RICH ROBINSON
THROUGH A CROOKED SUN
RELEASED October 2011
Tracklisting:
01 – Gone Away
02 – It’s Not Easy
03 – Lost And Found
04 – I Don’t Hear The Sound Of You
05 – Hey Fear
06 – All Along The Way
07 – Follow You Forever
08 – Standing On The Surface Of The Sun
09 – Bye Bye Baby
10 – Falling Again
11 – Station Man
12 – Fire Around
Taking more of a singer songwriter approach perhaps than on his debut –‘Paper’, Rich Robinson has taken the Black Crowes’ ‘indefinite hiatus’ to come up with an album that seeks to balance the current fascination with Americana with some nice laid back blues.
Opener ‘Gone Away’ is a song that grows on you with its incessant refrain and nice guitar. It’s not a statement of intent just a fine song, but strangely low key for an opening shot, but then I guess Rich is to a degree playing to his audience which will undoubtedly contain a majority of Crowes’ fans. After that one song it should be minds set to rest…
Don’t expect an album that sounds like the latest Black Crowes releases though this is something a little more immediate: from the nice languid atmospherics of “It’s Not Easy” and it’s wonderful guitar tone to the acoustic and beautiful water-filled simplicity of “I Don’t Hear The Sound of You”.
Rich’s vocals here are impressive and far from workmanlike, there’s a nice quality to his voice and a real lived-in quality to the songs which sound like they have lived and breathed. On “Hey Fear” he perhaps sounds most like his brother in his phrasing – it’s a song that you could easily see on a Crowes album.
One of my favourites is the tranquil “All Along The Way” – just close your eyes and drift away to this one… The introspective “Follow You Forever” is another track of depth and beauty. The only real mystery is not why a Fleetwood Mac cover on here - "Station Man' is a fine song, but rather why it is a note for note facsimile of the original.
The Crowes may be temporarily “pining for the fjords” as Monty Python might say but the spirit is alive here. Well worth reaching into the wallet for…
by Mark Diggins
