Black Crowes - In the Garden of the Crow Brothers

Few people know it, but Christopher and Richard Robinson come from a musical family. Their father Stan was in fact a singer with little success, who managed to land just one modest hit in his career, “Boom-a-Dip-Dip”, back in 1959. Predictably embittered by a world that hadn't thought much of him, the man was nonetheless careful never to encourage his sons' musical ambitions, and in fact worked against them from their earliest childhood. In vain: borrowing the name from a beloved illustrated children's book (“Johnny Crow's Garden” by Leonard Leslie Brooke), in 1984 the brothers launched their first outfit in their native Marietta, a suburb of Atlanta – the high-school band Mr. Crowe's Garden. This is the lively Georgia of the dishevelled R.E.M., of Pylon and of the B-52's, but Athens doesn't seem all that close after all: after some early, unpolished steps in the name of no-frills punk, the Robinson brothers' sound evolves into a passionate revival of Seventies English blues-rock, leaving behind the Byrds-ian sixties mythology that at the time (thanks to the Paisley Underground) seemed to be all the rage, and betraying the Tom Waits and Dream Syndicate posters that had accompanied Chris's college years as a backdrop in his bedroom. The still-teenage hearts of the young Crowes beat for the Rolling Stones and the Faces: while, like any self-respecting adolescent, Rich makes no secret of his worship of Keith Richards, it's his brother's stylistic emulation of Rod Stewart that borders on the pathological. Personality is still in short supply, but talent is not, and over five years of apprenticeship the pair have the chance to hone it alongside their technique. Spotted at a New York gig by George Drakoulias, a young talent scout and right-hand man to Rick Rubin, the band is signed by Rubin's newly founded label, American Recordings. Within a few months the lineup takes on its definitive name, Black Crowes, and is overhauled: out go a couple of childhood bandmates nobody remembers today, in come Johnny Colt on bass and Jeff Cease as lead guitarist, while Steve Gorman is confirmed behind the drums.

Bad Boys with a Soft Heart

The time is ripe for their recording debut, and it's the band's discoverer Drakoulias himself who handles production, alongside a couple of other engineers – Brendan “Bud” O'Brien and Kevin “The Caveman” Shirley – who would go on to become among the most sought-after names in rock production that decade. Recorded between Los Angeles and Atlanta over the summer of 1989, and titled Shake Your Money Maker after the famous Elmore James song, the album is released in February 1990 and quickly establishes itself as one of the year's great revelations. It opens with a memorable guitar line that soon splits in two, kicking off a brash electric dialogue that feels like a chivalrous duel. This is “Twice As Hard”, merely the first title in a devastating run of crowd-pleasing hits that seem tailor-made to tear up arenas. It's no coincidence that in his early promotional interviews the twenty-year-old Rich declared his unconditional love for Aerosmith: the imprint is indeed straightforwardly hard-rock, with a brazenness never quite matched again, but, despite its reactionary slant in clear contrast with the reforming wave arriving from Seattle, the record sounds surprisingly fresh. Cease's Les Paul and the younger Robinson's Esquire act as highlighters, old neon signs blazing in otherwise grimy, shadowy dives. But the real fuel comes courtesy of the frontman, thanks to his Steven Tyler-esque delivery, a sufficiently flamboyant cockerel performance that knows how to grab listeners' attention: he dutifully rattles off his earthy little lessons, but does so with such persuasive force that you end up lending him your ear with no conditions attached. Nothing more is needed to realize that this will be merely the prologue to a triumphant march, free of any overly bold intellectual musings but thoroughly enjoyable in its relentless string of ear-worms. In the end, the album is nothing more than that: a glittering rosary whose beads follow one another without a single stumble, one potential sing-along after another, a thousand miles from the anguish of a ⟦Facelift⟧ or the alienating unease of a ⟦Bleach⟧, to name two works from roughly the same vintage.

The opener's blueprint is then reproposed relentlessly, without major variation as the record unfolds, with the spotlight shifting at times to the electric guitars, at times to the piano of the sole deluxe guest, former Allman Brothers Band member (and longtime collaborator of the Jagger & Richards firm) Chuck Leavell, but always under the rough, charismatic aura of a Chris who is already the undisputed star of the show. Explosive even on necessarily disposable numbers, with the cockiness of the shrewdest opportunists and all the expected debts to the Stones, the young Crowes are already a remarkably well-oiled machine, despite looking like the most implausible runaways, perfectly in line with the kitsch excesses of the era: from the guitars dripping with easy spleen to the dry drumming that's never needlessly showy, to the razor-sharp voice of a singer who knows how to fuse energy and feeling with just the right character, respectfully lifting his tics from his own personal pantheon, careful never to cheapen himself as a soulless, thieving impersonator. It should come as no surprise, then, that the quintessence of this brash, derivative nature is embodied by a stunning cover of “Hard To Handle” (by Otis Redding), the track that, more than any other, propelled the Atlanta outfit towards global success: the mimicry and enthusiasm are so convincing that these cunning American newcomers could easily pass the song off as their own. Unlike other bands enslaved to the past, though, this isn't mere necrophilia; rather, one senses a boundless love for the purity of the most authentic rock'n'roll, free of any flag-waving or factional divides, a motivation sufficient to make their artistic perspective acceptable even at second or third hand, along with their skillful blues mystifications.

The overall impression, then, is of a group still dirt-poor but hungrier than most. And if the punchiest tracks make that clear enough (even minor ones like the filthy “Struttin' Blues”, which seems to be aping AC/DC), the point is driven home even more by the already sensational ballads that Shake Your Money Maker offers at regular intervals, written and arranged without a hint of shyness and leaving nothing to chance, designed to please just about everyone: from the naive romanticism of “Sister Luck” to the languid velvet of “Seeing Things” (with Chris front and centre, backed for the first time by the gospel choir that will work wonders on the following record), through to “She Talks To Angels”, penned by a still fifteen-year-old Rich and destined to prove yet another unrivalled driving force for the album, a precious alternative to the genuine “Bad Boys” label the folks at American are quick to pin on the Robinsons. Impetuous, scrappy and sensual in their own way, the Black Crowes of the debut lay down, in short, the first important building blocks of what would broadly become their signature style. They avoid insincere pretension and are exactly as they appear: direct, spirited, a touch rough around the edges but also vital and genuine enough to matter. As a result, with one's defenses conveniently lowered, one often finds one's critical faculties swept away by this impetuous flow, like an infection impossible to contain, spreading well beyond the feisty, drum-driven anthem chosen to close the record (“Stare It Cold”): equally illuminating as a kind of manifesto is the ideal continuation represented by the outtake “Don't Wake Me”, a thoroughly deserved bonus track – added a few years later – on the remastered edition of the album.

In its first year alone, the album sold over three million copies, with all five singles pulled from it landing impressively high on Billboard's genre charts; it was the crowning moment for the Atlanta group as the most credible of the new acts devoted to reviving a staunchly traditionalist strain of rock. Part of the credit undoubtedly goes to the quintet's intense live promotion, and to the quality of those shows: first riding the coattails of their "godfathers" Aerosmith, then as part of the ZZ Top roadshow, and finally, at last, as headliners in their own right. Proverbial, in connection with the tour alongside the bearded Texans, is the tirade against Miller beer (the tour's sponsor) that a particularly caustic Chris delivered to his hometown Atlanta crowd in March 1991 — a stunt that got the Crowes fired by the promoter but also earned them a remarkable amount of publicity (and public sympathy).

Several other incidents in those same months — refusing to let Maggie's Dream open for them (ironically, given that band endorsed Miller too), the arrest of the elder Robinson brother after a run-in with a woman who had confronted them in a shop, and his collapse from malnutrition on an English stage — all helped boost the Georgians' popularity and cast an aura of "soft notoriety" around them, the kind that sells well and demands nothing of them. Their masterstroke in this respect was headlining the Great Atlanta Pot Festival in spring 1992, an event campaigning for the legalization of soft drugs that alienated more conservative public opinion but proved a tremendous launchpad for their sophomore album, The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion, released that same June.

