Black Rebel Motor Cycle Club has always come across to me as a band forged of the times and musically-reared on the tension of a dodgy post-90’s soundscape. It feels as though the “indie” enthusiast has been forced to hike the hype-riddled trails from one band to the next—or worse yet one “New Seattle” to the next soon-to-be overly rent-laden city after another. Where these waves of press, blog-induced fanfare, and over saturation are quick to disappear each year, BRMC is proving their credibility and staying power with Baby 81.
Fusing the components of their first two fuzz and echo-laden releases—2001’s B.R.M.C. and 2003’s Take Them On, On Your Own, as well as the blues/country/gospel of their ambitious and oft-overlooked record Howl—BRMC puts their past “buzz” and inner-turmoil (the band was dropped from Virgin Records in 2004) where their collective ability is in an album that simply demonstrates their capacity for outweighing the bands they emerged with, and the labels or comparisons they were saddled with. The guitar on Took Out A Loan raucously cuts through Fender amps and clouds of cigarette smoke giving way to the strong-armed drumming and pulse of Berlin and the understated, straightforward momentum, of Weapon Of Choice. The seamlessness of Baby 81’s track listing quickly establishes a trim and concise approach to their songwriting and self-production, but the album also allots for moments that you wouldn’t necessarily expect.
Songs like Windows and Not What You Wanted incorporate piano and acoustic based compositions respectively, and juxtapose these elements against a more restrained reverb/wall of echo backdrop, which BRMC seemingly staked their reputation on five or six years ago. It’s Baby 81’s midpoint, 666 Conducer, which yields the album’s highlight—a Howl ready Americana groove with barroom vocal delivery and delayed guitar wails building towards the end. By the time the last song, Am I Only, comes around the pompousness of it’s crescendo from simple acoustic strumming to strings, drum pounding, distorted guitars, bells (and I think even horns), almost feels misplaced on the album simply because of the blue-collar attentiveness to continuity and rock n’ roll rhythms.
Black Rebel Motor Cycle Club is a band that anyone familiar with their music has probably already made up their minds about. The aim of Baby 81 doesn’t come off as an attempt to necessarily change your mind or prove anyone wrong. And that’s what is especially refreshing about it: It’s a band playing exactly what they want, most likely for themselves, and it allowing for the breathing room that is becoming increasingly difficult to attain in a stifling musical scene. |