• achtergronden
• DE 7EVEN
• video's
• agenda

ernaast

The Scarecrows | Crow Man

Unsatifying Norwegian roots.
CD, self-released

Tekst: Maurice Dielemans

Publicatiedatum: 13 januari 2001

It seems like it's a long way from Nashville to Norway, but country music has quickly spread in popularity across the world. From the late 1600s to the mid-1800s, European settlers brought their folk tales, along with new instruments such as the fiddle and the harp, to the Promised Land. While the slaves also brought the banjo from Africa to the American South, it didn't take very long before the traditional folk or mountain music became known as country music.
In the early 1900s, with the invention of new technologies such as the radio and the phonograph, country music even travelled beyond the Appalachian Mountains and the rural West.
Basically, the white man's blues has remained the same since its early beginning, but over the past 100 years or so, country music has developed into many various styles and sub-genres ranging from western swing to cowpunk. Nowadays more and more European bands are creating an interesting twangy sound. British bands like Lowgold and the Peter Bruntnell Combination, or the Hillbilly Boogiemen from the Netherlands, can easily measure up with their American colleagues.
Country music has also reached Norway. While Norway is mostly known for its hairy "church-burning and devil-worshiping" death metal music, Tondheim's indie-rockers Motorpsycho previously recorded an obscure country album called 'The Tussler'. So now there are the Scarecrows, a Norwegian band highly influenced by country rock. Mostly upbeat, there are quiet a few great songs out there, but unfortunately most of them suffer from weak vocals and repetitive lyrics.
This album could have been so much more interesting if the Scarecrows only combined Norwegian folk music with a melancholic twangy guitar sound and made an instrumental album - Now that's a damn good idea for their next album! Some songs on 'Crow Man' like 'Read Between the Lies' and 'Sleeping in the Shadow' sound like frustrating pop songs, but even with these tracks 'Crow Man' remains a solid collection of rock songs. Therefore, you should buy this album if you like Motorpsycho more than you like Gram Parsons (Which I find very hard to believe). You can also wait for the next album by the Scarecrows. I'm sure that will sound much better than 'Crow Man'.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/recensie/the-scarecrows/crow-man/84/
Meer The Scarecrows op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/the-scarecrows