The lineup saw just a couple of changes, but their impact would prove explosive for the evolution of the band's sound: Jeff Cease was replaced by the young but seasoned L.A. axeman (with a far more pronounced blues bent) Marc Ford, formerly of Burning Tree, while Canadian organist Eddie "Harsch" Hawriysh (the only member missing from the album's cover photo) established himself almost invisibly as a true sixth member of the band, carrying far more weight than a guest, however celebrated, like Chuck Leavell had before him. It's precisely a background figure like Harsch, crucial even in his invisibility, who perfectly embodies the Black Crowes' new musical direction, having shed the hard-rock swagger of their debut in favor of an almost devotional rediscovery of the sounds most typical of their homeland: a rock-hard Southern rock steeped in moods both boozy and churchy, deeply indebted to Black music, from blues to boogie to soul. The title itself is telling, a tribute to the hymnal anthology of the same name compiled by William Walker in 1835, and more broadly to the roots tradition of liturgical singing and the age-old practice of shape notes. George Drakoulias and Brendan O'Brien were again on production duties, delivering a sound that, compared to the debut's rawness, is more polished and attentive to detail.

Just like the sextet themselves, decked out in the promo photos as if for some sinister voodoo-style soirée, the band's sound has had a makeover: dirtier, more vicious, riding a high-gear groove that's as irresistible as it is infectious. Chris thus gets to run wild in a new and even more fitting setting, countered by the powerful voices of his robust African-American backing singers, Joy and Barbara Mitchell. From the very opening of "Sting Me" the passion runs like a fever, and that tightly wound spiritual-style delivery, adopted as a fresh twist on their bastard rock, quickly proves itself a kind of magic formula, all the more exhilarating thanks to the searing guitars and swirling Hammond organ. Catching your breath is not part of the script, though, since an even more dazzling gem, "Remedy", is already pressing in, and while the elder Robinson brother is a touch less unhinged in his delivery here, he still indulges in plenty of showmanship on the chorus, in the comfortable space left open for him by his vocal partners. In these grooves, which repeatedly echo the godfathers Allman Brothers, Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Band, Southern rock is granted a thrilling second life, courtesy of a ragtag bunch of kids who clearly did their homework. Vibrant, full-blooded, irresistible, "Remedy" is perhaps the single gem, more than any other, for which the Black Crowes will be remembered, as well as tangible proof that the promises of Shake Your Money Maker would be fulfilled without hesitation, and with interest.

Even as it moves into its thick of it, the album stays red-hot and tumultuous, coursing through and through with a crazed energy that goes well beyond the gurgling Fenders of the Ford & Rich outfit, dazzling as they are. On "Hotel Illness" the bluesiest, most clattering side of the Stones resurfaces: compared to them, though, the Crowes can claim genuine roots, which is perhaps why the song never collapses into a bland stylistic exercise and instead comes across as a credible ride fueled by pure feeling, branded with Chris's harmonica. The mood stays effervescent, the tones pleasantly sour, like a boozy, aged Southern gut-buster.

"Black Moon Creeping", on the other hand, serves as an indirect (and deeply personal) tribute to Led Zeppelin, anticipating by a few years what would become a defining expressive direction on By Your Side. This homage to masters Page & Plant is quickly reaffirmed by the even meatier "No Speak No Slave", its guitar work occasionally atmospheric so as to carefully avoid the fond mimicry the band had reserved for the Faces and Aerosmith on their previous record. The result is a powerful, blazing number, as is Ford's accompanying solo, made even mightier by the accelerations driven by Colt and Gorman, arriving just in time for "My Morning Song" to recover the blues-and-gospel-tinged vigor of the album's opening: the machine roars on relentlessly, like a steamroller powered by a race car engine.

And what about the ballads, you might ask? They're here again this time around too, and they more than hold their own. Bittersweet and nocturnal, "Thorn In My Pride" presents the band at its most intimate and sensual. Chris is clearly in his element as the languid heartbreaker, but between substantial, never gaudy guitar flourishes and a prodigious sense of rhythm worthy of the greatest icons of Black music, it's really the whole ensemble around him that shines in his service; Ford's Stratocaster, for instance, embroiders and ignites without ever overdoing it, and Harsch's pleasantly tipsy piano is every bit as good. The overall impression is one of an irresistible party, a joyous exorcism staged by the young raven-haired guru and his rough, bewitching voice. The American band hasn't yet settled onto the subtly psychedelic path that would, if only marginally, later become a kind of crutch for its artistic old age (mostly, to be fair, in the solo experience of the frontman leading the Chris Robinson Brotherhood, but that's a story from two decades on). Here, what prevails is an almost scholarly fidelity to the most varied idioms of American roots music. Mostly fairly long, the songs on The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion nonetheless seem to fly by too quickly, so effective is their sweet spell. They entertain without boring, without losing themselves in self-indulgent grandstanding. If anything, they enchant, as in the case of "Bad Luck Blue Eyes Goodbye", delivered heart-on-sleeve and with an intoxicating gait. As on the previous album, the choruses all tend toward the unforgettable, but this time it's the vocals that truly steal the show from everything else, no longer needing the help of flashy, swaggering riffs.

The frontman is flawless as a tormented soul, albeit one far removed from those populating the contemporary grunge universe: he immerses himself fully in the intimate nature of his homeland and becomes its passionate, credible, and often (as in the track just mentioned) genuinely heart-wrenching spokesman. The high point of this aesthetic of intense fervor is the gorgeous "Sometimes Salvation", a theatrical masterpiece in which Chris lays himself bare in his most romantic, well-worn pose. Soaked in spleen like a sponge, dressed in decadent, sepia-toned guitars, with spiritual-style touches that no longer reek of crude imitation but have become an invincible armor, the track was served up for promotional purposes with a powerfully impactful video about heroin addiction, starring a Sofia Coppola barely in her twenties. The leap in quality is evident on every level. Whatever criticism once dogged the band now rings hollow, entirely pretextual and useless: these are no longer just kids hung up on glittering (and somewhat trite) hard rock, and one begins to suspect that their 1990 debut was, above all, a brilliant Trojan horse. Their music has grown enormously in no time at all, and not just formally: it now has a soul that truly shines. Fiery and duly grounded in the most earthbound of dimensions — carefully steering clear of any hazy notion of psych abstraction or figurativism — the album is, in every respect, a triumph: overloaded yet never cloying, murky, genuine and overwhelming like a great North American river. The release comes right at the close, with a cover of Bob Marley's "Time Will Tell", far from an odd choice since it's clearly in tune with the wealth of passion just poured out; almost a joyous, secular prayer for the evening hour, a thanksgiving delivered with a tone of serene fatalism that doesn't feel out of place at all.

The Best Note

Launched by a quartet of singles that all topped Billboard's genre charts (a record never since matched by any other act), The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion debuted straight at the top of the US album charts and set itself up to become the band's biggest commercial (and critical) success. Its follow-up, recorded with Jim Mitchell during 1993 (featuring guest appearances by the Jayhawks' Gary Louris, Marc Perlman and Karen Grotberg) and originally titled "Tall", was shelved before completion so the band could ride their new tour and the magic moment they were having, fueling their growing live reputation. Between concerts cut short by brawls (with plainclothes narcotics officers) and crew members facing charges for assault and resisting arrest, it was, to say the least, a turbulent year for the Black Crowes, and their (rather exaggerated, in truth) reputation as bad boys picked up a couple more notches, much to the delight of the folks at American Recordings. Meanwhile, the first imitators had already begun popping up, hoping for even a modest slice of the appealing pie the Robinsons had baked: the Los Angeles-based Freewheelers, signed to Geffen, fronted by the charismatic clone Luther Russell. Others would follow in the years to come, chief among them Marah, led by brothers Dave and Serge Bielanko, though none would ever fare particularly well. In the spring of 1994, regardless, the Georgian sextet went back and reworked a number of the songs from "Tall", enlisting for the occasion the trusted producer of their friends Jellyfish, Jack Joseph Puig.

