Although it had its charms, The Doobie Brothers <\/i>only hinted at what this band could accomplish, a fact proven on the sophomore follow-up Toulouse Street<\/i>. <\/p>\n
Positioned somewhere between Creedence Clearwater Revival and the early Eagles, the sound of this music draws on a variety of sources \u2013 blues, Caribbean, gospel \u2013 and gives it a Southern rock twist by way of California. That may seem a contrived way to describe all this but it\u2019s accurate, and time has only sharpened the diversity of the music and how well it flows together.<\/p>\n
Heard with fresh ears in their album-length versions, classic rock staples \u201cListen To The Music,\u201d the bracing \u201cRockin\u2019 Down The Highway\u201d and the gospel-inflected stomper \u201cJesus Is Just Alright\u201d are better than you remember. The group interplay is solid and the vocal harmonies \u2013 a forgotten strength from these guys \u2013 strengthen these warhorses. \u201cJesus is Just Alright\u201d in particular is still a joy to listen to, an infectious, non-pandering tune with great guitar work<\/p>\n
The best song here is the title track, an acoustic paean to love, New Orleans, and the spell of a fading summer\u2019s evening when something slightly mystical is in the air. An elegant flute solo divides the verses to round out the piece. A side note: When the band hand-picked their favorites for their Doobie\u2019s Choice <\/i>album, this one made the cut, but none of the aforementioned hits did. <\/p>\n
The guys attempt a boogie funk hybrid on \u201cCotton Mouth\u201d and a Caribbean feel on \u201cMamloi;\u201d the former is moderately successful, the latter trite and irritating. A cover of \u201cDon\u2019t Start Me To Talkin\u2019\u201d is Allman Brothers lite, not too bad, while \u201cWhite Sun\u201d also bleats along pleasantly, the CSN&Y harmonies canceling out the goofy lyrics. Finally, the seven-minute \u201cDisciple\u201d plows through territory already covered for three minutes before turning into a guitar showcase; it obviously wants to be an Allman-esque epic but falls just short, though it sounds fine as it plays. \u201cSnake Man\u201d is a fun closer, a jaunty two-minute blues-inspired tune. One wonders if it could have been developed into something more, but alas.<\/p>\n
Toulouse Street <\/i>is miles ahead of the band\u2019s debut and would only be bettered by its immediate successor, The Captain And Me<\/i>. Worth checking out if you enjoyed the hits and wanted to dig a little deeper into the band\u2019s back catalog. At the very least, try to get \u201cToulouse Street\u201d somewhere and listen to it at dusk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":31112,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6972],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-42798","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-doobie-brothers","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/45"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42798"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}