I think Counting Crows gets a bad rap sometimes, like maybe they’re lumped in as some kind of low-rent Hootie and the Blowfish or something. I don’t know why.
Despite the disrespect, Adam Duritz is one heck of a songwriter and, though I’ve never met him, he seems, too, like a transparent, REAL human being.
I think I\’d heard \”Mr. Jones\” on the radio before I\’d heard anything else on the album. I remember thinking it sounded a lot like Van Morrison, which was cool, I guess.
I REALLY heard the album for the first time in a friend\’s car as we travelled home from a long night of revelry. The first track, \”Round Here\” starts with just a simple, picked guitar riff and then builds and builds and builds into this wailing crescendo that almost had me in tears.
The characters who run through the songs on this album are down-and-out, broken-down people dealing with loss, heartbreak and a longing for something real. I loved the emotion packed into the lyrics and in Duritz’ voice (I mean, just TRY listening to “Raining in Baltimore” without all the FEELS), and those words and sounds resonated with me in a powerful way.
Most of the songs on \”August and Everything After\” are slow burns. \”Perfect Blue Buildings,\” \”Anna Begins,\” \”Time and Time Again\” and \”Sullivan Street\” all have the same building emotion found on \”Round Here,\” but each finds a different way to get under your skin.
\”Omaha,\” \”Mr. Jones\” and \”Rain King,\” on the other hand, are welcome, more uptempo reprieves from all the deep emotional dives, but even then, Duritz never lets up on the lyrical contemplation.
In \”Rain King,\” probably the most exultant number on the album, Duritz sings:
I said mama, mama, mama
Why am I so alone?
I can\’t go outside, I\’m scared, I might not make it home
But I\’m alive, but I\’m sinking in
If there\’s anyone home at your place
Why don\’t you invite me in?
Lyrics like these were just grafted to every single synapse of this wayward college kid\’s brain, and the album was on heavy repeat for the better part of a year. It\’s a therapy album, a way of working through the complex emotions that separate us and bind us together.
It\’s a haunting, passionate and beautiful ride. Well worth a listen.