is more than can be said for, to take a random example, Kasabian.
Meh.
Well put.
@h-p-saucecraft
Meh too!
Says the AWer with two Black Crowes albums he hasn’t played for donkeys’ years
I think they’re great. Saw them at least twice during their ‘90’s heyday and they pinned me to the wall.
They always seemed to be very open about their aim of picking up a Faces/Stones vibe and carrying it forward. Fair fucks to them.
Well, yes. Faces had stopped and the Stones didn’t want to sound like the Stones, so somebody had to fill the massive bar band vacuum.
I didn’t go out of my way to see them but they were on at festivals and I didn’t run away when they came on.
Shake Your Money Maker was full on Faces/Stones – Keef took to wearing a Black Crowes T-Shirt and namechecking them for about 6 months.
Around the same time, the UK pushed the same vibe with Quireboys, Dogs D’Amour (to an extent) and latterly Thunder.
Shake Your Money Maker remains the high point – The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion.
Saw them twice in 1990/91 – once at The Marquee. and once supporting someone (Aerosmith, I think?).
They were better in a small club venue the a big stage
Yeah, I saw Quireboys at Southampton students union – the brother of one of my housemates was there.
@fentonsteve
Possibly because you were pinned to the wall next to @Beezer