Over the course of four albums, Los Angeles-based rockers The Black Rebel Motorcycle Club have traversed a career path that sounds like a rock industry cliché: the impressive debut (self-titled) that garnered critical raves of the “saviors of rock” variety (lately bestowed upon the much less impressive Arctic Monkeys) and favorable comparisons to bands like The Jesus and Mary Chain and Love & Rockets; the “difficult” second album, Take Them On, On Your Own, which didn’t sell and was critically panned, garnering unfavorable comparisons to bands like The Jesus and Mary Chain and Love & Rockets; and the “experimental” third album, Howl, which found the trio reduced to a duo as drummer Nick Jago was mostly AWOL for the sessions, trashing the whole Jesus and Mary Chain smack-rock blueprint in favor of a rootsy, gospel-flavored Americana aesthetic which won over critics and fans alike (and probably saved the band’s career). Another positive development witnessed by this critic was the BRMC’s concerts in support of Howl: initially, a reticent, inward outfit which played in darkness and whose front men (Peter Hayes, guitar and vocals; Robert Levon Been, bass, guitar and vocals) often turned their backs to the audience a la The Velvet Underground and the always cheery Mary Chain, the band’s concerts in 2005-6 saw them evolve into a E-Street Band-styled, audience-pleasing colossus, often playing for over two hours with nary a dull moment along the way (not an easy feat to be sure).

Which takes us up to 2007's Baby 81. So far, the early reviews of the BRMC’s latest are wildly variant, with some critics lamenting the band’s return to the noise of their first two albums, others applauding the very same return, and still others seeing the album as an aesthetic compromise of sorts. However, taken on its own, Baby 81 is a very strong rock album regardless of the band’s history, its main fault – clocking in at over an hour long – being a lack of judicious editing. The rootsy turn taken on Howl is still alive on the new album, but instead of gospel and acoustic blues, the BRMC here look back to 1970s blues-rock, with the opening three tracks, “Took Out A Loan,” “Berlin,” and “Weapon of Choice” powered by some tasty electric slide guitar which suggests that the band listened to some old Billy Gibbons (of Z.Z. Top) and Johnny Winter tracks (yes, there was blues-rock before Jack White, kids!) before the Baby 81 sessions began. In contrast, the poppy, piano-based ballad “Windows” and the breathy, closing “Am I Only” are melodic, Beatle-esque stabs at Britpop, which further deflate the claims by some that the BRMC have merely regressed to their old musical tricks here. Admittedly, a song like “666 Conducer” relies heavily on the swaggering and decadent dark vibes formerly conjured by the Jesus and Mary Chain, but also cops the drumbeat from classic rockers Led Zeppelin’s “When The Levee Breaks” for good measure, and the result is irresistible. Lyrically, the band delivers zen pop-slogans which are as empty or full of meaning as the listener desires – “Suicide’s easy / what happened to the revolution?” (“Berlin”); “I won’t waste my love on a nation” (“Weapon of Choice”) – but which tend to stubbornly stick in the memory either way. Baby 81 only falters in the album’s second half, where songs such as “Lien On Your Dreams” and “Need Some Air” start to sound a little too generic and by-the-numbers, lacking distinction. Ironically, the album’s longest track, ”American X," at nine minutes plus, doesn’t fall into the latter category, as the band stretches out into a neo-psychedelic guitar groove that hypnotizes rather than bores (and which should work a treat in concert).
Overall, then, the BRMC offer a little too much of a mostly good thing on Baby 81, but if it’s true that no-one listens to albums in a linear way any more, listeners can take the task of editing upon themselves as they load their Ipods or program their CD players. However, it’s also true that, in the old-school sense of the album as an artistic artifact, a little more restraint on the part of the band here could have yielded a shorter disc that was damn near perfect. Maybe next time.

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Comments

missjunk says:

Nice post, I find them to be a bit of a hit or miss. I can't seem to grasp them. Though I try really hard. I really like a few of there songs, but most, seem to miss their mark... too bad... great potential....

Posted about 1 year ago | Delete

Hodad says:

I think it is a pretty good CD overall and I am glad they have returned to the previous form. I like the sound...Two Thumbs Up!!

Posted about 1 year ago | Delete

cpetersonart3 says:

I got this CD today and it brought me back to the garage rock that I grew up with in Detroit -late 60's early 70's

great review it got me hooked !!!

Posted about 1 year ago | Delete