Tony Joe White - Rain Crow (2016)

The predatory, hypnotic swamp grooves that have been Tony Joe White s stock-in-trade throughout his career lend a magical backwoods bayou ambience to the nine tracks of "Rain Crow", on which his peculiar songcraft and grizzled Woodbine baritone conjure up gripping regional narratives. Conjure Child finds a blind swamp girl threatened by lustful drunks in the bayou: escaping their bad intentions with the mystical aid of animals, it concludes with her pushing their bodies overboard as a gator snack . Elsewhere, The Opening Of The Box , is an account of a snakehandling religious ceremony set to pounding tom-toms and sinuous bass; but best of all is The Bad Wind , White s fuzz guitar and shaker oozing menace as a cuckold seeks revenge, but takes the moral high ground at the last moment: Sometimes it s best to just let things ride, he muses.