Chris Robinson Brotherhood
Servants Of The Sun MEGAFORCE
California dreaming.
They might share strands of DNA, but these days Robinson brothers Chris and Rich are headed in completely different directions. There’s no denying the might of younger sibling Rich’s band The Magpie Salute, who revel in the pair’s former band The Black Crowes’ lustrous history. Chris, meanwhile, has spent the best part of a decade following his groove to the end of night.
“I load up the van, I drag the amps to the stage, we drive around California going from club to club,” Chris told me in 2011 when the band had just one album Big Moon Ritual, under their belt. They were tied to the West Coast, both geographically and spiritually. A head full of stars and smoke, Robinson’s familiar vocals snaked around the easy drift of their songs, playing tag with the musicians as the notes rose and fell.
Eight years, six full studio albums and two EPs later, the Chris Robinson Band are sounding as honed as it’s likely they’re ever going to be; you get the feeling they might be in is their most cohesive, joyous and beautiful record yet. This record is the crossroads where The Black Crowes meet with Lowell George’s Little Feat – and the results are glorious. Groove, sway, funk, rock guitar… Picture an enhanced Chris Robinson sashaying across a stage, his eyes like opaque glass, and this record is the soundtrack to that leisurely strut. Lyrically too, he’s right on point, and an endless Californian highway rolls by, the sun’s spectral fingers across bare skin, the blue above is cloudless, the towns are minuscule and miles apart.
