Album Review:Them Crooked Vultures

By Captain Pownzor
Staff Blogger

Well here we go; I sat down and just listened to probably the most anticipated album of the year.
Them Crooked Vultures come on so strong it feels like prom night, with in the first 5 songs, I’m ready to go alllllll the way. No One Loves You and neither do I has one of the coolest riffs I’ve heard in decades.
But upon cracking the 6th song of this long anticipated 13 track epic, I realize the fun machine eventually had to take a shit and die.
Much like that typical drunken prom night the band starts to slow down and each track further feels like it’s a little more Jamband quality.
There are really good elements to the songs toward the middle, Reptiles is cool as shit, but it just doesn’t seem to have the same level of WOW potential as the tracks did out of the gate.
Then we are presented with the song Interlude with Ludes. That literally is the song, in continuing again with my prom metaphor, that makes the perfect soundtrack to your heaving your pricey dinner out of every orifice in the bathroom. It’s just a blurry intermission.
Luckily then comes “Warsaw or the first breath you take after you give up”. This is the second wind folks; wipe that filth off your tuxedo and get back in there. Things heat up and the tracks get sexier (Warsaw), Experimental(Caligulove) and Darker (Gunman). The gents then finish up strong with “Spinning in Daffodils“, which ends up taking off into something so spectacular by the end your transported right back to after prom, in the back of your mothers station wagon where you made tender love to your high school sweetheart for what seemed like hours.
The album may not be fully what some would expect, some in fact may feel much like your high school sweetie that night, greatly disappointed. There was a lot of really high expectations for this album, which to be fair is completely justified. I will say there are tracks on this album that are some of the best songs I have heard in years.
Them Crooked Vultures have saved my play list for a bit. However, as a full album I know there are a lot of songs I am going to skip. There is stuff that sounds a ton like Queens, stuff that has a real classic rock and blues feel to it. There is a new entity here but I don’t know if its going to save music. It is certainly a turning point for the music industry, Perhaps it might cause a shift in focus back to a more primitive form of melding Classic and New rock and roll. I can only be thankful.
It is on the cusp of release and I cannot wait to hear more from Them Crooked Vultures.

You can stream the whole damn album before the Nov 17th Release on Them Crooked Vultures Youtube account playlist.