Once again, the band intended a sharp, surprising shift: toward an airier, more psychedelic rock, with fewer muscular workouts, fewer riffs piled on top of each other, and a stronger leaning toward alternative-style ballads. Amorica is, in every sense, a more mature and ambitious project, one that distances itself from the usual revivalist registers without giving in to the siren call of a watered-down grunge that, in the year of Kurt Cobain's death, was still very much in vogue (think of the Stone Temple Pilots' shrewd bestseller "Purple"). Instead, much like R.E.M.'s contemporaneous "Monster", it dares to take a more emotionally visceral approach, exposing itself unfiltered and with unmistakable romantic emphasis. Listening to a track like lead single "A Conspiracy", one might be tempted to doubt all of the above. Within its grooves rages the same explosive band of their earlier records, with the elder Robinson brother truly in top form, leonine and frantic as he juggles ferocious inflections and brooding poses; the jagged contributions of the two guitars are still wonderfully incisive, Gorman's drumming still prominent, but it's always Harsch's murky keyboards steering the group's torrential sonic flow, a flood that sweeps everything along while the frontman screams himself hoarse like a man possessed. In heart and temperament, one might think, the Crowes haven't budged an inch. In reality, though, the album's opening tells a different story. Warm Latin aromas usher in sweet Gibson scrapes, within a harsh, bastardized blues, a filthy, ragged pastiche capable of revealing glorious glimpses amid its chaotic twists and turns, alongside the roars of a Chris rougher than ever. The setting is a tangle thick with ripples and rough edges, but the singer never loses his grip and clearly knows how to pull the strings.

Quirky rhythms, loose-limbed percussion and wonderful tex-mex atmospheres, for that matter, are repeated almost immediately: starting with its title, "High Head Blues" makes no secret of its musical direction, even at the peak of its oddness, in the heart of a heretical reworking that digs deep down to the very foundations of the genre. The air is appropriately unhealthy and dissolute, Chris hams it up between whiny complaints and ironic flourishes, and the result is another captivating track, full-bodied, unruly, and light years away from anything the band had done before. The impression here, above all, is that the Georgians aren't just experimenting with new approaches but, perhaps with a little help from the inevitable soft drugs, are having a damn good time doing it. It's not entirely clear whether, in the closing bars, after a resounding drag on who-knows-what kind of cigarette, the frontman declares in Spanish "Esta es la mejor mota" (this is the best weed) or "Esta es la mejor nota" (clear enough even in Italian), but the meaning remains more or less the same.

The move away from the core of their established sound becomes clear shortly after, when the spotlight falls entirely on a ballad like "Cursed Diamond", beautifully framed in melancholy and dedicated, among other things, to the power of forgiveness. A Chris who is phenomenal in both talent and the simplicity with which he's able to move listeners turns it into the lyrical peak of a wildly inspired album and, perhaps, of the entire Black Crowes adventure. At the center of it, here as in the other ten tracks, is the couple. Relationship dynamics, abuses of power, abandonment, harmony, infatuation, affection. And then, naturally, hatred, so fashionable in 1994; not, however, something crudely aimed at others, in some indiscriminate rejection of everyone and everything (as if it were the most clichéd of generational weapons), nor a drive diluted into the usual dreary nihilism. It's turned inward, and stands as the spark for a far more radical reckoning, a tool of redemption, to stick with the repertoire of symbols and the moral clarity of Black music that the band has always regarded with such great respect.

While Chris's words come at the listener like a flurry of boxer's hooks, Ford and Harsch work wonders, building the melodic framework of a raw gem that's impossible to resist without a touch of being moved. The band has reached a point where they can touch on something special with real ease, but they manage it without resorting to cheap showmanship and without sliding into the kind of sentimentality à la Bryan Adams, to name a contemporary who — by milking certain clichés — made millions. With "Nonfiction" they slow down and strip back their sound, presenting themselves in a more candid, confiding light. The leaner approach loses none of its power, not least because in this transparent, unplugged guise the frontman has even more room to spin his tales with good cheer. Stylistically, the band here leans toward a late-Sixties West Coast folk sound, modest yet glowing with that pleasant aroma of Americana: a necessary pause in the record's otherwise crazed emotional flow, a relaxing oasis. Eddie's bouncing organ, the lively guitars and Colt's spirited bass set up a charmingly informal new frame in which Chris can roam freely through yet another sun-drenched episode ("She Gave Good Sunflowers"). There's a precious sense of freedom in the air that again harks back to the late Sixties, and it's American down to the very last sonic molecule; Ford's solo excursion makes it almost feel like some impossible outtake from the soundtrack to "Easy Rider", even though it's really just another small love song among the rest, all flesh and nerve. What follows is a sufficiently adrenaline-fueled, ragged blues ("P.25 London"), set alight by the harmonica and the playful verve of a Chris who, for a moment, returns to rummaging like a mischievous kid through the family trunk up in the attic.

The whole thing sounds vividly grimy and enjoyable but, more importantly, it nimbly dodges the usual traps of necrophiliac revivalism, because the band playing here is an imaginative (and brash) Nineties outfit, and thankfully that much is obvious. For the genuinely spine-tingling "Ballad In Urgency/Wiser Time" pairing, the intensity of "Cursed Diamond" returns in full force. Refined without overdoing the mannered aestheticism, the Crowes here deliver ten of the most incredible minutes of their career: decadent but never affected, shining losers posing as winners, casting a spell with harmonic guitar strokes and the seductive warmth of one of the finest voices of his generation. No solo here sounds any less self-indulgent or showy than Marc Ford's, in this enchanting two-part travel diary, save for Harsch's sweet piano, which stays well clear of such excess. There's clearly an enormous amount at stake here, yet one comes away satisfied without feeling weighed down, convinced that these guys shaped a small miracle just to give it to us. Having set aside youthful bravado and more orthodox blues, what they arrive at here is, quite simply, one of the most moving chapters in roots rock, whatever meaning one chooses to attach to that term.

It's great music, nothing more and nothing less, and the fact that it hasn't aged a day in more than twenty years proves it in the most eloquent way possible. The new, instinctive lightness of touch is offered by a Delta-blues number that's far less flimsy than it might seem on a first, distracted listen ("Downtown Money Waster"): there's a deeply earthy, genuine intoxication in it, and the band's attitude is devotional in the highest sense of the word. The farewell is then achingly sweet, almost cathartic, the final prayer ("Have mercy baby, open your eyes…") like an exorcism completed, an invitation to fully savor the wonder of everyday life, without dwelling too much on the big questions.

That's the Amorica of the title, and behind the pun lies a deep meaning: grateful love for life, told in the most American accents possible but also without unnecessary filters or artifice. Unfortunately, the undeniable artistic effort put in by the Robinson brothers only pays off up to a point. None of the new singles secure memorable sales, the album misses the top ten by a hair, and in the end it's talked about more for its bold (though it raises a smile today) cover image, taken from a Hustler Magazine issue from a couple of decades earlier: a photo of a mons pubis barely covered by a tiny bikini bearing the national flag. Big chains like Walmart and Kmart refuse to sell it in their stores, and the tug-of-war between the band's management and those opposing their choices is resolved - not before guaranteeing the Crowes a hefty return in terms of publicity - with a self-censored cover swap in which all references to sex are essentially erased. Meanwhile, live activity never lets up. Hailed as one of the best of their long career (there's even a triumphant night shared with Grateful Dead in Florida), the 1995 "Amorica Or Bust" tour is in reality plagued by every kind of friction among band members - the brothers first and foremost, but not only them - and on a couple of occasions the Crowes genuinely come within a hair of breaking up.

