Yahoo! Music Album Review

Released on 22/08/05
Label: Echo

News that a white rock band are "returning to their roots" is usually no cause for celebration. Generally, this signals a cynically calculated attempt to align said band with rock's more credible (ie black) origins, a practice perfectly illustrated by U2's press-ganging of BB King into service for their ghastly "Rattle & Hum". Word, then, that Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, overlords of the dark, heavily fuzzed guitar assault, the sweetly narcoleptic vocal harmony and haunted yet urgent intensity had rediscovered the blues and gospel, might reasonably have set alarm bells ringing.

Any panic, however, was premature. Third album "Howl" (named after the famous Alan Ginsberg poem of the same name) represents a rebirth after the band's dismissal by Virgin Records, the battling of addiction problems and the departure of British drummer Nick Jago, which combined to seriously threaten the band's future. With Jago now back on board again, BRMC have scored a third, albeit very different triumph.

On their debut LP of 2002 and its follow-up a year later, the trio wore their Jesus And Mary Chain/Spiritualized influences on their sleeves, but they wore them there right next to their hearts and tapped directly into rock's transcendental power. "Howl" burns with just as much commitment and fervour; it simply burns slower.

Opener, "Shuffle Your Feet" sets the mood with handclaps that suggest the dragging of shackles and tracks the Stone's easy roll back to chain-gang blues/gospel. The Roy Orbison-styled title track shows Peter Hayes' voice for the subtle, soulfully sweet and beautifully emotion-softened instrument it is, but it's his harmonica work that cuts clean through the hammered blues of "Ain't No Easy Way". "Fault Line" is another fine exercise in spare-picked blues, but BRMC go the spooked and lowering way of Will Oldham for the mighty "Restless Sinner", with its talk of ghosts and sickles and crosses.

"Devil's Waitin'", the bluntly-titled "Gospel Song" and "Sympathetic Noose" are the only time BRMC's old obsessions resurface, but it's not hard to imagine the irresistibly languid "Weight Of The World" treated to their familiar wall-of-fur effects. Wild cards are the piano-driven "Promise" ("Hunky Dory"-era Bowie joins a gospel choir) and drone-heavy closer "The Line", which introduces base notes of traditional Celtic song.

"Time won't save our souls," runs Hayes' lament on "Shuffle Your Feet". In the grander scheme of things maybe not, but thankfully, the last two years have likely saved Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's career.

    by Sharon O'Connell