Sooner or later in any set of blues-inflected songs, somebody is getting shot. It’s not so much a question of why since 86% of blues shootings are crimes of passion. (The rest are either gambling cheats or thieves.) The big question is who will be doing the shooting and who will be singing about it. In the first track of the new EP currently streaming on Aaron “Woody” Wood’s website, he makes it clear he’s holding the steel. “Coal Black Hair” takes up a venerable blues form and fills it with a rock sound that does not shirk from the challenge of playing a type of music first wrought by some legendary bands.
The whole EP, in fact, uses the idioms of blues and southern rock without falling into parroting or parody of the genres’ pioneers. Instead, Wood shows that the fields cleared by those pioneers are still producing bumper crops of great tunes. Guilt and busted relationships even pervade the most radio friendly track, “Come Back,” which receives the gift of Wood’s passionate singing to lift it’s lyrics above their appearance on the printed page.
His strength as a songwriter is better illustrated in “Hold Your Tongue” and Wood spins the lyrics out with obvious pleasure in the craft of it. His vocals truly take hold in “Speak Your Name” and it is easy to imagine that voice (which is reminiscent of Chris Robinson) mixing with the track’s organ over the collected masses at Bonnaroo or some such gathering. If the tape were left to run, the Wood’s backing band has the talent to sustain an extended jam on an anthem like “Speak Your Name.”
That their talents run deeper is clear from the most musically interesting track on the EP, “Back Home.” With a clear chord progression that ends in an addictive piano hook, the music sets an atmosphere into which Wood can again enter with his distinctive voice. He has been recognized in many places for his passionate delivery, and for good reason. One suspects that he could make the Woodfin phone book dramatic, but I tend to believe that he’s not faking it on these songs.
That intensity, however, does not overpower the music on this EP. If Aaron Wood has learned anything from the wide variety of legendary musicians with whom he has played, it is that he can express as much with his restraint as with his playing. This EP rocks hard, but it works because no one element goes overboard. (In fact, I kind of wish there had been at least one all out guitar solo for me to air guitar.) Woody Wood is an established professional with a resume that extends from the Blue Rags through far too many legends of rock, blues, country, and jazz to enumerate here.
What this EP does, however, is give the listener an idea of what Wood is an artist. As such, he compares well to other artists like Warren Haynes and the Black Crowes and stands in succession to legends like Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Allman Brothers. But because he plows the same ground, don’t assume the harvest is the same. The fruits of Wood’s labors are clearly his own and just the thing for a sticky hot summer night.
You can here the EP here : Aaron Wood Music. Click the link for “Music.”
You can also help Woody finish the CD by pledging support on Kickstarter. (If you pledge before July 4, you get to go what sounds like a raging 4th party.)