Customer Reviews

By Your Side

5 star:		(62)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(17)
2 star:		(16)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I'm not a long time diehard crowes fan. So I'll save you the overly analytical, tooth comb review. Basically if they had more CD's as consistant and well crafted as this one I would be that long time, diehard fan. Over the years they always had some great songs but I never found a disc that I liked the whole enough to buy. This is the best American rock album I've heard in so long I almost forgot there was real rock n roll bands left anymore. Chris Robinson's melodies are very focused and musical and the guitars and rhythm section are all meat. I read some of the reviews saying they missed the more loose, jammy feel from previous CD's. I personally don't think the Crowes do that too well (leave that to the Allman's and Carlos). I love that this CD is one strong "song" after another and they all are to the point without any unecessary fluf. The backup vocals in the gospel, R&B style give great counterpoint melodies to Chris's lead vocal. Maybe all that matters is like the title of my review says. It hasn't left my CD changer since I first put it in. When "Horsehead" starts your yugo turns into a GTO!! It melts blaring, stoplight hiphop at 20 yards baby! If your sick of buying remastered 70's favorites because there ain't much happening in rock right now, check out this CD and it will renew your faith that there's life after Bonham, Jones and Bolin ceased to be.

P.S I refuse to accept that Appetite for Destruction was meant to be my generations rock revival.

"By Your Side" offers a middle-ground between the meat-and-bones blues and rock 'n roll of their first two albums and the sophisticated songwriting and rhythms of "Amorica." Thus, no matter which album is your favorite of the Crowes, chances are, you will enjoy this album. There is even a good helping of the psychedelic rock from "Three Snakes and One Charm" left over.

Again, the Black Crowes go further to prove they are much more than a simple retro band. Bands like the Rolling Stones and the Faces are definitely huge influences, but has either band ever offered up such funky grooves, or rocked with such soul and energy, as the Crowes do on songs like the musicially inspiring "Virtue and Vice," the groove-filled "Then She Said My Name," or the angry "HorseHead"? And could a simple retro band ever shake things up enough to write with the creativity displayed on the melodic and dreamy "Welcome to the Goodtimes" and the pure funk of "Heavy"? Don't kid yourselves: the Crowes have been forging *new* grounds that *comes* from 70s rock. They have taken this blues rock, merged it with gospel, psychedelia, soul, funk, mashed the layers together, and combined it with class A musicianship to create a sound like no other. On "By Your Side," we see the Crowes pass out of an experimental, but very musically successful stage and begin to embark upon a more mature sound.

despite some of the claims made in prior reviews, this is not their best cd. My guess is that those who say it is have only listened to SYMM. This cd picks up the pace for sure, it is good times rock n' roll, but the lyrics in part are a little shallow, and the band is definitely missing front man marc ford, though Rich does an okay job with the lead guitar. Welcome to the Goodtimes, Virtue and Vice, Go faster, and Kickin my heart around make the cd well worth buying, but if you don't have Amorica (dark and disturbing), or Southern Harmony (the greatest rock album of the 90's), you are missing out. The lyrics and guitars on both are incredible.

I have to admit I'm a recent fan of the Black Crowes and "By Your Side" was their first complete album that I listened to, but not the last. Because of this I album I got everything that they have ever released and I have to say, this one is definately their best. From "By Your side" to "Go Tell the Congregation to "Virtue and Vice" there is not a minute of music on this album that does not rock. I read a biography of the band at the Apple music store and that writer said it best, "This album is Criminally Under-Rated". If you're a Black Crowes fan then you'll love this album.

For starters, The Crowes are an amazing rock n' roll band. Their music is more than welcome considering the severe absence of good rock n' roll these days. As far as By Your Side goes, most people's biggest criticism is that it is too polished. My response to this is that it is important to understand that once a band has been together for as long as these guys have, they naturally get tighter. I don't think this should be mistaken for over-production or anything. And, personally I would not prefer a recording to be sloppy simply so I can say without a doubt that I haven't bought some nice, neat, corporate package. I'd rather trust the musicians. The songcraft on this album is great. The melodies are strong and are not a mere regurgitation of anything else. The guitars are superb and well-driven. Additionally, there are alot of classic Crowe-isms, keeping an identifiable element of consistency with their other records. Also, you can listen to this album the whole way through; every song is awesome. This album rocks, pure and simple, and is a must have.

I absolutely loved this album when it came out. To me it was the most exciting thing we had heard from this great band in over 6 years. After the first two albums, I found "Amorica" too experimental and "Three Snakes And a Charm" a slight improvement but a bit slow in spots. This effort just gets back to basics--both for the Crowes in particular and rock and roll in general.

