Album Review: The Greenhornes ****

Shabby and shy: The Greenhornes' Craig Fox, at Friday's Big Day Out. Photo / Richard Robinson

Rating: 4/5
Verdict: Once again proving you don't need Jack White to rock

As their Big Day Out performance last week revealed, the Greenhornes have few bells and whistles and look entirely unenthused about being up their on stage. They come, they perform, and they move on to the next gig. That's what they do. Singer and guitarist Craig Fox is especially shabby and shy. One imagines he wouldn't have put up much of a fight when Jack White stole his rhythm section - made up of Jack Lawrence (bass) and Patrick Keeler (drums) - for the Raconteurs and the Dead Weather in the mid-2000s.

But crikey, for a coy-looking lot the Greenhornes sure can play their instruments, and they conjure up a sound that's a mix of British Invasion fervour and 60s garage rock, with a healthy dose of country and psychedelia thrown in.

On **** (or Four Stars, as it is known) - the Cincinnati, Ohio band's third album and first collection of new material in eight years - they come up with their most consistent and diverse slab of sonic garage blues revival rock yet.

It can turn from reflective and sweet on My Sparrow and Better Off Without It (with guest keyboardist Andrew Higley providing some shrill, swooning moments), to the rowdy and raw riffs of Need Your Love, which is beautifully laid-back yet heavy, and the steely and jagged frenzy of Underestimator. Then there's the more trippy tangents on songs like Cave Drawings, which escalates into the primal psychedelic wilderness, and Lawrence's haunting vocal turn on Go Tell Henry, where you get an inkling of the vast scope of the Greenhornes' seemingly straightforward sound.

But then the true charm of this band comes through on the slacker blues of Song 13 (with a schoolyard-style clap along echoing through it) and the dulcet, easy-beat quality of Get Me Out Of Here.

So, while it might seem a little like falling into the band's cunning publicity trap, four stars it is then for Four Stars.

-TimeOut