Evil Urges
Year by year, album by album, My Morning Jacket have slowly been raising their profile as leaders of the so-called roots revival. Marathon shows across the country have solidified their reputation as one of the country's premier live acts, aided by a four hour midnight show at this year's Bonnaroo and a New Years Eve show at Madison Square Garden sure to be just as epic. Throughout their ten years, songwriter Jim James has led them from alt-country to electro-funk, and they indulge both directions on their fifth release, Evil Urges.
Their 2005 release Z shocked some fans with its electronic tendencies, veering the five-piece towards slow-burning dance music. Evil Urges shows a return to their rootsy roots, but gives even the most country-ish elements a set of balls missing from all their flannel-shirted peers. Though "Thank You Too" sounds like the final slow song at the annual barn dance, building strings and a lengthy guitar solo keep the Nashville schlock factor at bay. Some quirky acoustic plucking helps narrate "Librarian," a love song recalling the days when people actually read books, as the "take off those glasses, let down your hair for me" come-ons recall every bookworm stereotype from The Music Man to She's All That. Though he mentions the "interweb," James seems content to be stuck around the turn of the century ? the old one ? with homespun yarns that meander along, never getting lost because they don't seem to have any destination.
Not all syrup and good-old-boy pickin', the album's heavier sides tie the band to Black Sabbath as much as The Byrds. "Remants" is a hard rock riff dictionary, while the opening reverb chords of "Two Halves" are sure to shatter your subwoofer. With a drummer who plays in constant solo mode, and a guitarist who's not content to let his swirling lines stay buried, the tension between the rock-out and swing-along tendencies of the music give it a unique edge. Because when the Lynyrd Skynyrd riffs give way to the Marvin Gaye singing, the metal comparisons end. No matter how heavy a song may seem, when Jim James' falsetto soars in, even the crunchiest tracks become beautiful. In the out-there "Highly Suspicious" he sounds so natural hitting those high notes that the James-Brown-on-steroids funk of the song mixes in with even the most warbling ballads.
If the album has an Achilles' heel, it's that with fourteen tracks the merely-good ones pale in comparison to the great. When pre-released on the band's website, the title track seemed a top-notch return to country-rock form. In the context of the long album, however, it seems to take almost six minutes to say what could have been done in two and a half. And though it sounds very pretty, the "I see trees of green" rewrite "I'm Amazed" ? where James lists all the things that amaze him ? wears thin fast. Even with a little fat to trim though, Evil Urges begins another chapter in My Morning Jacket's life, reconciling their various musical inclinations, country and metal with a dash of funk, without losing uniformity of purpose or sound. Though their reputation is building slowly, one gets the sense that's the speed the band is most suited for.