Sure, there are none of the understated drawn-out, experimental sounds that the music critics who hate melodic rock music like. And that's what's so great about it. I wouldn't want each of their albums to sound just like this, but at the time (a time when grunge was mercifully beginning to die but when boy bands were truly taking over the popular music universe) this release hit the spot. For sure, it still does.

"Kickin' My Heart Around" was the first single released--and I was instantly pumped when I first heard it. A catchy, rocking song with attitude. The title track and "Only A Fool" were other tracks that I heard on the radio--both very endearing anthems with great background vocals. Other standout tracks include the opener "Go Faster", the closer "Virtue and Vice", and "Heavy". Just an amazingly catchy overall effort that is so refreshing to hear in this day and age. I like the Crowes' latest album "Lions" almost as much, as it continues the interesting evolutionary process of this band's music. But for sure, no rock album hit the spot more than this one at the time it came out.

If it were any other band, I'd probably rate this higher, but my boys just took a bad turn. I don't know what Chris was thinking when he wrote these lyrics. How he went from the poetic "Girl From a Pawnshop" off of Three Snakes to "Heavy" and "Kickin' My Heart Around" is beyond me. He used to write the best words. Also, the album has too much noise; if they've completely changed their style, I don't like it. Hopefully, they were just trying to get their name known again, and they'll go back to their good stuff from now on.

I'm a huge Crowes fan. Southern Harmony is by far their best album (I'd put it up next to the Stones or Zep in terms of all time rock albums), but this one just doesn't do it for me. Yeah, it's alright (and long overdue), but these guys really rocked when they had a little more hippie-dippie action going for 'em. I say get Marc Ford to deal with whatever he's got going on and get him back in action ripping those Allman's-esque riffs like it's nobody's business.

My advice to the Crowes: Get on it and Spark one up!

Being a native of Atlanta, and being a sucker for good hooks, wailing vocals, and attitude-laced rock-and-roll, I hustled out to my local entertainment superstore to purchase the new Black Crowes album. On the way back home, I pumped it through my stereo, and imagined how little this record would change if Mick Jagger had sung vocals. Yes, I like Chris Robinson's voice a lot, but the whole record is so....so....STONES. Ever since I bought the record, I haven't been able to shake the scenario: record company execs saunter up to the Crowes and tell them, "hey, all they ever play on the radio is "Hard to Handle" and "Twice as Hard". Why don't you boys do more of that?" Well, they did. This record parallels "Shake Your Money Maker" closely. It's more of the bar room, pool table, late-night kind of rock and roll that they made originally on SYMM. And I don't particularly care for it. My favorite Crowes albums are "Amorica" for its rawness, its soul, and its damn-the-torpedoes attitude, and "Southern Harmony" for they way it paints a picture in my mind of sickness, diesase, and moral depravity. They were taking CHANCES back then, and I for one enjoyed it. "Gone" and "High Head Blues" are two of my favorite Crowes moments. On these two records, it didn't seem as though they were purposefully trying to shake the whole "Stones" moniker, but the music on these two albums showed a band ready to move on for its own sake -- whatever the critics called them. Oh, and I rather liked Three Snakes and One Charm. So there. Anyway, By Your Side seems to be an idea conceived by record execs to turn the Crowes back into the new Stones. Like somebody somewhere knew that this record would be a sure-fire way to bring the Crowes back to the national spotlight and away from those banal "Where Are They Now?" specials on VH1. Well, it's gonna work, but as "Amorica" suggests, I'm not entirely sure that the Crowes WANT to be the Stones. Okay, yada yada yada. I've said my piece. Oh yeah -- the record still rocks.

This is a great CD from a band that simply does not run out of steam! A mixture of the Stones-ish rock and roll as featured on their first two albums, with some gospel-tinged numbers as well--great stuff! Chris and Rich robinson are amazing songwriters! Any Black Crowes fan should not be without this disc in their collection!

This album did not sell well back when it was released, and their label subsequently dropped them--a shame, because were it not for the general public's downspiraling of musical tastes back in the late nineties, the album would have done much better. Korn, Limp Bizkit, and other crap were ruling the charts. Mainstream rock wasn't as bad back then as it is now, but starting to get there...the last 20 years or so of the general decline in quality of what the public considers good music just makes my stomach turn.

So let's not let the tanking of mainstream rock music ruin our OWN individual tastes! Buy this CD, and support quality blues-rock music! Hang in there!