Foghat
In The Mood Of Something Rude

Being authentically rockers also means getting goosebumps of joy when coming across records like this, recorded with musicians playing together in the studio, side by side like on stage, with the only variation being the singer facing them, watching and getting pumped up while barking into the microphone. Forget backing tracks and overdubs, here the feeling is everything, and if a vocal passage is a bit sharp or an instrument hits an imperfect note, so be it; the important thing is the atmosphere, the soul of the piece.

Foghat released no fewer than fifteen albums starting from 1972 (if I'm not mistaken, this is the eleventh, year 1984) and they still proudly grace stages in America. I'm referring to the two original band members who are still alive and kicking, along with the replacements for those who didn't make it this far. Foghat's history has roots in the 1960s, in the British Blues scene: at that time the genre was thriving and alongside names like the Stones, Cream, Mayall, Free, Yardbirds (then Zeppelin), Taste, Groundhogs, Animals, and others, certain Savoy Brown were also doing great, led by guitarist Kim Simmonds, whose bossy ways resulted in frequent personnel changes (even future Yes/King Crimson Bill Bruford was hired but quickly fired for a manifest lack of feeling in playing the blues! Oh yes...).

The most conspicuous of these musical comings and goings, as well as the genesis of Foghat, took shape when the second guitarist Dave Peverett was caught one day by the "boss" jamming with relish in rockabilly style, with evident and enviable general enthusiasm, with the rhythm section while Simmonds was on lunch break. The furious argument that followed ended with the three resolutely turning their backs on their steady but frustrating role as salaried employees within Savoy Brown, leaving Simmonds flabbergasted. Finding a lead guitar to strike out on their own was easy and exhilarating, as the new member Rod Price was surely a slide guitar great, a true Duane Allman of England. At that point, the powerful producer of Savoy Brown went out of his way to put obstacles in their path, ensuring they couldn't find gigs throughout the UK, resulting in the decisive move by Peverett and company to leave the London scene and relocate permanently to the USA, where it all began fifteen/twenty years earlier thanks to the likes of Bo Diddley, Elvis Presley, etc.

Foghat is thus a British band with a decidedly American career and sound: four purebred Englishmen who, fifteen years after the American invention of rock'n'roll, planted themselves in that country determined to recall and reinvigorate a music almost forgotten there, that in Great Britain was experiencing a magnificent revival and evolution.

The talented and unfortunate Peverett (who passed away in the early 2000s due to an unforgiving illness), enlightened on the road to Memphis by the good Elvis Presley like so many, was more than a bluesman, he was a pure rock'n'roller. This is understood, for example, from his inclination to apply vocal effects, both in the studio and live, with the so-called slapback echo, a single short and unintelligible repetition, giving the singing an unmistakable sound and a strong '50s connotation.

The three musicians surrounding him have always supported him, traveling like trains, seasoning the leader's '50s recipe with blues and thickening it with hard rock. The resulting groove is raw, vivid, straightforward, charming, irresistible for true rockers, as already stated. The only peculiarity of this album, compared to all the others of the band, is that it is made only of covers, but little changes: the sound, the attitude, the enthusiasm, the approach are there; it is super sincere and highly deserving boogie rock.

Just a couple of mentions from the tracklist of this work to conclude: first, the irresistible rendition of Rodney Crowell's "Ain't Living Long Like This", with an exhilarating lead guitar work by Erik Cartwright (who took the place of the poor Price, removed from the group for... alcoholic unreliability and later died in a domestic accident in 2005): the instrument compressed to a fireball on the right channel, with a sublime, filamentous, and sonorous timbre, creative, piercing. One of the best guitar parts I know.

Secondly, the seismic reinterpretation of James Brown's "And I Do Just What I Want", a matter of pure energy, bursting with grit, with a legendary pre-finale instrumental that is virtuosic, crazy, amused, and frantic. An avalanche race for just over three minutes, without taking prisoners, one of the most rock things I've ever heard, practically ultra-punk if it weren't for the fact that these guys can play (listen to bassist Nick Jameson), and shout, and enjoy playing, nothing at all like nihilism.