Savoy Brown – Voodoo Moon

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On the inside of the cheap cardboard sleeve of the newest Savoy Brown album, guitarist Kim Simmonds, the only remaining founding member, states “I believe the songs on Voodoo Moon are the best I’ve written since the early ’70s. It is modern blues rock but with more song orientation than normally associated with the genre.” Now aside from blues rock being, and having always been, a song-oriented genre anyway, what Simmonds really means here is it’s a softer album than is usually assoicated with the genre. In fact, there’re so few blues rock songs here, it’s a stretch to consider Voodoo Moon part of the genre at all. Things start in a muscular enough fashion with Shockwaves which, although it might serve to highlight immediately the under-production of the album, rocks along with a nice riff and some great lead guitar. The lack of production punch threatens to hinder things, but the immensive groove of things like Too Much Money, Look At The Sun and Round And Round, are absolutley undeniable – no human listener could possibly resist moving Too Much Money – and the smooth R&B of Natural Man indicates where this album really sits. There always has to be a boogie-woogie blues number as well, apparently, so She’s Got The Heat comes and goes in a largely derivitive but dependably well-executed manner, but generally speaking Voodoo Moon is chilled R&B/soul groove with blues guitar, bookended by genuine rockers Shockwaves and Meet The Blues Head On. While vocalist Joe Whiting is a little rough around the edges, as so many other blues singers are, a couple of tracks enjoy the change of pace which comes with Simmonds own smooth voice, and ultimately perhaps his estimation of the quality of the material here wasn’t too far off the mark.

Written by Andy Lye
More: 2011, Albums, Blues, Quick.Play Reviews, Savoy Brown