Gig review: The Black Crowes, Academy, Glasgow

SOUTHERN rockers the Black Crowes have recently ended a two-year hiatus. One of their first acts has been to release a live album, another to embark on this tour.

The Black Crowes

Academy, Glasgow

****

Being an old-fashioned rootsy rock’n’roll band, with an old-fashioned rootsy rock’n’roll sound, gigging is their lifeblood. There is no new material to promote, only their love of playing to celebrate.

The musicians gathered around the Robinson brothers – frontman Chris and lead guitarist Rich – have changed over the 20 years since they enjoyed their biggest hits, but there was a seamless consistency to their warm, inviting set.

Even though there were the indulgences that tend to come with blues rock, nothing felt particularly forced. Squealing solos and boogie breakdowns sustained rather than punctured the atmosphere, while with every soulful utterance, Chris Robinson sent a reminder that, in his own rather casual way, he was born to do it. Occasionally it seemed a little too easy – Soul Singing felt like a jam that had yet to be fleshed out into a song.

Robinson was complemented along the way with some fine ensemble harmonising and controlled firepower in a set that encompassed the acoustic setting of She Talks To Angels, quaint bluegrass ditty The Garden Gate, gospel infusion Sometimes Salvation and the infectious rhythm’n’blues groove of Otis Redding’s Hard To Handle, which bled into a cover of Billy Joe Royal’s Hush before making its way back home. It may all have been familiar fare, but it still felt fresh.