Ben Harper & Relentless7 – White Lies for Dark Times – Album Review
“Ben Harper is that rare talent able to not only vacation in the worlds of gospel, soul, folk and even reggae, but meld them gracefully together on both album and stage. But sometimes you just want him to rock, like he did on 1995′s “Ground on Down.” And, at long last, he’s assembled a new band that seems dedicated to just that, and it’s a beautiful thing. The bare-knuckled “Lay There and Hate Me” is a head-on collision between soul and rock, a grittier, angrier “Gimme Shelter.” “Keep It Together” is a worthy tribute to Led Zeppelin, proudly bearing the influence of Harper’s 2007 Bonnaroo jam with John Paul Jones. The eyes-closed, fist-shaking, prayer-through-song side of Harper often comes through, most effectively on “It’s Up to You,” a slow-building tsunami of sound. The band quiets later in the disc, which might have been a buzz kill if the songs weren’t so damn good.â€