For the follow-up to Amorica, which the Georgians arrive at with their nerves literally in tatters, they opt for a production approach quite different from the longer, more considered one used the previous year: Rich records a dozen demos which he sends to Chris in California so he can put his own lyrics over them. A small house in Atlanta is then rented, nicknamed "Chateau de la Crowe", where the band reconvenes with trusted producer Jack Joseph Puig to refine the already impressive work the Robinsons had done separately. In a thoroughly informal atmosphere, with none of the sterility of a proper recording studio, numerous other tracks are written and put on tape during the new sessions, which also feature contributions from the Dirty Dozen Brass Band on a couple of tracks. Nominally completed at Ocean Way Studios in Los Angeles, the band's fourth album, Three Snakes And One Charm, fully reflects both the laid-back climate in which it was made and the restlessness that had marked the tail end of the previous experience. Stylistically it continues with the eclectic approach and genre-blending already tried out on the breakthrough record, though the result itself is less cohesive and the mood, while lively, is rather chaotic. Of course these imbalances also bring positive developments in this instance, chief among them Rich's growth as a player: encouraged by Ford, he effectively becomes a second lead guitarist.

The opening is exceedingly lively, thick with drafts and steeped in a general euphoria: the band's guitars are still overloaded and darting, the keyboards mischievous, amid a climate of southern revelry and wide-open, festive intoxication. The impression is that of a frantic mix of influences that ends up smothering, and even toning down, the singer's usually hyped-up temperament. After a maybe too-easy start, the band is back in its element with what it evidently does best, the ballad. Within that category, "Good Friday" has little to envy in its counterparts from the previous record. The necessary clarity returns, rewarding a Chris who is appropriately back in focus with his warm voice and his wild harmonica. There's even a banjo to be heard, valuable in flavoring the track without cheapening it into an overly cartoonish oddity; that's because the Crowes don't like tying themselves to one stylistic tic rather than another, and indeed prove themselves excellent at crossing genres, traditionalists with a taste for breaking the rules (as well as unmatched masters of the sing-along). Backing up this principle is another frenzied track, "One Mirror Too Many", sublime in its blend of electric and acoustic as much as in the murky atmospheric canyons shaped by the younger Robinson brother. But it's still the older brother who takes things up a notch, somewhere between guru and Mephistophelian presence, fully confirming his attitude, a stage presence that's the perfect rock animal, the physique du role and that aura of the tireless hippie that a truly magnetic rock frontman simply can't help but flaunt. As for surprises that are more colorful and decisive, at least in terms of pushing the pedal of a "healthy, self-aware" populism, there's still room to spare.

The first such occasion is offered by the genetically modified blues-rock of "Nebakanezer", remarkably skilled at flirting freely (and with undeniable success) with the sirens of radio-friendly alt-pop. The magic trick is then set for a swift encore with the big single "Blackberry", another bastard gem and the perfect testament to the impure but irresistible aesthetic ridden this time around by the most Dionysian Black Crowes ever seen. Once again their refrains prove to be genuine easy-listening pearls, the sparkle of tracks crafted to please everyone, from Allman Brothers nostalgists to anyone looking for something sweeter or simply less dated.

In this grand balancing act seems to lie the winning formula of an album that set off - undeniably - with the wind at its back. While the two Gibsons roar around him, the rhythm section drives on and Harsch dishes out intoxicating runs as if it were raining them, the frontman seems to be having the time of his life, like a mad little devil riding the heady momentum. Then, with "Girl From A Pawnshop", comes an abrupt change of pace, further proof of the happy shape-shifting the Atlanta band is capable of: here, far more restrained than usual, grave and even mournful, in a track steeped in ecstatic wonder but free of the theatrics that would feel out of place. Then again, Chris is such a temperamental artist that he can't fully resist venting dramatic, even flamboyant outbursts, perhaps dedicated to model and actress - and granddaughter of Frank Zappa - Lala Sloatman (walked down the aisle a couple of months after the LP hits stores); in terms of quality and lyricism his performance never slips into cheap kitsch, and his bandmates always know how to back him up sublimely, right up to the joyous hymn of redemption placed at the end of this long song.

After a superb first side, the level can only drop a little, naturally. So "(Only) Halfway To Everywhere" chooses to favor a playful tone, coasting along on a tasty soul-and-funk groove, egged on by the horns galore of the "wild dozen" and the feverish presence of the backing singers, while the singer certainly doesn't need coaxing to let himself be swept along, once again playing the poor man's Rod Stewart (or Steven Tyler): a passage as earthy as it is dispensable (much like the jolly romp that disavows the early Zeppelin-esque evocations in "Let Me Share The Ride"), but also a litmus test of a vitality that's almost crazy in its sincerity. Whatever one thinks of it, the variety of approaches adopted to avoid, once again, settling into a fixed form remains an added value for the Georgians. Often accused unfairly of being merely clever copycats, the Crowes show here their impatience with stereotypes and the limiting baggage that comes with them. This explains the frugal electro-acoustic ballads that crowd the second half of the album and seem almost purged compared to the fairly chaotic mood expressed earlier: the radiant tribute to the Californian sixties of "Better When You're Not Alone", the pleasant "Bring On, Bring On" or the ramshackle exorcism of "How Much For Your Wings?", a lightening of mood that smells of lo-fi ante litteram; simple things, evidently, for eclectic talents like these American musicians, but also a necessary diversion to catch their breath, loosen up and play what they like without pressure, in a vein that, in the solo adventures of the two Robinsons, would become a genuine expressive refuge.

Born in a period of great tension, Three Snakes And One Charm has the undeniable merit of showing the Atlanta outfit in a prolonged, recreational interlude that defuses the drama and couldn't, in fact, be healthier. Luckily these Crowes are guys who also appreciate escapism and lightheartedness, not insufferable, stiff know-it-alls planted behind their lecterns. And luckily, even if nearing its end, they're still living through their most intense and exhilarating creative phase. This explains why even the songs collected here largely maintain a standard of good (when not excellent) craftsmanship. In the memorable ending of "Evil Eye" one can even catch a glimpse of some dark omens, though the tone, however infected with unease and nervousness, remains pleasantly serene: dark clouds are gathering on the horizon but - our heroes seem to say - they might just vanish as quickly as they appeared, without leaving too much of a trace.

Better a day as a lion?

Despite the compromises, beyond the illusion that every rift can be magically mended, the need to promote the latest effort heavily on the road brings the Georgian band back to the standoff and uneasy truce it had already fallen into about a year before this new production effort. Exhausted after six months of touring, the Black Crowes go back into the studio at the start of 1997 to give final shape to the large amount of material left out of previous sessions. The new album, which according to preliminary plans should be titled "Band", is nevertheless shelved, just as had happened four years earlier with "Tall", in this case due to American's refusal, as the label hoped for something more striking. The prolonged internal friction within the sextet nonetheless finds a resolution with the firing of Marc Ford, officially over a heroin addiction, followed by the departure of the other "dissenter", Johnny Colt, who in truth had grown increasingly detached from the band and was by now intent on reinventing himself as a yoga instructor. With two key members from the earliest days (or thereabouts) out of the picture, it would seem they'd reached the end of the road ahead of schedule. The replacements, however, are prompt - their friend Sven Pipien on bass, ex-Cry Of Love man Audley Freed as second guitarist - even though the band effectively disappears from the radar. 1998 is notable solely for the release of Sho' Nuff, a thoroughly enjoyable box set featuring the first four LPs remastered and enriched with outtakes, plus a previously unreleased live EP, multimedia material (music videos, screensavers), stickers and more.

Meanwhile American Recordings becomes a subsidiary of Columbia, and due to friction with Rick Rubin, the Crowes effectively opt to switch labels to Columbia, bigger but, paradoxically, at least on the surface less restrictive. For the recordings of the new album they turn once again to Kevin Shirley, already a collaborator of Drakoulias's back at the time of the debut, with whom they hole up for the first time in a New York studio, Avatar. The producer's intent, after flatly rejecting what the band had already recorded (as it was too similar to the standard of the last two albums), is to steer his clients toward a lean but sharply focused rock record, forcing them to play as if they were teenagers again. After being postponed a couple of times, the new By Your Side finally sees the light of day in January 1999, with Rich as the sole guitarist in the lineup. Stylistically, the simplification of arrangements and lyrics is undeniable, as is the shift toward more classically understood love songs and the greater room given to irony at every level. The lighthearted tone comes through, for instance, even in the band bio in the booklet, which doesn't skip a bit of sarcasm about the decidedly unflattering years weighing on Eddie Harsch, while a freshly divorced Chris fearlessly plays the mischievous card of ambiguity: after the shaggy, late-hippie look sported over the previous four years, he dusts off the brash directness of about a decade earlier, disguising it with a vaguely androgynous look, and rebrands himself "Diva" for the occasion. Even from small details like these, the return to the glory and youthful carefree spirit of Shake Your Money Maker seems rather pronounced.

