BLACK CROWES > Warpaint

There’ve been too few genuine organic rock & roll bands since the ‘80s: wild-eyed boys with stringy hairs, flared nostrils, whip thin bodies wailing bawdily about lost nights, intense pleasure and the jagged pain of falling from the such ecstatical height

Label: Silver Arrow 
[Rating: 4 Stars]

There’ve been too few genuine organic rock & roll bands since the ‘80s: wild-eyed boys with stringy hairs, flared nostrils, whip thin bodies wailing bawdily about lost nights, intense pleasure and the jagged pain of falling from the such ecstatical heights. When the Black Crowes dropped 1990’s Shake Your Money Maker, their vintage raw Stones/Faces-channeling debut, it was a startling reminder of the power an intense jolt of streamlined guitars, bone-snapping beats and unbridled yowling embodied. Brothers Chris and Rich Robinson “hiatus” created a void for freewheelin’ boogie grooves, undulating gospel riffage and general hippie ambience. Though co-existential with the jam bands, theirs’ was a precise machine jack hammering its way through the Valhalla of lost boys, fallen angels and unabashed swagger. Warpaint, though missing that full-tilt sting, returns the Robinsons in pure ground-pawing glory with North Mississippi All-Star Luther Dickinson joining for added wah-wah power. Whether the soul rave “God’s Got It,” the full-sway acoustic Exile-evoking “Good Bye Daughters of the Revolution” or the yearning balladry of “Josephine”-echoing their breakout “She Talks To Angels,” this is raggedy swamp, dirt ‘n’ tent revival and bottle-pounding jukerock at its finest. The trippy “Movin’ On Down The Line” and “Wounded Bird,” as well Zeppelin-esque “Evergreen” manifest supple guitar-driven rock as B-3 clouds of rise from the chaos. Slow build, big burn grinder “Walk Believer Walk” and late-night acapella “Whoa Mule” land hardest.