August 3, 2000

Live At The Greek

There's no denying this is a work of lickmanship.

7 / 10 Way, way down inside, woman, you need a double CD of tunnel-vision boogie-monster Americans jamming live with the Brit legend of occult axemanship in an attempt to prove that hot licks still cut in in 2001. Well, do you? There's no denying this is a work of lickmanship. Recorded last year in LA, it's an unapologetic licks licking legendary licks affair as the Crowes' Rich Robinson trades brute arpeggios from the Led Zeppelin back catalogue with the man who fingered them first.

There's an immediate plus about the Crowes playing material by their alleged spiritual forefathers in the name of "rock'n'roll for the sake of rock'n'roll" (Chris Robinson). It stops them lapsing into the stoned sleepwalking jams that have marred recent albums. Beyond that, however, the crucial problem for these blue-eyed blues zealots is whether they can shake free of the irony and overkill that surrounds such mythologically weighted and, frankly, old songs.

/img/PageAndBlackCrowes0800.jpg Hey! Yes they can. The opening Zepper 'Celebration Day' sets the tone, coming at you like a rusty helicopter crash. Dirty and raw, with swarms of solos skidding off into ditches, 'Live At The Greek' has the feel of a well-recorded bootleg. Overdubs and gloss are eschewed in favour of messy joie de axe and, though Chris Robinson lacks the full priapic screech of Robert Plant, it's generally pretty stirring.

'The Lemon Song' is given a particularly strong squeeze, verging on the funky; 'Whole Lotta Love' struggles valiantly to stand up out of its 'rock classic' armchair; and even more arcane moments like 'What Is And What Should Never Be', 'Your Time Is Gonna Come' and 'Heartbreaker' kick with a pulse which would not be seemly in the Rock'N'Roll Hall Of Fame. Perhaps the version of the delicate Yardbirds' song 'Shapes Of Things' was inadvisable (murdered), but with Crowes songs coming in at the end and diversions into classic blues covers there's enough variety to keep things interesting.

Snigger at the preposterous male chest-beating that underlies much of the Zep oeuvre if you will, but to argue that it's not worth rolling out these riffs is to accept that the best rap of nowadays should be permanently binned too. Guitar tech album of the year, and a whole lotta irony-trashing fun besides.