The stylistic coordinates give it away even better than any non-musical hint, since once again the echoes of "Exile On Main Street", Humble Pie or Rod Stewart's "Gasoline Alley" are extremely strong, and there's not the slightest hesitation on display: the telling opener "Go Faster" is an instant shot of pure adrenaline, marked by a simply contagious r'n'r emphasis. The band's engine roars with the same force as its best days, and the dive into the past is a dizzying backflip toward the hard-rock swagger of its earliest steps. Yet they don't merely ape that phase, because in the meantime the band has grown exponentially and gained an enviable self-assurance. At the head of this triumphant charge, the elder Robinson once again plays the possessed rocker and, together with a Steve Gorman never so explosive, bears witness to the group's excellent form. The feeling is immediately reaffirmed and sealed by another combative number, "Kicking My Heart Around". With a frontman who seems wound up like a spring, the Crowes express themselves at the peak of their Dionysian purity, without overthinking things too much. The one-two punch is overwhelming, as is the all-encompassing guitar work (rhythm and lead) of a Rich who has finally taken full ownership of his own music, with no more competitors or prima donnas treading on his toes. Setting aside the nobler, more intriguing lyrical ambitions that bore their juiciest fruit on the grooves of the two albums produced by Puig, the band brings its artistic vision back to ground-zero immediacy, stripped down like a sound rediscovering its own genuine, uncompromising roots.

The title track and the even softer "Only A Fool", both chosen as singles, tie their essential but luminous melodic lines to a basic riff or to an always well-placed piano flourish, reprising in the most shameless way the winning formula of that by-now-distant first gem. Compared to back then, there's even more fluidity, essential to keep all this leonine grit from overflowing or tipping into something grotesque. The result, in short, is decidedly smooth, with the energy managed to its best effect, avoiding any waste. The only drawback is that, perhaps, not every song is truly memorable, though the "muscular" tautness of the sound and the dash of craftsmanship applied as needed more than compensate for any dips in inspiration. There's much less of Harsch this time around, or at least his murky, erratic influence is kept in check in favor of the brighter spirit embodied by the Robinsons. In a sense Amorica marked a limit beyond which it would have been impossible to push further, and that phase then ran its course with Three Snakes And One Charm and its first, partial retreat into a form of bizarre crossbreeding. A vein they return to, if only sporadically, as shown by the circus-like performance, the rattles and the nostalgic poses struck with masterly flair on "Welcome To The Goodtimes".

By Your Side is, all things considered, an enjoyable album, lacking the romantic urgency of its immediate predecessors but engaging on other terms. Frivolous and to-the-point in their breezy displays of optimism, always skilled at masking their jubilant slackness thanks to the rigor of a perfectly tuned musical machine (a bit like the Rolling Stones of the same period), the Georgians throw a proper party, almost as if trying to exorcise the breakup they narrowly avoided. To best achieve their aims they're forced to perform real feats of cohesion, depth and electric shading, breakneck pace and the "glue-stick" effect of the songwriting, landing on an "oxygenated" and winking brand of easy-listening that on a few occasions ("Then She Said My Name", "Heavy") proves irresistible: for once it's the magic of carefree abandon that steals the show and gets an inevitably more surface-level listen drunk on enthusiasm.

Between playful moments and crowd-pleasing flourishes, offered on purpose to win over arena audiences, it emerges with unmistakable clarity that the band wants to open up, to connect, seeking a shared embrace with its followers (which, after all, is what the title says too): the approach couldn't be more open-armed, and it's another important weapon for an album that otherwise isn't quite so memorable. There's a touch of autopilot, it's true, but the band seems in such overwhelming form that it's easily forgiven. At times one can also spot glimpses of that mature-jam-band showmanship that would deeply mark the second half of the Crowes' career: see the anthology of clichés that is "Go Tell The Congregation" or the Zeppelin-esque "Horsehead", a seriously tough track from an outfit that seems to have discovered the pleasure of grandeur and, for once, openly chooses to strut its stuff.

Despite the physical and personal swagger on full display, the Crowes' commercial flare-up had by then burned through its vigor. The album peaked at a mere number twenty-six on the charts and sold three hundred thousand copies at home, despite the enormous promotional effort behind it, including TV appearances, the intensive "Souled Out" tour and the co-headlining runs that followed in short order, in the United States with Lenny Kravitz and in Europe with Aerosmith. A far more relaxed occasion came that October, when the Robinson brothers' outfit shared the stage with the legendary Jimmy Page for a couple of shows that it's not out of place to call "devotional". Fiery reworkings of the Zeppelin catalogue, a handful of great blues-rock classics, and a few choice gems from the Georgians' own discography made the New York and Los Angeles concerts truly memorable. The latter, once again recorded by Kevin Shirley, was made available on the Musicmaker.com website in February 2000 and then released by the small Tvt Records as a double CD titled Live At The Greek: Excess All Areas in July of that same year. Although it left out any Crowes songs, excluded for contractual reasons with Columbia, the record pleased both fans of the Atlanta band and purists of the legendary London group, and, surprisingly, sold over two hundred thousand more copies than the heavily hyped By Your Side. The end of the partnership with their label was, at that point, inevitable, as was a repeat of the experience with Page (joined, this time, by the Who) across several new summer dates. The year closed with a genuine explosion of popularity for Chris, plastered across every tabloid thanks to his marriage to the famous star of "Almost Famous" (and daughter of Goldie Hawn), Kate Hudson, celebrated in full view of the paparazzi amid the snows of Aspen on December 31, at the ranch of the bride's stepfather, actor Kurt Russell.

Having mutually settled their contract with Columbia, the Black Crowes signed with V2, the new label of English tycoon Richard Branson, won over by the promise of total creative freedom made to them by the new partner (starting with no veto over their choice of producer, something they'd fruitlessly chased two and a half years earlier with Don Was). The sixth studio album of their career, Lions, was recorded at the Montana Rehearsal Studios in New York in early 2001 and hit stores in May of that same year. The band lacked a full-time bassist, having fired Pipien (for showing up late to a gig) and having been abandoned by his subsequent replacements, Greg Rzab and Andy Hess, but it was Don Was himself (and, more occasionally, the younger Robinson) who personally filled the gap. Once again Rich held almost sole command of the guitars, with Audley Freed relegated to a marginal role, so as to avoid drowning the riffs - the real "meat" of these songs - in a wall of sound deemed too diffuse.

As critics unanimously noted, the recent live adventure with Jimmy Page left a significant mark on the creative dynamics of the Atlanta band, since the influence of Led Zeppelin had never before seemed so decisive on a Crowes record. Unfortunately, that influence proves less beneficial than it might have been, perhaps because the Georgians appear genuinely short on inventiveness, and their skill, however considerable, can do little to rescue the new songs from a general (and disheartening) sense of going through the motions. Between watered-down sound, storylines trivialized well beyond what's excusable, and lyrics that are consistently saccharine - inspired in Chris by the angelic stereotype of his young wife - Lions easily claims the title of worst album in the Robinson brothers' discography, a dubious feat that manages to unite industry insiders and devoted fans alike in agreement.

And to think that, right from the start, the band seems more concerned than ever with appearances, trying to look suitably fired up. In vain, because the impression of watching a drowsy, sluggish pachyderm quickly takes hold. The first of the explicit tributes to Page & Plant plays out technically correct but stirs very little emotion; faithful to himself as ever, even Chris seems a touch bloated, or perhaps, more than anything, simply unconvinced. What's missing are the pathos and the sweat that have always been a crucial hallmark of the Black Crowes brand. The debts owed to Zeppelin become blatant on "Come On", though here the band recovers some of its old shine and entertains as it should. Certainly, this doesn't stray from the norm of an otherwise dazzling divertissement, and this retreat into mere style can't satisfy fans in any way.

