Like a heavy weather warning, there’s not much you can do once Beth Hart decides she’s coming through. The assumed shorthand for Beth Hart is blues siren, but she’s far more than that, even if this latest album opens with the fiery Savior With A Razor, which struts in like a cowboy kicking open saloon doors before Slash comes in through the window like Paul Kossoff with a grudge against his Gibson Les Paul. Very good it is too, and no one would blame you if at that point, a light bulb went off above your head and you thought, ‘I get it; Beth Hart, blues siren’. Because when Hart throws back her head and lets rip; we all get the blues.
But that’s only a minor part of her aural arsenal. Admittedly there are moments here where it’s all Janis Joplin attitude and a hellhound on our trail, but look closer and there’s a smoky Tom Waits burr, a honkytonk roadside bar, country twang, a broken-down ballad or two. She’s assuredly switching through the gears as if they’re all second nature to her, she’s not trying on a musical style for size.
