Review by Maeve
Meet the band:
Charlie Starr – Vocals, Guitar, Pedal Steel, and Banjo
Richard Turner – Bass Guitar & Vocals
Paul Jackson – Guitar & Vocals
Brandon Still – Piano & Organ
Brit Turner – Drums & Percussion
For the past few years Blackberry Smoke, Georgia based southern rockers have gained a wide fan base while touring with every big name in southern rock and with their own headlining shows. Building an audience the old-fashioned way by relentless touring — around 250 shows a year! The band came up on the same circuit as fellow Georgian (and now country music star) Zac Brown, who recently signed Blackberry Smoke to his record label and released its third full-length studio album, The Whippoorwill.
On The Whippoorwill, Blackberry Smoke revisits the classic paradox of life in a small American town, the concurrent desires to stay and go, the conflicting feelings of loyalty and hopelessness, and the realization that giving up your own dreams might mean that your kids have a chance at a brighter future. The sound is still very similar to their earlier work, but this time they sound a bit heavier and darker than before. At the same time, the production is more varied and a bit cleaner and smoother.
Musically the band is very much its own influence. Sure the Allman Brothers leave their mark, but Smoke’s major thrust is country music of the Jimmie Rodgers sort, had Rodgers played an overdriven Telecaster with a hard rhythm section. The double barrel attack of guitarists/vocalists Charlie Starr and Paul Jackson, effecting a harmony circa Jagger/Richards, 1972 and a twin guitar attack that is not so much Allman/Betts as…well, Starr/Jackson. Brad Paisley and Keith Urban can only hope to play this brand of country guitar. Brandon Still’s keyboards are not those of the Black Crowes’ Eddie Harsch’s take on the Faces’ Ian McLagan but that of Jerry Lee Lewis by way of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Billy Powell pounding out “Call Me The Breeze.” This band is the total package.
It’s obvious that Blackberry Smoke appreciates what they have accomplished. The Whippoorwill, from beginning to end, weaves together the perfect balance of ballads and up-tempo rockers, with a mixture of their eclectic sound that includes hints of so many different genres. Their growing fan base, that mainly up to this point has been by word of mouth or catching them as an opener for acts such as Zac Brown Band and The Marshall Tucker Band, should get exponentially bigger if people are willing to give them a chance. You’re not going to hear these guys on country radio just yet as they’re not blatantly singing about trucks, mama, or girls in sun dresses and as fans know, country radio isn’t very accepting to newcomers who don’t fit into the mainstream, but these guys deserve to be heard.
TRACK LISTING:
01. Six Ways to Sunday
02. Pretty Little Lie
03. Everybody Knows She’s Mine
04. One Horse Town
05. Ain’t Much Left of Me
06. The Whippoorwill
07. Lucky Seven
08. Leave A Scar
09. Crimson Moon
10. Ain’t Got the Blues
11. Sleeping Dogs
12. Shakin’ Hands with the Holy Ghost
13. Up the Road
