Album review: ‘Them Crooked Vultures’
Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 4)
Hot-shot resumes aside, the three heavy hitters in Them Crooked Vultures have a taste for the strange. Guitarist Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age) indulges his weirder impulses in his long-running “Desert Sessions” ensembles. Drummer Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters, Nirvana) instigated the excellent heavy-metal detour Probot. And bassist John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin) has collaborated with genuine subversives from Diamanda Galas to the Butthole Surfers. Together in Them Crooked Vultures, the three settle not for bland détente but for something a bit more out there.
The arrangements are laced with twists in tempo and mood. Nasty riffs and sticky melodies are everywhere, buttered over by the androgynous harmonies that have made Homme a hard-rock anti-hero, but verse-chorus arrangements hold little interest. Instead, there are fascinating digressions, packed with surprises. “Elephants” shifts from slow stomp to herky-jerky room wrecker and then blisses out into a psychedelic slow dive. “Warsaw or the First Breath You Take After You Give Up” starts off raw and dirty, amps up the pomp with carnival organ and backing choir, then races off with Jones’ bass and Grohl’s drums chasing Homme’s guitar. Jones’ mastery of texture, whether on funky Clavinet for “Scumbag Blues,” classical piano on “Spinning in Daffodils” or slide guitar for “Reptiles,” is the band’s secret weapon. Grohl’s wall-of-wallop allows no one in the band to rest on his reputation. And Homme brings sensuality – a rare ingredient in music this hard and heavy.
Even “Interlude with Ludes,” a spaced-out lounge ditty that serves as a breather between assaults, makes a point: the Vultures are hard-rock adventurers eager to get real, real gone.
greg@gregkot.com