Even a festive track like "Lickin'", buoyed by an agreeable stylization, fails to rise above the sense of being a joke, an exercise with no real stakes, knocked together in no time for purely diversionary purposes. "Ozone Mama" brings back the turgid, playful funk of its predecessor, but without the energy and enthusiasm that abounded back then. Therein lies the most telling difference between the two records: By Your Side had soul, red-blooded outbursts and a still-sharp sense of irony, while Lions feels like a cozy after-work get-together, devoid of real motivation and dangerously short of breath, despite now-impeccable technical mastery and lavish arrangements.

So the thirteen tracks chase each other wearily, form wins out over substance, and the tedium remains palpable, between a pretty Gibson warble here and a faded chorus there, ever faithful to the usual formula; for once, Chris's manic verve raises more eyebrows than excitement, but that's just one warning sign among many. Even the ballads, for what it's worth, come across as lukewarm and a touch too transparent, even though the elder Robinson spares no emotional effort: while the languid "Miracle To Me" never rises above generic pleasantness, "Young Man, Old Man" is a page of listlessness best forgotten quickly.

The only thing that seems remotely interesting is the oddball baroque revival of "Cosmic Friend", with its aftertaste of cut-rate Beatles-style psychedelia, but it quickly loses itself in a slight, lo-fi variation on the theme before fading into yet another display of (prematurely) geriatric rock. The single "Soul Singing" tries to liven things up and gives off some fine late-hippie aromas (which would become an indispensable presence on Chris Robinson Brotherhood records), while a fantastic chorus earns "Losing My Mind" the title of best track on the record. But it's slim pickings, drowned in a sea of needless grandiosity. These thoroughly unmotivated Crowes seem to struggle enormously even with things that once came to them naturally: they're reduced to pale imitators of themselves, bereft of decent ideas, led by a Chris who has never sounded so tedious (the closing track says it all), lost in the maze of his own romantic clichés with no real decadent spark to back them up. The sensation, surely unintended, is of a band that has given up, an old sports car being driven at idle like any ordinary sedan. Perhaps that's why it's such a struggle to get to the end, discouraged by such a deep and sudden decline. The lions evoked by the title are tired beasts. They wave pride and freedom like banners but head down a worrying creative dead end, settling into it without seeking any alternative: no more claws tearing at the heart for them, just an intangible, bombastic regularity, often too aestheticized, that smacks of a fundamentally wasted effort.

The promotional push was, once again, massive, with a first tour ("Brotherly Love") shared with two other bands of brothers - Oasis and Spacehog - and a second, tellingly titled ("Listen Massive"), that kept the American outfit busy well into the autumn. With barely two hundred thousand copies sold at home, sales remained significantly below expectations, so it came as little surprise to many when, following the departure of drummer (and founding member) Steve Gorman in January 2002, the Robinsons announced, for the first time, an indefinite hiatus for their creation.

Endless restarts...

The hiatus actually proved a most fitting opportunity to see the two brothers at work on solo projects postponed for far too long. In just a couple of years, Chris released two albums under his own name with an Americana flavor, "New Earth Mud" (2002) and the remarkable "The Magnificent Distance" (2004), for which he enlisted the help of future bandmate Paul Stacey (already a collaborator of Oasis) on production and songwriting (with minor contributions from Harsch, Ford, Freed and Stone Temple Pilots' Dean DeLeo). For his part, Rich launched the collective Hookah Brown, which would back him on his solo debut "Paper" (2004). His drummer in this not particularly fortunate venture, Bill Dobrow, had the honor of sitting behind the kit for the main band for a very brief spell in early 2005, when the two Robinsons decided the time was right to relaunch together. Joining them for about a year and a half would be Eddie Harsch and a returning Marc Ford, alongside Sven Pipien, who would never again miss a single commitment, making sure not to get fired a second time.

With Gorman also back in the fold, the band roared back to life, with a memorable summer tour shared with Tom Petty and his Heartbreakers, and a string of nights at San Francisco's temple, the Fillmore, destined to be immortalized on their third live album, "Freak'n'Roll Into The Fog" (2006). After the momentum of a rebirth with a (nearly) classic lineup, 2006-07 was a period of reshuffling for the American band: Adam MacDougall took over from Rob Clores in the seat once held by Harsch, and, on second guitar, so did North Mississippi Allstars frontman Luther Dickinson, replacing Marc Ford and his own replacement, Paul Stacey.

While the Crowes kept a steady, confident course during this period, there was still room for an exceptionally precious glance back at their past. It came in the late summer of 2006, when much of the material from the old "Tall" and "Band" sessions was pulled out of storage and finally saw the light of day as a double compilation with the telling title The Lost Crowes, effectively a pair of missing links framing the work produced by Puig around the mid-nineties, as well as a crucial document attesting to the band's state of health during a turbulent yet also extremely vital phase.

The excerpts from "Tall" tell the story of a band at a crossroads. On one hand, leftovers like the loose-limbed - yet appropriately fired-up - "Tied Up & Swallowed", in line with their earliest work, now ripe for being forgotten (it sounds like an outtake from Shake Your Money Maker); on the other, tracks like "Dirty Hair Halo" that closely recall the hazy, dazed tone of certain passages on Three Snakes And One Charm (of which only a loose embryo of "Evil Eye" is present). In between, plenty of rough drafts of Amorica, which, on closer inspection, aren't rough at all: "A Conspiracy" and "Wiser Time" are remarkable even in these non-definitive versions, less polished but full of life and even more nervy than the finished studio originals; a scruffy, boozy "High Head Blues" is quite fun in its stylings but already betrays its full potential, while a wired, rough-edged "P. 25 London" outdoes in sheer grit its officially chosen namesake; the loveliest early draft, though, is a bare, aching "Cursed Diamond" (Chris whispers, Rich and Eddie are barely audible), more intimate than ever and capable of bursting into flame in spectacular fashion.

What's most surprising about these demos is the confidence already on display, in place of the timid approach one might expect. The 1993 band had considerable self-assurance, full belief in their own abilities and sufficiently clear ideas - all the hallmarks of "greatness". Among the pile there's also a handful of understated yet charming songs, like the nocturnal gem "Feathers" and "Lowdown" (a stillborn twin to "Ballad In Urgency"), or the wonderful final surprise of "Thunderstorm 6:54", shadowy and unforgettable, among the most evocative things the Georgians ever wrote. It's a crime that they were never developed as they deserved: velvet and roughness meet there, intriguing in a way that perhaps only the band, in a state of grace under Puig's direction just a few months later, could manage.

Rounding out the picture, a couple of gems: the most wicked and sensual number of the lot, that "Song Of The Flesh" destined to become a cult object among the tracks never promoted on an album; and the moving folk instrumental "Sunday Night Buttermilk Waltz", an incredible (and unexpected) tribute from Rich to his idol Nick Drake. In the less forcibly flashy guise of "Band", even the tracks that anticipated By Your Side retain a genuine character of their own that makes them shining gems, even if only rarely granted the honor of further development. Without the scaffolding of a fully polished production, these tracks reveal the band's purest soul, vigorous yet unadorned. There's no shortage of colorful divertissements that reveal curious echoes of what was to come later, often with less shine ("Grinnin'" already has the frivolity of Lions), but above all one can glimpse the first seeds of the roots infection that would strike the band like a blessing late in their career, still mixed in with blues-flavored solutions ("Predictable") or the rustic path of Americana exploration found on ...Until The Freeze (the lofty, Jayhawks-style folk of "My Heart's Killing Me").

