Album Review: The Shouting Matches - Grownass Man

So, you'll either know or not that this is Justin Vernon's new/old band, as he rests the Bon Iver nameplate. But those looking for a new Skinny Love perhaps best look elsewhere.

This is just a relaxedly scuffed little three-piece real band of Vernon, with old Wisconsin musical buddies Brian Moen and Phil Cook. It's Cook's big rolling organ lines – unashamedly quoting the right ones such as Booker T Jones and The Band's Garth Hudson – which colour the bluesy soul and gospel stylings through most of this. Vernon mostly eschews his studied approach – and even that falsetto – that trademarked some previous work.

The Shouting Matches don't quite 'rock', but much of this does unselfconsciously swing, and even lets itself stumble a bit. It's echoey, a little unsanded at the edges, but if from a garage it's a tidy one where they've moved the Prius to set up the microphones and amps. They grab-bag at some typical bar-band territory. Opener Avery Hill and the latter Seven Sisters try for a swipe of the kind of Rolling Stones' country-tinged swagger even they couldn't get right all the time. Then, another of Vernon's location songs – Gallup, NM – sounds like a Wilco demo right down to the picked-at attempt at Nels-Cline-doing-Tom-Verlaine wiry solo. New Theme mixes in the Green Onions soul overtones. The final I Need A Change is the sparer plaintive ballad and worth the trip.

Whether this is Vernon's new chosen path or just a battery-recharging comfortable sidetrack, it's more just a trio of classy musicians sounding like they're having a good time.