Now is the perfect time for add-on releases, from b-sides to live recordings to cover records. Sister duo Larkin Poe already proved their impressive country-blues bona fides on this year’s Self Made Man (QRO review), but sounding like the oldies means you can cover the oldies, so they’ve put together a nice bonus covers album, Kindred Spirits.
Like any collection of covers, Spirits rises & falls on the choice of songs, and the choice of what to do with them. Larkin Poe don’t rest on the laurels of others, but do some nice twists. Neil Young’s classic “Rockin’ In the Free World” is stripped down, while Elvis Presley’s “(You’re The) Devil In Disguise” is made shady and cutting. Even the likes of Phil Collins’ iconic “In the Air Tonight” goes dark country (albeit without the epic drums). The world probably didn’t need turning Post Malone’s “Take What You Want” into country, or another version of Lenny Kravitz’s overplayed “Fly Away”, but it’s particularly fun when the country men singing get turned into women, such as The Allman Brothers’ “Ramblin’ Man”. And the record closes with Elton John’s wistful tribute to the rock days of yore, “Crocodile Rock”.
No covers record is truly necessary, but often very sweet, and what is necessary right now are things very sweet, like Kindred Spirits.
