Like many musical styles, country-blues can easily slip into either inauthenticity or being too authentic for wider appeal. This risk becomes even greater the more popular an act becomes, either going for the brass ring of massive stadium success or stubbornly trying to reject people liking your music. Sister duo Larkin Poe aren’t playing stadiums – yet – and haven’t lost their appealing downhome authenticity on their latest, Blood Harmony.
Distinctly a ‘downhome’ record, the Southern gals have not one, but two, killer tributes to their home region in “Georgia Off My Mind” and “Southern Comfort”. Blood is largely a saloon upbeat hepstepper of an album, in songs like those two or “Kick the Blues”. But there are a few times when the pair go sadder, such as the slow heartbreak in “Might as Well Be Me”, and darker, in the dark lady “Lips as Cold as Diamond”.
While they still feel and look young, Larkin Poe have been building up an impressive catalogue of country blues records that are both appealing and authentic, like Blood Harmony.
