The
Palladium Ballroom
Dallas, Texas
November 21, 2008
By Ron Dempesmeier
Encore:
Cold, Rain And Snow
On an unusually cold evening in
Dallas, the Black Crowes brought some typically hot rock to the
audience. The band proved they are not going to be pigeonholed
as just a “Classic Rock” act content to play their hits from
over 15 years ago. Their set featured 6 songs from their latest
release, Warpaint. Luckily, this is the best album the
Black Crowes have released since 1994, so the songs went over
very well in concert.
Conspicuous in their absence
were hits like “Jealous Again”, “Hard To Handle” and the ballads
“She Talks To Angels” and “Thorn In My Pride”. Probably the
best know song of the evening to a casual fan would have been
“Remedy”. The Black Crowes vary their set lists widely in their
tours and they have become somewhat akin to bands like the
Grateful Dead and Little Feat who played as much for themselves
and the sheer enjoyment of making music as for the audience.
The band opened with the
inspirational “Wounded Bird” which asks the subject to stop
looking back at his regrets and “set your mind to fly.” This
was followed by syncopated hard rockers “A Conspiracy” and
“Horsehead” which were played with punchy abandon. That led
into a bluesy “Walk Believer Walk”. Lead singer Chris Robinson
got to demonstrate his harmonica skills on “Good Friday”.
The band is also well known for
covering songs from their 60s/70s heroes and this evening they
started with the Bonnie Bramlett and Eric Clapton song “Don’t
Know Why”. They also did the lovely Dillard & Clark ballad
“Polly” by Gene Clark (also of The Byrds fame and one of the
forefathers of Country Rock).
The band went into a quieter
set of music when drummer Steve Gorman came to the front of the
stage to play a hand drum and guitarist Rich Robinson strummed a
twelve string acoustic for the raga influenced “Whoa Mule”. “Oh
Josephine” from Warpaint has become the beautiful ballad
that matched “She Talks To Angels” in the hearts of the audience
tonight. The band definitely stretched it out and gave it a
grand finish.
One of the older songs
performed was “My Morning Song” which was about as whiplash,
hard rocking as the Black Crowes got. This song was a guitar
bonanza with plenty of chances for Rich Robinson and Luther
Dickinson to exchange 6 string salvos. This was followed by
“Movin’ On Down The Line” which starts out with the feel good
vibe of “It’s all right brother, it’s all right sister” and
mines a groovy psychedelic vein of music.
“Goodbye Daughters Of The
Revolution” proved that the band could also kick out a good time
rocker in the same style as The Faces. The encore was a
traditional song called “Cold, Rain And Snow” which was played
at many a Grateful Dead show. It was an appropriate song for
the climate outside, but inside the Palladium the good vibes of
the show warmed the crowd.