The overall impression, in this case, is of a band unburdened by any particular worries and, in that sense, free to roam at will over still largely untrodden musical terrain. The Black Crowes of "Band" come across as touched by inspiration, energized, fired up and sporting a sensational groove, sturdy and bubbling, that draws them close to early-Seventies psychedelic rock (more west coast than southern): a collective open to improvisation and, in character, closer to a seasoned jam band. Tracks like "Another Roadside Tragedy" are excellent, tight and euphoric but set in a lovely mood of carefree, worldly comfort, which when needed is galvanized by passages of great atmospheric intensity, somewhat like the more expansive tracks on Amorica (the ballad "Wyoming & Me" is pure magic). Even the only sketch that points toward By Your Side ("If It Ever Stops Raining") has a more endearingly rustic, handcrafted feel, with shades and brushstrokes of extreme beauty, while the one brighter, more crowd-pleasing song, in line with the Zeppelin-esque vein of the period, is "Never Forget This Song", which oddly enough was never carried forward to the album. With all these arrows in its quiver, The Lost Crowes remains a true little treasure chest and a formidable opportunity to hear the Atlanta band free of adulteration, captured in two moments of intense creative ferment but also of deep stylistic confusion and genuine relational turmoil.

The wait for the seventh LP is worthily filled, in July 2007, by the release of "Live At The Roxy", a delightful acoustic document of a trio of nights at the eponymous Los Angeles club, offered by the Robinson brothers alone just a few months earlier under the off-the-cuff moniker Brothers Of A Feather. While yet another live album thus hits the shops, the Black Crowes regroup alongside Paul Stacey in a small recording studio in the Catskill Mountains, about a hundred miles from New York, to shape a new album of original material, Warpaint. Once again Rich wrote the music and mailed the material to Chris, so he could pen and sing the lyrics. For the finishing touches and any further ideas, though, group work is needed, and the three weeks of near-monastic retreat prove a genuine tonic for the Georgia outfit. Nature, harmony and tranquillity, aided by the Arcadian setting, are mirrored in the serene mood in which the new songs are recorded, all cut live with post-production tweaks kept to an absolute minimum, in a couple of cases even recorded outdoors. With their historic stylistic turf by now occupied by younger, sharper outfits like the Black Keys, the bucolic approach and the lack of technical additives offer decisive support for the semi-revolution underway on the stylistic front, with the band firmly set on embracing a roots-rock paradigm that had in the meantime come roaring back into fashion, thanks to the indie successes of the likes of Wilco, Decemberists and Okkervil River — a rather disorienting move when set against the Georgians' most recent output.

"Walk Believer Walk" is a crucial track for grasping the band's renewed vein and the visceral quality that runs deep through Warpaint. A pitch-black blues à-la Blind Willie Johnson, with a boozy flavor, featuring an excellent voice/guitar dialogue up front and, in the background, a Hammond that doesn't make you miss Eddie Harsch's. The lack of any let-up and the hymn-like repetition are functional choices in a philological sense, but what really makes it so gripping is a Chris who shows he can still roar just right. Perfectly cast as a preacher, he's also the absolute protagonist of "Movin' On Down The Line", which comes across now as a prayer, now as a mantra, now as a joyous gospel liturgy, made smoky and fragrant by the sumptuous guitar work of his younger brother and of Dickinson. His scream and his ever-present harmonica are invaluable in giving the whole thing a less pompous, less self-celebratory tone: they rough it up just enough to give it a charge.

A very different mood characterizes "Locust Street", where bright acoustic playing steers the Black Crowes' sound toward far more decisively country-folk territory. The clean sonic dressing works more than well, and it's easy to be swept along by a band in dazzling form, one that reveals a firm intent to stake its claim in the great Americana tradition, somewhere between the early Jayhawks, Richmond Fontaine and Uncle Tupelo. The attempt, it must be said right away, comes off miraculously well, and the favorable response from critics and aficionados can only encourage the band, as we shall see, to keep heading in this direction for future creative choices. Amid soft percussion, acoustic fragrances and spiritual inflections, a track like "Whoa Mule" harks back decisively to the languid, laid-back vibe of some of the softer moments on an album like Three Snakes And One Charm — unplugged, utterly relaxed, in what effectively sounds like a classic-Crowes unplugged set (here with an added touch of rural, pastoral peace).

"There's Gold In Them Hills" also opens on a slow tempo, and it's perhaps the most interesting song on this convincing record: fragments of elegiac singer-songwriter craft, made compelling by the frontman's warm, deeply inspired voice, are hybridized with a little march that sounds thoroughly New Orleans. The result is curious but decidedly enjoyable.

However snubbed by the major radio and TV networks and the press, especially outside the States, Warpaint is without doubt the best release by the Atlanta band in a good dozen years, if you set aside the astonishing Live At The Greek. The nicest gift for fans is the first single and inevitable opener, "Goodbye Daughters Of The Revolution", the quintessence of the band's classic, full-blooded sound and proof of a seriously flattering state of form. The familiar southern blend of guitars and rakish piano hits with real impact, every ingredient weighed to the gram, every note in its right place, and you can sense a balance the two Robinsons' group had been missing for a long time. It's a happily populist track, brimming with enthusiasm and true to the band's glorious trademark sound, literally lit up by Chris's ever-galvanizing voice and by the crucial work of an axeman of Rich's caliber. "We Who See The Deep" follows a similar approach, a ride full of good vibrations and prime rock meat that finds them winking at one of their earliest loves, the Stones, after a long string of "betrayals".

As mentioned, the Crowes of Warpaint show real ease roaming across the most disparate musical genres (each corresponding to a different phase of their by-now nearly twenty-year career). With "Oh Josephine", for instance, they return to one of their signature forms, the ballad, and do so sumptuously: delicate touches over electric velvet, elegant piano and a seasoned heartthrob's voice, just like on the gems of Amorica. Compared to the band's golden age, this song might raise the suspicion of a certain going-through-the-motions, but it's also true that there's more than mere craft behind this album's rediscovered compositional health: nothing new under the sun, which is almost inevitable for artists of their genre, but the Robinsons haven't forgotten how to cast a spell and can still pull off a grand romantic flourish, with class, with a will to entertain and to enjoy themselves. There are a few negligible spins in neutral, redeemed anyway by the musicians' skill: "Wounded Bird" is stadium rock that seems to bring back the raw, early hard-rock Black Crowes, the fresh-faced squires of Aerosmith, and ends up exhausting itself in what is perhaps a slightly tired rehash of that model; more genuine is the following "God's Got It", a cover that marries Southern emphasis and blues in a sort of triumphant nursery rhyme, perfect for getting a concert crowd clapping along in time.

Though a far cry from the sales figures of more than fifteen years earlier, the album performs admirably on the market, debuting at number five on the Billboard chart and proving to be a rather unexpected last hurrah for the Crowes' waning adventure. It's also an unhoped-for injection of confidence for the American collective, who took a risk by opting for a self-sufficient route (the label is their own family imprint, Silver Arrow) and find themselves spurred on by the good results to keep going and strike the creative iron while it's still hot. It's hardly surprising, then, how little time separates this record from the even heftier follow-up, the double album Before The Frost… Until The Freeze, which hit stores in late August 2009 as a single-mono-CD (with the option to download the second part online) and a little later on double vinyl. All the recent choices are reaffirmed: the line-up is unchanged, Paul Stacey still sits at the controls, the label is again their own, and the sound keeps insisting, without hesitation, on a Seventies revival that doesn't rule out forays into bluegrass and alt-country (telling signs: the choice of Levon Helm's studio in Woodstock, and the covers included on the collection or in the accompanying DVD documentary, "Cabin Fever"). Before The Frost… opens with the bright, well-charged blues piano of "Good Morning Captain", a new, passionate foray into the genuine flavors (and muddy landscapes) of the Southern tradition.

Just as on Warpaint, Chris shows restraint, doesn't overdo the emphatic flare-ups, and settles for the more measured (and by now well-seasoned) role of tour guide through this meticulously crafted journey into the world of roots music. The lead guitar remains front and center, but just as much care goes into the "set-dressing" of moods, into nuances that are always tipsy to just the right degree. Southern blues, restrained yet charmingly tart, remains the guiding star by which the band navigates, ranging now toward an earthy alt-country, now toward Seventies-style rock lightly streaked with psychedelia, but always and only within the grooves of an Americana with a sharp aftertaste.

