New Albums
BLACKBERRY SMOKE
You Hear Georgia
Georgia rockers continue to profitably mine their comfort zone
THIRTY TIGERS
6/10
Blackberry Smoke’s greatest asset remains their greatest handicap: they’re almost too adept for their own good at replicating every nuance of early-’70s Southern country rock. Produced, as appears to be obligatory in modern country circles, by Dave Cobb, You Hear Georgia is a 50-years-later companion to the Allman Brothers’ Eat A Peach and Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Second Helping. Blackberry Smoke embrace this destiny lustily – Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Ricky Medlocke co-writes one song, and most others sound like someone from Skynyrd did. But the best tracks, counterintuitively, are those furthest from Blackberry Smoke’s trademark boogie – “Ain’t The Same”, a harmony-soaked Eagles-ish lament, and “Lonesome For A Livin’”, a perfect tears-in-beer country duet with Jamey Johnson.