MARCUS KING: Young Blood (ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

Back to the roots for Marcus King. After a soporific "El Dorado", the little prodigy of Southern blues rock decided to go back to the basics. A solid rhythmic session, a guitar, an amp, some fuzz pedals, these are the ingredients of "Young Blood" which goes back to rock and roll, the real one, the one that cultivates enough groove and feeling to revive the memories of a distant time, when analogical recordings allowed musicians to establish a dialogue with the listeners beyond the LPs.

Still produced by Dan Auerbach, who this time lets Marcus King's guitar fully express itself, "Young Blood" is a condensation of Marcus' rock influences, which range from Jimi Hendrix ('It's Too Late', 'Whisper') to Cream ('Lie Lie Lie', 'Pain') via Creedence Clearwater Revival, with tracks like 'Rescue Me' or the excellent 'Blood On The Tracks' that smell like the Bayou.

But to reduce Marcus King to his influences would be to offend him. "Young Blood" is above all a very personal album which, with its inspired riffs ('Hard Working Man') and its incandescent soli sometimes flirting with psychedelia ('Good And Gone'), tells the story of a painful break-up and testifies to the vital impetus necessary to recover.

The warmth and depth of Marcus King's soulful voice speak volumes about the difficult months he went through before writing this album. To tell his story in a purely rock musical direction is a wise choice. It's not surprising that the only track on the album that deviates from this, the soulful 'Dark Cloud', is also the weakest. But with its wealth of nuggets, 'Young Blood' is without doubt Marcus King's most sincere and authentic album to date. - Official website

MARCUS KING

YOUNG BLOOD

AUTRE LABEL

ROCK