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Written
by Raymond Burris, posted by blog admin
The
beauty of an album like Nick Black’s Summer + Spring is manifold, but primarily
lies in how effortlessly it comes together. There’s a confidence level
propelling these songs reaching well beyond Black’s relatively paltry twenty
eight years on the planet and there can be little question, even after a single
pass from a first time listener, that Black has the stuff long careers are made
of. His skills as both a guitar player and vocalist are substantial enough that
he could likely dominate any release featuring him, but it’s a testament to his
musical vision that he resists any such temptations on this album and his work
preceding its release. Instead, Nick Black’s Summer + Spring comes off as a
fully realized band effort with a well rounded performance greater than the sum
of its individual parts.
It
kicks off in noteworthy fashion with the song “Joy to the Girl”, a surging and
tightly arranged funk track that shows off the band’s collective chops while
never allowing one player to dominate the performance. Black’s vocal has the
same vitality that we hear from the instrumental performances and he rides the
groove with assertiveness beyond his years. His guitar is a major source of
fire in the song but never loses its musical direction despite coming across as
full of spit and vinegar. “Summer & Spring”, the album’s title song, has a
much jazzier air than the opener and the relaxed jaunt the band takes will win
over many listeners. His vocal embodies the same relaxed mood and steers its
way through the arrangement acting in near perfect complement to the
instruments. He takes a slightly more commercial direction with the song “Change”
and, despite its serious subject matter, the songwriting never invokes its
themes with a heavy hand either lyrically or musically. One won’t mistake the
lyrics on Summer + Spring for high flown, pseudo poetry, but it certainly has a
level of conversational eloquence quite suited to its classy arrangements.
“Runaway
Heart” offers a spotlight moment for Black’s vocal chops and he hits a
decidedly bluesy note in this dramatic tune. The drumming is especially on
target and frames the song nicely. Listeners enter a decidedly funky stretch in
the album’s running order with the trio of songs “When the Morning Comes”, “Lay
It on the Line”, and “Dance in the Light”. Of the three, the first is by far
the hardest pure funk tune while “Dance in the Light” merely echoes the two
earlier tracks in atmospheric ways. “Lay It on the Line” does an excellent job
of straddling the line between soul and funk to create a compelling hybrid. “Diamonds”
echoes those funk influences some, as well, but there’s a different thrust to
the song’s percussion that has a jazzier base. The last number on Summer +
Spring, “The River”, is another change of pace as Black strips everything down
to a pure acoustic blues that his voice really excels with. There’s a
completeness to this album that few other releases, any genre, equal nowadays
and it’s the best effort yet from this top notch singer and musician.
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