Warpaint : THE BLACK CROWES
Warpaint
THE BLACK CROWES
Thursday, May 1, 2008
The Black Crowes’ Warpaint marks a return to form for Georgia brothers Chris and Rich Robinson, back from a seven-year hiatus and picking up those Telecasters like their last three mediocre efforts never happened.
Dark, soulful and sophisticated, Warpaint wears its Southern charm proudly on its tie-dyed sleeve without falling back on the too-obvious Stones aping (“She Talks to Angels” being a re-write of “Wild Horses”) of the band’s early career.
If anything, Warpaint sounds like a record The Band might have made many decades ago. “Goodbye Daughters of the Revolution” possesses the rugged, roots-rock fatalism that defined Robbie Robertson and Co. However, the Crowes keep the deep, bluesy rhythms coming with tracks like the slide-guitar-gonna-charm-a-rattlesnake stomp of “Walk Believer Walk,” and the beautiful, bayou-kissed ballad “Oh Josephine.”
Sure, “Locust Street” may be more Faces-styled, country-blues pop, but when Robinson sings, “Can you hear the sunrise crying?” you sense the Crowes have crept back to a place where they can make great music – informed by the past, but not imitative.
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