Larkin Poe – Blood Harmony (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 42:27 minutes | 837 MB | Genre: Rock, Blues Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Tricki-Woo Records
The latest full-length from Larkin Poe, Blood Harmony is a whole-hearted invitation into a world they know intimately, a Southern landscape so precisely conjured you can feel the sticky humidity of the warm summer air. In bringing their homeland to such rich and dazzling life, Georgia-bred multi-instrumentalist sisters Rebecca and Megan Lovell fortify their storytelling with a rock and blues-heavy sound that hits right in the heart, at turns stormy and sorrowful and wildly exhilarating.Since pivoting from bluegrass and renaming themselves after their four-times-great-grandfather—a cousin of Edgar Allen Poe—Rebecca and Megan Lovell have turned up the electric guitars and found their place in the blues rock/jam band world. What keeps them from being another Allman Brothers knockoff is talent. Both are accomplished multi-instrumentalists who have the added magic of sibling harmonies. Rebecca’s songwriting continues to improve, and Megan’s mastery of lap steel and resonator guitar gives their music an authenticity uncommon in the jam universe. Add to all that a quiet worship of the Black Keys whose infamous crash and bash theory of the blues has obviously rubbed off on the sisters. Here on their sixth full-length album, Larkin Poe work the blues rock groove hard, most impressively on the quiet and evocative closer, “Lips as Cold as Diamond.” Recorded at Bell Tone Recording and The Lily Pad by Roger Alan Nichols and Tyler Bryant (who is married to Rebecca), the duo’s loud-soft dynamics are fleshed out by, among others, bassist Tarka Layman, drummers Kevin McGowan and Caleb Crosby, and Bryant on programming and keyboards. Blood Harmony’s opening track, “Deep Stays Down,” begins with just lap steel, drums, and vocals before eventually bursting into what the Lovells are now: a full-blown rock act complete with roaring guitars and Rebecca in full wail. Her passion and grit fit alongside Grace Potter or Susan Tedeschi, and she’s become expert at singing her lyrics’ increasingly clever moments, as in the lead track, “The cat’s in the bag/ The bag’s in the river/ And the river runs deep/ And the deep stays down.” In “Georgia Off My Mind,” these Georgia natives eat a peach, drink a Coca-Cola and spin Ray Charles records before mournfully leaving for their new home in Nashville where, “I’m trading my sweet and lonesome pines/ For a rhinestone studded sky.” They up the tempo for a rocked up “Kick the Blues” where Rebecca convincingly cries, “Gimme a shout, gimme a scream/ You gotta shovel the coal if you wanna make steam.” Talented, focused, and serious about their future, these sisters bring a welcome new energy to jamming blues rock. – Robert Baird
Tracklist:
1-1. Larkin Poe – Deep Stays Down (03:19)
1-2. Larkin Poe – Bad Spell (03:15)
1-3. Larkin Poe – Georgia Off My Mind (03:54)
1-4. Larkin Poe – Strike Gold (03:20)
1-5. Larkin Poe – Southern Comfort (03:47)
1-6. Larkin Poe – Bolt Cutters & The Family Name (03:15)
1-7. Larkin Poe – Blood Harmony (04:05)
1-8. Larkin Poe – Kick the Blues (03:26)
1-9. Larkin Poe – Might as Well Be Me (05:10)
1-10. Larkin Poe – Summertime Sunset (05:09)
1-11. Larkin Poe – Lips as Cold as Diamond (03:42)
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