Night Beats - Myth Of A Man on CD

Description

Fronted by Texan native Danny Lee Backwell, Myth Of A Man is Night Bets fourth studio album, and their second for Heavenly Recordings following the release of Who Sold My Generation in 2016. While Blackwell has always fed off the musical legacy of his Texas roots-Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators, The Red Krayola, The Black Angels and more paving the way for the napalm-coated psych-rock headtrip of past albums-Myth Of A Man has him pulling from the surrogate wellspring of Nashville, Tennessee. It was there that he worked with the eminent Dan Auerbach, and a murderer's row of battle-worn session musicians-the combined weight of experience that comes from working with every legend from Aretha Franklin to Elvis not lost on Blackwell. "I was just humbled by being accepted," he explains, "Big hearts all around." In short, it's an album that holds its own next to the classics, less of the bloodshot acid trip of Sonic Bloom (2013) and Who Sold My Generation (2016) here, Blackwell has recalibrated them, slowed them down just enough and allowed them the space to breathe and exist as something new. It's the same book, just a different chapter. The moody organ comps and slow stroll of the 12-string on "Her Cold Cold Heart" evoke the noxious feeling and hypnotic state of toxic love, the spirit of Bill Withers is flowing through the acoustic guitar and sun-soaked shuffle of "I Wonder," and string-trimmed ballads like "Footprints" and "Too Young To Pray" evoke the imaginative, cowboy psychedelia of fellow Texan, Lee Hazlewood. "Let Me Guess" with its searing riff and Elevators-esque organ assures us that the scuzzy sound we know and love is alive and well, while "One Thing," a song about being used and abused-or as Blackwell sharply puts it, "being rolled up and smoked"-has plenty of fuzzed-out guitars to let us know he might just be happy about it.

TRACKS

Her Cold Cold Heart
One Thing
Stand with Me
There She Goes
(Am I Just) Wasting My Time
Eyes on Me
Let Me Guess
Footprints
I Wonder
Too Young to Pray