New Music Tuesday - Counting Crows

Counting Crows - Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings

4 out of 5 stars
Ok, so Tuesday is a little late this week, as Anne was out visiting. But I still managed to download and listen to this CD a few times since then. This is my most anticipated CD in years, and despite my obviously high expectations, it exceeded them! This is the first full length release from the Crows since Hard Candy back in 2002, so they've had more than enough time to work on this one.

The CD is a concept album of sorts, with the first half ("Saturday Nights") being hard rocking songs of partying, and the second half ("Sunday Nights") being the more somber, regretful day after. It's a great way to highlight the fact that the Crows even have hard-rockers, and of course the downtrodden songs are always lead singer Adam Duritz' forte.

The album starts with "1492," a song I'm pretty sure the Crows have been touring with for a few years, and I think they just finally found a home for it here. The guitars are wailing and the song is loud and immediate. It's definitely "Saturday Night," and it kicks the album into a stream of songs with loud, layered guitars, plenty of neat little licks, and wonderfully written songs. Adams voice sounds great on every song, and each song feels like the band is playing live-- they are filled with energy.

The last song of "Saturday Nights" is "Cowboys," the best song the Counting Crows have done since "Mr. Jones." The song is loud, immediate, filled with paranoia and despair, and catchy as hell. The "come on, come on" lyric from "Accidentally in Love," is back, but this time it is the flip side of love; it's the selfish need of love and attention. It's the song after one too many drinks, when you're starting let all your insecurities out and frankly, you're kind of scaring people. It's a great lead-in for Adam to start telling his Sunday morning stories.

The last half of the album has the Crows going very country, in the way they did on the album This Desert Life. More Americana or roots rock than Nashville, but the songs have plenty of slide guitar and banjo. The slow songs are more forgettable than the first half of the CD, but one of the highlights is "When I Dream of Michaelangelo." Adam steals a line from his "Angels of the Silences" from Recovering the Satellites to string a little song about faith and sex and God. Duritz evidently misinterpreted Michaelangelo's scene with God and Adam as not having just touched fingers, but as Adam not being able to actually touch God: "And he seems so close as he reaches out his hand/ But we are never quite as close as we are led to understand." If there is a better line about alienation from your creator, I haven't heard it. "On a Tuesday in Amsterdam Long Ago" Adam does his recquisite solo piano, horribly sad song ("Raining in Baltimore" on August and Everything After, "Colorblind" on This Desert Life). "Come back to me/come back to me" he croons, mournfully, over and over, and the song would be a little repetitive if it weren't for the emotional impact of Adam's voice. It's also got a great little line in there: "She is the film of a book of the story/ Of the smell of her hair." The album ends with a nice little song about getting dumped called "Come Around." It's sort of a happy song in disguise, as it's about a guy who is hard on his luck, but he is on his way back up.

Overall, the album does start to lag because of the slow/midtempo songs starting to back up, but this is a great CD for all Counting Crows fans and rock fans in general. It's not indie, but this isn't your standard pop either. The music is wonderfully made, lyrics full of emotion and story, and it sounds like a band having fun. Check it out.

Counting Crows Website


Counting Crows - Cowboys
Counting Crows - 1492