With "Appaloosa" the band plays the card of a subtle, airy melancholy in the most classic of Yankee ballads: limpid, flowing, pastoral and dense with sweeping harmonies. In this setting, room for Rich's signature axeman flourishes is necessarily kept to a bare minimum, though the decorative digressions never feel cumbersome or like an end in themselves. Dickinson's approach, and his — in some ways impressionist — devotion to a roots-rock that's crystalline, rich and never theatrical, clearly prevails. There's certainly no shortage of fine songs in the mix, starting with the pop-rock (again of a traditionalist stamp) and the memorable refrain of "A Train Still Makes A Lonely Sound", a nostalgic train-song — nomen omen — written the way they used to be, with the added value of the frontman's warm, gravelly voice and the backing of this handful of phenomenal musicians. Following a path already trodden for them by Creedence Clearwater Revival, and of equally fine craftsmanship, is also "Houston Don't Dream About Me", where Chris holds back and casts a spell with very little while his brother carves out soft marvels on his Gibson.

The record has a discreet but irresistible pulse, guaranteed as usual by an excellent rhythm section: a constant, intensely vital pulse that conveys both the relevance and the potential of genres many consider minor only because, in other hands, they sound like soulless, picture-postcard exercises, pale collections of musical dioramas. With the Black Crowes, though, it's a whole different story. Stylistically we really are at the opposite pole from their debut, and you get the sense of being in the presence of a band that has indeed aged, but magnificently so, now transfigured into the outfit of sharp veterans that the Robinsons may well have always dreamed of becoming. Never, moreover, has their palette of references been as multifaceted as it is here: from the intimate, country-folk rigor of "The Last Place That Love Lives" to the radiant naturalist revival of "What Is Home?" (not far from Mountain Home, disciples of Greg Weeks), passing perhaps through the razor-sharp, turbocharged Delta blues of "Kept My Soul" — there's an embarrassment of riches, and the Atlanta sextet proves prickly, fizzy and above all sharply focused even when trying to decline the same "irregular" verb of Lions ("Make Glad"). Speaking of (happy) anomalies, the strangest and most enjoyable track of the lot is "I Ain't Hiding", an unexpected plunge into the most disreputable corners of the Seventies (even distant echoes of dance, this time around), which suddenly flares up from urban gospel into a wild, clattering blues: the love of Black music in all its forms proves irrepressible here and makes a particularly tart, inspired pastiche work brilliantly. Nor is it the only strange hybrid on the album. Something similar happens with "And The Band Played On" (as well as "The Shady Grove" on the bonus LP), crossing the house's usual stylistic hallmarks with lighter, more Beatles-esque touches verging on vaudeville: only Yankee straightforwardness keeps it from tipping over into baroque flourishes that would feel out of place.

The second part of the collection, …Until The Freeze, opens with brushstrokes of sitar, with a long instrumental of disparate folk leanings that has all the air of an affectionate tribute to George Harrison's gentle mysticism. Even here, though, our heroes show no wish to bask in the glow of a formula, however winning, and press straight on with their exploration. Appalachian moods and echoes (complete with rustic fiddles keeping time) reaffirm, on "The Garden Gate", the perspective of harmless divertissement, and the same goes for the few interludes where the spotlight falls on piano (chief among them the magnetic — à la "Hunky Dory" — "Lady Of Avenue A"), the absurd gospel-blues-redneck of "Shine Along", and the ideal bridge that, on "So Many Times", links the Manassas creed (Chris Hillman & Stephen Stills) to the grand Americana pastoral of their friends the Jayhawks. The genuine, rustic tonalities remain credible because they never degrade into grotesque caricatures of bluegrass or rockabilly, revealing instead inflections tinged with an always-genuine asceticism. For the Crowes this is also a chance to return to a more spiritual dimension, even if a far cry from the more contagious, expressionist spirituality of The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion: here the overall orientation leans more toward a naive pantheism, celebrating intimate harmony within nature, in an expressive portrayal that could have taught more than a lesson in sincerity to the by-now scattered troops of the New Weird America. With this record the former Atlanta bad boys prove themselves to be truly beyond anything they had done before. They pick up from Warpaint, develop it and surpass it in agility, opening up countless new paths before themselves, without settling on any single one of them so as not to rule anything out in their bold exploration. It may seem, depending on how you look at it, strange or inevitable, but it is precisely at the close of their extraordinary artistic journey that the Black Crowes craft their most mature album and the one most free, in the truest sense of the word, from any form of constraint.

Not content with that, in August 2010 the Georgians scrape the bottom of their own barrel with a new release, Croweology, a double reimagining of some classics from their catalogue in an exclusively acoustic format, once again recorded in the studio with Stacey. Rounding off this considerable self-celebratory effort comes the double tour "Say Goodbye To The Bad Guys", with three-hour shows (half electric, half acoustic) scheduled at the end of that year and the following July, in the United States and Europe respectively. At the end of this pilgrimage, which, as its title suggests, was meant to be final, the group does indeed announce a second indefinite hiatus in its activities. This one, however, lasts only a year or so, interrupted by the release of yet another (and hardly essential) live album, "Wiser For The Time", and by the related new live juggernaut of some thirty dates across the States and the UK, with young Jackie Greene stepping in for the departed Luther Dickinson. Both the second and the third hiatus (the latter beginning in December 2013) prove valuable, if nothing else, for the two Robinsons, each busy with his own side projects: Rich produces and releases his solo sophomore effort "Through A Crooked Sun" in late 2011 (followed by "The Ceaseless Sight" in 2014), while his older brother takes the time to launch a new outfit, the Chris Robinson Brotherhood (with bandmate MacDougall and the most dependable of Ryan Adams's foot soldiers, Neal Casal), who put out a couple of albums in 2012 ("Big Moon Ritual" and "The Magic Door") and a third ("Phosphorescent Harvest") in the spring of 2014.

The flagship band's dormant phases have by now become routine, and no one would dream of giving any more credence to the announcements of a break-up, fired off almost like clockwork by the two Atlanta rockers. The tone of the most recent statement, however, released by an embittered Rich this past January 15th, seems to leave no room for misunderstanding, and it crushes fans' remaining hopes, bringing up absurd financial demands (and a certain tyrannical streak of madness) on the singer's part: "I love my brother and I respect his talent, but his current demands — that I give up my equal share in the band, and that our longtime drummer Steve Gorman surrender 100% of his share, effectively reducing him to a mere hired hand — are not something I can accept". Anyone who has loved the Black Crowes across the twenty-five years of their incredible career can only feel the same way he does, dismayed by such a bleak ending.

Assuming, that is, it really is an ending…

In the end, the Black Crowes' hiatus didn't last that long. The band was put on pause in 2015 by brothers and founding members Chris and Rich Robinson over financial disagreements. Peace arrived as early as 2019, in fact, with a televised announcement of a celebratory tour honoring the evergreen Shake Your Money Maker, the 1990 record that marked the black crows' arrival on the scene with their filthy, sensual, Southern-fried blues rock.

But it was in 2024 that the biggest surprise came, just as the band was gearing up to celebrate its 40th anniversary: the announcement of album number 10, Happiness Bastards.

Released a few months ahead of the album, the single "Wanting And Waiting" revealed just how eager the brothers were to have fun like in the old days, riding their beloved rock'n'roll with cascades of hard rock riffs and winking lyrics. The whole thing polished up a bit more than usual, at times perhaps a little too much so.

By far the best tracks of the bunch, with their punchy riffs and piano reinforcements, are the two opening songs, "Bedside Manners" and "Rats And Clowns", which immediately reassure us about the Atlanta band's good form. Further on, the blistering "Dirty Cold Sun" strikes with its insistent guitar rhythms, and "Bleed It Dry" delivers a blues harmonica swoon straight out of the deep American South tradition.

After a parade of Stonesy backing vocals, searing, penetrating solos and old-school grooves, Happiness Bastards closes out with a lunar ballad titled "Kindred Friend". It's the fitting end to an album with no interest in dazzling us with modern gimmicks or chasing the mirage of a new timeless classic, but one that fully achieves the goal it set for itself: delivering a handful of well-crafted songs that justify the band's return and let fans once again savor that familiar warmth.

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