John Butler Trio: “Flesh and Blood”

Dan MacKnight

    I distinctly remember when I first heard theJohn Butler Trio: I was fifteen years old, it was shortly after they released Sunrise Over Sea, and their concert at the Sydney Opera House was being shown on PBS one night as I was flipping through the channels.  I was blown away by their truly original style, which is a weird blend of everything to rootsy folk jams, to blues with a touch of hip hop and reggae.  I just couldn’t believe that an acoustic guitar could make the sounds that he was making (granted, he plays his acoustic instruments through a Marshall stack with no less than a billion effects pedals).  Since that day, I have seen the John Butler Trio play no less than five times, almost every time they came through Boston.  But in 2010, John changed out his lineup and released April Uprising.  I hated it.  All those funky jams on his previous releases were replaced with commercial, soulless radio pop.  It left a bad taste in my mouth, and I walked away from the John Butler Trio for a while.

Well, when I saw that JBT had released their first album in almost four years, I hesitantly decided to give it a listen.  The songs off of Flesh and Blood have some bits that remind me of Sunrise Over Sea and Grand National, but a lot of it was stepping into uncharted territory for the band.  Thankfully, it was a big step away from April Uprising.
 

The band touches on multiple musical styles in this album, never fully devoting themselves to one specific genre.  You can’t say, “This is a good blues album,” or “This is a great reggae album.”  It is however, a great John Butler Trio album.
   
The opening track,  “Spring to Come” exudes classic JBT sounds.  It rings with familiarity as the subtle drumming is complemented by Butler’s signature finger picking style.  Tracks like “Livin’ in the City” are loud and bluesy, reminding me a lot of earlier albums from the Black Keys (Thickfreakness, anyone?).  “Devil Woman” has an almost-rockabilly vibe to it, with Byron Luiters thumping away on an upright bass to a swing beat.  The album then moves into a big, fat dub reggae jam in “Blame It On Me.”  The album closes out with “You’re Free,” which is a spacey number that marries drum machines and droning synth programming with Butler’s airy vocals as he noodles away on a slide guitar.
    I’m not going to say that this album is for everyone.  The John Butler Trio isn’t everybody’s cup of tea.  It does, however, touch base on so many different musical styles that most people can at least find a song or two that they enjoy.  It seems fitting that the album is called Flesh and Blood, because it sounds much more genuine and heartfelt than the trio’s last album.  The John Butler Trio is always actively trying to change their sound as they grow as a band.  Flesh and Blood reassured me that the band is moving forward in the right direction.

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