Детали релиза : Larkin Poe - Bloom (2025) [FLAC (tracks)]

Album review

The Lovell sisters, Rebecca on electric guitar and lead vocals, and Megan on lap steel, dobro and harmony vocals, have carved out quite a niche for their brand of power blues rock. Their eighth studio album, Bloom, rocks even hard with its larger, more in-your-face sound. Megan Lovell's lap steel has become more accomplished and Rebecca's full-throated yowl is consistently soulful and convincing—Delaney & Bonnie, Susan Tedeschi, and Bonnie Raitt all come to mind at various moments when she sings. Larkin Poe may be from Georgia, which they frequently sing about—as they do on the tuneful "Nowhere Fast" —but many of their moves come straight out of heavy Texas blues rock. The veneration the sisters hold for ZZ Top has been apparent since the band's beginning. In "Nowhere Fast" they follow a Billy Gibbons-in-"Beer Drinkers & Hell Raisers" model, opening with "We got just enough gas to get into trouble/ Just enough trouble to start a reputation/ Just enough torque to get the world shakin'" before slamming the pedal to the metal: "Cool whippin' like it's Saturday night/ Cool whippin' gonna push that light/ Cool whippin' gonna kick that ass." All the songs were written by the sisters, assisted by Rebecca's husband guitarist Tyler Bryant, who also engineered, produced, and played bass, electric guitar and 12-string guitar on Bloom. Despite all the full-on electric guitar crunch on the album, it's clear that more focus has been placed on the songwriting. Crafty, reflective lyrical passages are scattered throughout, like in "You Are The River," where the volume comes down so the words can resonate: "The sand in the oyster, the pressure on the coal/ The sum of the parts is greater than the whole/ Chain of reactions, a butterfly's wing/ My hand holding yours to form another link." And in "Little Bit," the Lovells demonstrate how much of life's lessons they've absorbed, tossing out bits of wisdom like, "can't put a price on peace of mind" and "more ain't always more."

© Robert Baird/Qobuz