CD Odyssey Disc 511: Black Mountain

I raced out of work right at the closing bell so I could get home and watch the Bruins/Leafs game.  Fortunately, my Bruins prevailed 5-2.

Go! Go! Black and Gold!

Disc 511 is…. Black Mountain (Self-Titled)

Artist: Black Mountain

Year of Release: 2004

What’s up with the Cover?  Black mountains.  I guess when you’re starting out you want to keep it simple and make sure the cover evokes something about your band.  Mission accomplished.

How I Came To Know It:  I had discovered this band in 2008 through their second album “In the Future.”  I liked that record so I sought out their earlier self-titled effort shortly thereafter.

How It Stacks Up:  I have three Black Mountain albums which I think is all of them.  Black Mountain has steadily improved, but that means their first record is also their weakest.  I put it third.  Since this is my last Black Mountain review, per CD Odyssey tradition, here’s a quick recap:

1. Wilderness Heart: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 315)
2. In the Future: 3 stars (reviewed way back at Disc 4)
3. Self-Titled: 2 stars (reviewed right here)

Rating:  2 stars

When I first heard Black Mountain it was on the release of their second album and I was pretty excited with what I heard.  People who’d known them longer were less impressed and when I got this album I could see why.

The big thing the Black Mountain detractors tell me is that the band refuses to commit to their sound; that they’ve got too much indie irony in their seventies-tinged hard rock.  As I noted back on my review for “Wilderness Heart” this is a problem that has pretty much been cured by their third album.  On their self-titled debut, however, it is still painfully evident.

In terms of being over-clever the album couldn’t get off to a worse start with “Modern Music.”  Nudging and winking its way through saxophone notes that seem designed to mimic farts, the song wants to inject a Lou Reed feel into the band’s sound, but it just comes off as a Dadaist piece about how modern music is empty and devoid of meaning.  This song proves that point very well – so well it manages to make itself into a hot mess of self-mockery.

At this point I’d be tempted to just sell the damned record (as I did with heinous spinoff project “Lightning Dust”) but fortunately the second track on the album, “Don’t Run Our Hearts Around” is one of the better songs.  Here the band lays down a guitar riff that would’ve been equally at home in 1968 and groove it out.  The band loves the combination of hard licks and soft vocals, and it can be jarring, but on “Don’t Run Our Hearts Around” they get the mixture right, and deliver a post-sixties psychedelic rock song that sounds fresh for the oughts.

Amber Webber’s bewitching voice was the siren’s call that led me to the tepid waters of “Lightning Dust,” but unlike that record, in Black Mountain it is used mostly in the cause of good.  Co-lead vocalist Stephen McBean also sings well on the album.  If anything I could have used more of their voices carrying the melody and less weird sounds that seemed to be added for the sake of effect.  These weird sounds are OK on “Druganaut” where the subject matter makes them fit, but on other tracks like “No Hits”, they feel superfluous and directionless.

Later on the record, the band returns to the themes already beaten to death in “Modern Music” with “Satisfaction” which deliberately recalls the Rolling Stones, but not in a particularly evocative or interesting way.  With lyrics like:

“’cause everybody likes to claim things

And everybody likes to shame things

And everybody likes to clang bells around.”

the band seems intent to point out that we all like sixties and seventies rock and roll.  However the song doesn’t have a triumphant or unifying feel to this commonality.  Rather they want to talk about what they’re doing, rather than just doing it.

Long drawn out tracks populate the album, but with the exception of the passable “Set Us Free” they didn’t hold my interest.  Moreover they tend to be progressively stacked to the last half of the album, causing the whole record to flag as it approaches the finish line.

I found myself contrasting this album with Jack White’s many projects, which clearly draw on his deep and abiding love for rock and roll history from Robert Johnson all the way to the present.  White’s approach draws you in; Black Mountain’s approach on this record pushes you away, and maybe I’m old fashioned, but that’s not what rock and roll is about.

Five years later, when Black Mountain released “Wilderness Heart” they had found their feet, and the glimpses of their considerable talent that peak through here were finally in full bloom.  It was still a work in progress on their debut.

Best tracks:  Don’t Run Our Hearts Around, Druganaut, Set Us Free