Howl - Black Rebel Motorcycle Club [2005]
Where the hell did this come from?
After two albums with good singles but on the whole worthy of the description 'not bad', a pretty decent but by no means special rock band suddenly delved deep into their hearts, found their inner blues, which I don't think anyone thought existed in them, and pulled out a bloody stunner of a record. As I said: where the hell did this come from?
The title says it all. Howl is raw to the core. It's a cry of justice, injustice and misery. It's, well, a howl.
I'm born and weary but life's just begun
And I've run from the reasons and roamed to the gun
They say I'm the killer and thy will be done
And the doors won't be open when I finally become
And I've seen the battle and I've seen the war
And the life out here is the life I've been sold
The best moments come in the number of acoustic tracks that simply bleed soul. These are not just quiet remedies for those bored of the relentlessly happy, but whole tragic worlds created in a three-minute guitar lick (the drummer and bassist have very much been given leave for this album). Restless Sinner is particularly good, while Devil's Waitin', quoted above, is no less than haunting.
It could be said there's a lack of invested feeling in observant third-person ballads such as Restless Sinner - though I don't agree; it's a brilliant song with wonderful guitar work - but that never hurt Dylan, and if it's personal emotion you want, look no further than Fault Line. With copious amounts of harmonica, that most underrated of instruments, and a refrain of "Racing with the rising tide to my father's door", it's really quite moving.
But it's not all one-paced: Shuffle Your Feet, all handclaps and bottleneck guitar, and Ain't No Easy Way, one of the few indie singles of late to feature an instrumental mouth organ chorus, raise the tempo and are both absolute stompers in their own right. They provide a perfectly judged antidote to the bittersweet laments of the rest of the album's noose-fearing gospel.
It is, quite literally given their previous guitar anthem dreams, an incredible modern blues album.
And yet no one else seems to think so. From the universally acclaimed Since I Left You yesterday to the largely deplored Howl today, it's a bit of a fall. But I don't care.
This is gem of an album. What a shame that as soon as they could, BRMC went back to their old rocky road. But at least we are left with this - Howl.
No Spotify link because Spotify doesn't have this album. It's all on YouTube, though - give it a listen.