Rich Robinson – Paper

Guitarist Rich Robinson’s self-produced solo debut makes a strong case for him as the most essential member of the Black Crowes. Not to take anything away from brother Chris Robinson’s skills as a lyricist, frontman and vocalist, but—listening to Paper—the songwriting, music and vocal melodies (albeit not the vocals themselves) are strikingly richer than on Chris’s recent solo efforts. Paper is, without a doubt, the best work from any member of the Black Crowes since 1996’s dark, psychedelic-tinged and generally underappreciated Three Snakes and One Charm. Filled with fresh-sounding rockers up front, and delicate ballads with varied instrumentation toward the end, Paper is a well-balanced affair that returns, stylistically, to territory near the Crowes’ defining masterpiece, Amorica (1994).
The Crowes—who with their 1990 debut, Shake Your Money Maker, re-introduced grit and soul into the glitz- and glam-obsessed rock mainstream—have had a rough go over the past six years. First they lost guitarist Marc Ford to a drug problem and, soon after Ford was fired, bassist Johnny Colt split the band. The Robinson brothers and drummer Steve Gorman regrouped but seemed to go backwards with 1999’s dumbed-down By Your Side, an album billed as a return to the band’s straight-ahead-rock roots. More lineup changes followed, as did a tour with Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page that ended with Page pulling out due to a back injury and the Crowes suing him (the band released a solid but mostly forgettable live album as a document of the collaboration). The slightly better, but still disappointing Lions followed, and at times it felt like a bad Zeppelin knockoff. By 2002, Gorman parted ways with the Crowes, and a band that had shown so much promise in the mid ’90s had fallen off the map into that mysterious netherworld of rock known as “the indefinite hiatus.”