Strong passionate songs from a band on the rise.
John Hollier was raised on a crawfish farm in Louisiana, which tells you where his musical roots lie. He and his touring band of Teddy Thibedoux Jones (sax), Zachary Scott Kline (lead guitar), Ray Akers (bass), and Brian Cox (drums) have been acquiring a growing reputation supporting groups such as the excellent Randy Rogers Band, and appearing at various festivals.
After a self-titled debut album in 2023, featuring musicians from Cage the Elephant, Deer Tick and Miranda Lambert, Hollier assembled the current line-up and hit the road. Now comes Rainmaker, which was recorded ‘live’ in the studio, and this makes sense because the music they create certainly sounds as if it would be great experienced live. The Blasters, in their ‘American Music’, said: “We got the Louisiana boogie and the delta blues / We got country, swing and rockabilly, too / We got jazz, country western and Chicago blues” and there are certainly elements of all that gumbo mix on Rainmaker.
This is melodic and powerful music. It swings, and it rocks, and you can imagine it blasting out of the speakers as you cruise down a sunlit US highway (or even crawling round the North Circular). John Hollier has an attractive, strong voice with a hint of a quiver, which he uses to good effect to put across the dozen songs. The lyrics tend to focus on the uncertainties of love and lust; these are very much the songs of the touring musician, with fleeting relationships and the wistful feelings they induce. The song titles give the game away: If She’s Lonely, Can’t Say No Tonight, Never See Me Again, Lonesome Highway Waltz and Hollow Heart, for example. Lyrics such as “Been bleeding out my secrets, Kicking out the footlights, Empty rooms and last night’s ghosts, Honey it’s just how it goes” and “So baby lie to me, Tell me everything is gonna be alright, So baby lie to me, Cause I can’t say no tonight” tell the story.
There is a full and consistent sound to the album, and the band are excellent. The band’s promoters draw comparisons with Springsteen, and you can see their point, although Hollier does not, at least on this record, go in for the Boss’s political or social commentary. You would be filing them under ‘country-rock’ in your imaginary record shop, but this is an album which is likely to have a broad commercial appeal.
We are told that once Rainmaker has been unleashed on the world, John Hollier & The Reverie will be embarking on a tour of the US and Europe. When they make it to the UK, they will definitely be worth catching.
