The Black Crows - Shake Your Money Maker - 320cbr (Big Papi) $hake She Talks With Angels Hard to Handle

This is an extremely solid debut. There isnt anything particularly revolutionary included here, certainly no groundbreaking progression down uncharted musical avenues. What you buy here is ten perfectly crafted hard rock gems with a pop spin, not a single one of which would sound out of place on nearly any classic 70's rock n roll album you could care to mention.
The Crows play gritty, stomping rock n roll with a swagger and natural approach that other bands would die for, and spend much time trying to emulate with little success. The Stones, Led Zeppelin, Faces, Chuck Berry, early Aersomith....the Crowes wear their influences on their sleeve with pride, and are a better and more acceptable band for it.
'Twice as hard' and 'Jealous again' are two back to back classic openers, suffused with rolicking piano and the southern drawl of Chris Robinson's vocals crooning out the catchy, singalong choruses with gusto.
'Sister Luck and 'Could I've been so blind' take a lighter approach, swaying almost in the breeze and segueing neatly into the emotive 'Seeing things', a song about 'how wonderful it is to fall in love......or maybve it aint about that at all'. An emotional, epic sounding number it remains. The hit single, 'Hard to handle', am Otis Redding cover is marvelously catchy, particularly well executed an played. 'She talks to angels' is a masterful ballad, which Rich purportedly wrote when he was just 16, with a maturity and sense of melody belying his age.
Two rabid rock numbers, 'Struttin blues' and 'Stare it cold' drag the album to a wonderful and fitting conlcusion.
Superb record. The Crowes may have gone on to record more mature, complex and essentially better albums than this, yet the masterful simplicity and inherent likeability of this material makes it a must buy.