One of the most repeated and most overstated opinions you could about what is the worst thing for a musicians is that he was born in the wrong time, but in the case of My Morning Jacket it always made perfect sense. I was always wondering what would it happen if this guys were born earlier and started kicking ass in the seventies. One of their albums particularly made me wonder this. It was their fourth record simply titled Z.
With its power, heaviness and clearness, Z tried to overcompensate for the lack of punctuality. Listening to it, I still have a feeling these are hardcore motherfuckers who have at least ten albums in their discography and years of diligent and dedicated work.
Their influences are conspicuous and they were never ashamed of it. I mean, If everything goes your way and you manage to create remarkably good music that is not a copy of something already created, but you utilize that idea to turn it into something brilliant, then you are a stellar artist. Spirit of the past interpreted through a current zeitgeist was My Morning Jacket's forte on Z.
Z was opened with standouts: Wordless Chorus, It Beats For You and Gideon were all in a downtempo rhythm until guys decided to make us move with What A Wonderful Man. A whole new world opened in Off The Record, the song that warms up with curt surf rhythm until it suddenly stretches into a reggae theme, and then morphs into rock n roll anthem in the spirit of British bands of the first half of the seventies. In the second half, the song undergoes a complete metamorphosis and turns into a hypnotic, psychedelic tune making the whole track well rounded, but still complex.
If you are a lover of deep drumming sections, I am sure you Lay Low to be satisfactory. It is built on a rhythm that would be praised by The Allman Brothers Band or Lynyrd Skynyrd. Dondante is for everyone's taste, while Neil Young inspired ballade Knot Comes Loose still gives me chills with its discrete percussion sections and slide guitars that perfectly intertwines romance with tropical vibes. It is naturally congruent to the closing of the album.
Classic rock was still alive with Z. My Morning Jacket proved that you don't have to dig into your father's record collection to find good rock n roll. Classic rock still lives. At the end, I will ask the question from the beginning once again - What would happen if My Morning Jacket existed at the onset of the seventies? The answer is - they would rule the whole wide world, deservingly.
