Little Feat

Like their much more famous cousins, the Rolling Stones and Van Morrison, Little Feat are
eclectic in a vertical rather than a horizontal way. They are past the point of wanting to
make stylistic distinctions in their music. And if they had come along two or three years
earlier, when radio programmers and record buyers alike were still willing to take
chances, I'm sure they would have gotten plenty of recognition by now. Little F... More >

The problem with Lowell George isn't so much that he doesn't write good songs as that he doesn't write great ones. He's immersed in blues--it's his idiom. But his own boast to the contrary, "eloquent profanity" doesn't come easy to him, and it should--in a real blues artist, the secret of a simple trope like "Two Trains" is that it seems spontaneous and conventional both at once, while George's clenched throat and staggering slide bear witness to his creative effort. None of which is to say that these aren't good songs--when George finds the right trope (or when Bill Payne finds a piano part like the one that hooks the title cut) the strain is part of the fun. (Grade: B+)