Laura Cox admits she didn’t have much of a goal in mind when she started posting her classic rock covers on this new thing called YouTube back in 2006.
“I was a teenager, so the whole thing was just fun,” she says. “Pretty soon I was getting millions of views – it was crazy. I think what people liked was that I didn’t take things so seriously. I was just enjoying myself and sharing music I loved.”
By her mid-twenties, however, the Anglo-French guitarist and singer got serious and formed an eponymous band, with which she released a series of albums (2017’s Hard Blues Shot, 2019’s Burning Bright and 2023’s Head Above Water) that highlighted her gutsy singing and playing – she’s a southpaw who plays righty – along with her rapidly maturing songwriting skills.
“My heroes are people like Joe Bonamassa, Mark Knopfler and Angus Young,” she says, “I think you can hear those influences across those records.”
For her new album, Trouble Coming, Cox sidelined her live band in the studio and recorded with the No Money Kids, a duo she describes as “the French Black Keys.” The result is an album that sounds and feels like something of a breakthrough.
Blazing tracks like No Need to Try Harder and the aptly named Do I Have Your Attention are still rooted in blues rock, but they have a lo-fi garage edginess not found in previous efforts.
Cox tosses out the rulebook on the bluesy, tension-filled mood piece title track, eschewing standard verse-chorus-bridge songcraft, on which she bags lead solos in favor of swampy, distorted vamping and atmospheric slide work.
“I felt confident in the song and realized that it didn’t need a solo,” she says. “I still love playing guitar more than anything, but it was important for me to grow as a songwriter and all-around artist, and that meant I had to do things differently.”
She laughs. “For the first time, I’m actually enjoying listening to myself. I play the record in my car, my bedroom, even in the kitchen. It’s like I’m listening to somebody else’s record. That’s the biggest success I could ask for. I’m really happy about this music.”
- Trouble Coming is out now via earMUSIC.
- This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.
