The Afghan Whigs
Black Love (20th Anniversary Edition)
(Sub Pop/Rhino)
Even in the ‘90s, The Afghan Whigs felt like a band for outsiders. While their Sub Pop label-mates were thrashing and howling their way into the mainstream, Cincinnati’s Whigs were making music halfway between The Replacements and Marvin Gaye. Despite their bruised soul confessions being bleak and beautiful, the Whigs were rarely seen scowling from the covers of music magazines or blaring over radio airwaves. Instead, their music was more often shared in reverential tones between music-loving friends. To be a fan of the underrated Whigs gave one the sense of being in an underground fight club, but disciples shared music rather than a secret handshake.
Two decades since its release, Black Love remains a key album in The Afghan Whigs’ dark canon. High on the killer prose of Raymond Carver and James Ellroy, frontman Greg Dulli crafted his own noir epic. The musical kin of Robert Mitchum’s twisted preacher in The Night Of The Hunter, Dulli’s sermons are routinely shadowy, menacing and discomfiting. His parables of good and evil have only been learnt by stubbornly experiencing both options. He preaches after he’s practiced.
Crime Scene Part One opens the album with a hint of what we might have seen if Dulli had made good on his plans to bring Black Love’s songs to the big screen. As train yard sounds give way to a church organ, it’s not hard to conjure up the scene: after another disastrous binge, the protagonist has literally woken up on the wrong side of the tracks, but realises possible redemption lies within the Lord’s house. Our man wants something to believe in when the smoky bars close, the kohl-eyed mistresses evaporate and the hangover kicks in.
Greg Dulli’s characters are often charmers driven by a tar black heart and white hot lust. On Black Love, his voice sounds raw and reaching, his enflamed howl mesmerisingly at odds with the sweet chart-topping croon of ‘90s white soul artists like Michael Bolton.
Backing these dark vignettes is some astounding musicianship. Going To Town features a keyboard line to blow Billy Preston’s mind, while Blame Etc has a wah guitar punch you could imagine fitting neatly on a Shaft soundtrack. Such funky influences suggest the album’s title is multi-faceted.
Like a film’s director’s expanded cut, a bonus disc to celebrate Black Love’s 20th anniversary offers new insights. A subdued acoustic mix of Go To Town is reminiscent of Springsteen’s haunting Nebraska album, a piano version of New Order’s Regret lives up to its title and a demo of album closer Faded is Dulli’s primal plea for salvation.
Dulli’s dark drive forms the basis for all his best tunes with The Afghan Whigs, The Gutter Twins and The Twilight Singers. Black Love ends with the same sounds of the railway line which opened the album - our hero back in purgatory after blowing it again. Let’s be thankful Dulli chooses to neither keep it in his pants nor hide it in unpublished diaries.
-SM