Again within the Nineteen Nineties, the Black Crowes blew up out of Atlanta, enjoying soulful, swaggering traditional rock in an period of alt-rock irony and grunge bellyaching. Much more impressively, the 2 guys on the coronary heart of the band — singer Chris Robinson and his guitar-playing brother Wealthy — managed to tug off their multi-platinum run whereas completely hating one another, like an American model of Oasis. However finally the stress between Chris and Wealthy compelled the Crowes to shut up store.
The band launched their final studio album in 2009, and the Robinson brothers wanted a decade to chill off earlier than they reformed in 2019. In 2022, they launched 1972, an EP with covers of David Bowie, the Rolling Stones, the Temptations, T. Rex, Little Feat, and Rod Stewart, forcefully arguing that Rock Eden might be particularly positioned in a single yr of the Nixon administration. However what’s shocking about Happiness Bastards, their first studio album collectively since reuniting, is how enjoyable, energetic and, unmistakably not-crusty it sounds, even because the references they lean into are all roughly a half-century outdated.
With its slide guitar, boogie piano, and stomping beat, album opener “Bedside Manners” sounds just like the Faces on a bender in Memphis. Songs like “Rats and Clowns” and “Wanting and Ready” are glam-rock with gritty downhome spirit. “Soiled Chilly Solar” is a cool guitar brawl with Chris summoning the saucy contempt of “Stay With Me”-era Mick Jagger. “Bleed It Dry” is Dylan-evoking country-blues rendered with a snarl. “Flesh Wound” appears like mid-Seventies Rod Stewart if he’d made a secret file backed by Low cost Trick. Breakout nation star Lainey Wilson sings backup on “Wilted Rose,” a gospel-tinged acoustic ballad that ascends into Led Zeppelin grandeur.
The final Black Crowes album, 2009’s Earlier than the Frost…Till the Freeze, was recorded at Levon Helm’s barn in Woodstock, New York, and had a distinctly rustic interval sound. This outing, they’re working with producer Jay Joyce (Cage the Elephant, Eric Church), who has a knack for giving classic-minded music a digital-era immediacy. “Cross Your Fingers,” a music that in any other case mashes up the Allman Brothers and Zeppelin, even has a quick breakdown with a mildly processed beat and a rap-like vocal cadence. However whether or not Happiness Bastards works as a result of the Robinsons are reanimating the previous, or merely reenacting it, what issues is that they’re rocking now.
