Published on Apr 25, 1998
The Black Crowes’s success can be summed up in a simple
sentence: They were in the right place at the right time.
When their debut album
Shake Your Moneymaker came out in 1990, it provided a slap
in the face to the stagnating rock sound. Southern rock was back,
it had lost little of the boogie, and it even had gained a new
sense of introspection – all while being a touch trippy-hippie and
mysterious. It was exactly what the scene needed.
Brothers Chris and Rich Robinson (on vocals and guitars,
respectively) were a definite yin-yang duo on the lines of Ray and
Dave Davies of The Kinks: creative as all get-out, but as explosive
as nitroglycerine. Drummer Steve Gorman, bassist Johnny Colt and
second guitarist Jeff Cease rounded out the group – and were just
as pivotal in creating the sound that put the Crowes on the
map.
It takes guts to cover such an r&b classic as Otis Redding’s
“Hard To Handle” – and it takes talent to outdo the original. This
version makes me want to get up and dance every time I hear it (but
I can’t stand the alternate version I occasionally hear on the
radio with the horns added).
Of course, the other songs that are now well-grounded in radio
are still exciting to hear. “Twice As Hard” is a great way to kick
off the album, building from the guitar line into a crescendo of
the whole band, topped with Chris Robinson’s
occasionally-unrecognizable vocals. Thing is, it works – and it
works well. “Jealous Again” is a rolling number that sucks you into
the beat and doesn’t let go. And “She Talks To Angels” is a
surprisingly powerful ballad that seems to explore a darker picture
than the lyrics originally suggest – the imagery is especially
powerful.
But although 40 percent of
Shake Your Moneymaker has already been played to death on
radio, there still are many other good performances that have yet
to be truly “discovered” in the same way. “Seeing Things” is an
almost spiritual ballad that always struck me as one of the better
songs on the album, while “Sister Luck” is a track that should have
been a strong indicator of what we could have expected from the
band’s next release. Even the balls-out rocker “Thick N’ Thin” has
a lot of charm to it.
Sure, there are a few songs that don’t hold their water as well,
like the album’s closer “Stare It Cold” – but these are few and far
between.
The biggest complaint I have with
Shake Your Moneymaker is that it’s very much a mood album –
that is, whether you’re going to like it or not changes daily. Some
days I’ll pick this one up and barely be able to stand it, but most
days I feel as positive as everything I’ve said so far. If you find
that you’re just not getting into the whole vibe, best advice is to
put it down for a few days, then try it again.