Musicians gain the respect of their peers through one of three methods: being recognised for a musical innovation; building up an extensive catalogue; or employing a lot of them.
Black, now 41 and with a growing family to support, has managed all three. His twelfth solo album since first dissolving the Pixies was partly recorded in epic 24- hour sessions, an enormous cast of players swapping places around him.
Such extreme methods might lead the listener to expect a more eyeballs-out record than this sprawling double album. But this patchy, yet often excellent set teeters on the edge of politeness rather than insanity. There is plenty to enjoy, though, from the jaunty country-jazz of If Your Poison Gets You to the dreamlike In the Time of My Ruin, which rhymes “curator” with “date her” and is built around a smartly played circular bassline. The transformation of Ewan McColl’s Dirty Old Town into a blues track shifts it successfully from Salford to the United States. Johnny Barleycorn brings an E Street Band treatment to an ancient legend, putting it somewhere between blue collar and redneck, while The End of the Summer sounds positively French.
This is a well-played collection — unsurprisingly, given that the credits include veterans such as Steve Cropper, Steve Ferrone, David Hood, Carol Kaye and Chester Thompson, none of whom turned up because they admired the soft-loud sound that Black popularised with the Pixies. But this is not a case of a nervous if talented musician leaning on a small band of skilful old lags, rather of a man allowing his sound to be actively shaped by his collaborators.
Yet Black is surely as legendary as his employees. Whether the audience that grew up hearing him scream will be seduced by his mellow emulations of supposed legends is debatable. Aping Nick Cave or Leonard Cohen is one thing — country-rock has long been the refuge of the former scoundrel — but at times Black starts to morph into Van Morrison, especially on the horrible Elijah.
The revived Pixies are still going, so should Black get the urge to start hollering again he knows where to go. He has been accused of it before, rather rudely, but currently Black really can have his cake and eat it.
(Cooking Vinyl)