CLUTCH - Robot Hive/Exodus (review)


Tim Sult, Jean Paul Gaster, Dan Maines, Neil Fallon. Four names that sure, sound like a mish mash of porn names, but more importantly have led the pack as far as bluesy rock & roll goes for the past ten or fifteen years. A fifth name can now be added to that list: Mick Schauer. Together these five now comprise Clutch.

I was skeptical when I heard the fifth player was a keyboard player. However, February 5, 2005 at the Commodore my troubles with this thought were laid to ease. When the new album, Robot Hive/Exodus, dropped last week my concerns were laid to rest altogether.

The old school of Clutch fans will say the new album is Clutch light. But, these are people that can't appreciate music for what it is, and that is sound. Clutch have broadened their musical horizons. They've always been fans of old blues and jazz artists, and if you really listened to the music you could hear that love. The new album sounds like these guys would be just as at ease playing The Yale or The Fairmont as they would The Brickyard.

The keyboard plays like a groove synthesizer (which is what I guess it actually is). I dare all of you to keep still as the beat and delivery of "10,000 Witnesses" threatens to take you all to another level of bliss.

In amongst all the blues is the straight up rock and roll that Clutch has kept alive since their first full length. When Neil Fallon tells us to "Good St. Charles Darwin wrote his gospel down... Get your evolution on" [Never Be Moved] you want to be a better person. When he sings, "No doubt Vishnu missed you, and Kali [he pronounces it right even] kissed you. Better get ready..." [Gullah] you feel like you have to be scared even if you don't understand why.

One of my favourite tracks is Tripping The Alarm, an instrumental piece. This basically means it's the Bakerton Group playing; the Bakerton Group is Clutch without lead singer Neil Fallon. Tripping The Alarm is one of two instrumentals on the album.

For those who still don't want to believe in the power of the most intelligent hard rock band the world has ever had they prove they know their musical roots and embrace the soul of making a cover tune their own. The album ends with two covers from classic blues artists.

First is Gravel Road, a cover of Mississippi Fred McDowell. If this song was a woman it is so amazingly hot it would be Jennifer Connelly (of course I haven't met her but am assuming she's really nice). The second is Who's Been Talking? written by the legend himself, Howlin' Wolf. If The Wolf was alive today I'd bet your life that he would love the way Neil Fallon growls, "Goodbye baby, hate to see you go. You know I love you. I'm the causing of it all." Clutch makes it sound like a pleasure to have the blues.

The first two or three times I listened to this album I wondered how well any of these songs would do at one of their shows. I only had to recall that amazing night in February, three days before I saw the ladies of Sleater Kinney prove jamming isn't only for guys, and I remembered it made for the best concert in years.

Clutch keeps doing things that all the (shit) bands on the radio [other than Queens of The Stone Age; I don't know how they started finally getting radion respect] can't do. And that is make music from their hearts with absolutely no care of album sales and making glitzy videos. Clutch does it for the fans as is evident with their constant tour schedule and the release of albums via traditional stores, or their website, nearly every year.

I urge you all to take some time out of your likely boring and unhelpful lives to better your own souls and minds. This can easily be done by getting yourself in to the habit of listening to Clutch at least once a week for 60 minutes straight, or an entire album. I recommend the new album, Robot Hive/Exodus, for total newcomers. If you're already in to the heavy but don't yet know Clutch I'd recommend Blast Tyrant (2004) or Elephant Riders (1998) or Pure Rock Fury (2001). Whatever you do, please introduce yourself to Clutch. LET THE TAKEOVER OF THE WORLD BEGIN FROM THE ROCK!!!

"Gonna find my executioners and show them exactly what it means to live." 10,000 Witnesses, by Clutch.

PS - I peed on Charles Darwin's walking path in 1998. I had to go. Survival of the fittest, indeed.