Black Country, New Road Evolves In Their Baltimore Return

Ever since Isaac Wood's departure in 2022, the band has been busy tediously constructing a new sound and live structure. Using a diverse cast of instruments, vocalists, and musical identities, the band crafts looming ballads and stunning art-rock builds. Through their set, it was abundantly clear to me that every song was meticulously crafted and rehearsed for the live experience, but somehow just as free from the limitations of practice. They mold like putty to the room they play.

On each song, one of the three fronting members takes us down a winding road into their world, both instrumentally and lyrically. Each path on Forever Howlong is a little different, but is fronted by the same personality, obsession, and obnoxiously complex reflections the band was birthed with.

On "Salem Sisters," Tyler Hyde weaves through her experiences as a young woman. She examines alienation, societal judgment, and anxiety. As the band slowly builds, you can hear and feel hints of lush piano and harsh saxophone belting through the house. The instruments are separate, bleeding, and peeking out into the audience. The band soon dips and takes the room with them into a chaotic spiraling end. Strings and drums start to fill the mix and slowly bridge the other members into a combined unit. It sounds loud, grand; Black Country, New Road is awake.

The Georgia Ellery fronted "Besties" carried Baltimore into the second half of their setlist. Opening with a fast and frantic piano melody, "Besties" examines deep unrequited love. The band plays the opening verse surprisingly reserved, while Georgia, mandolin in hand, shows us into the deep pit in her stomach. "Besties" opening verse feels deeply anxious live. As the song boils through its first chorus and through its closing refrain, the band opens up. You can feel the room tense and gasp. The air rushes upward through the bones of the building as the saxophone starts becoming looser and more risky. The keys start to stick out into the mix, every note becomes a brick in what they're creating. The drum fills become louder and more frequent, they rattle the room, and you can feel your heart pound. All while Georgia's writing slowly becomes compressed, the syllables increase and the weight of what they've built on stage is apparent. With a lump in her throat, the final lines come spiraling out like a busted dam.

Regardless of the lineup changes, and the lack of new music performed over the last year, Black Country, New Road still sounds fresh. The music has evolved through so many live shows, it's become unpredictable and fun. It hits the crowd, and carries them with it. Honesty and humanity are buried beneath layers of songwriting and instruments. The live show rips and tears at you, and with every drop and dip of the music, it reaches out a little more. I don't think any song on their setlist is as big of a reflection of this as "For the Cold Country."

"For the Cold Country" uses the imagery of a knight as a metaphor for feeling closed off, unable to love or move forward. Through these beginning sections, the crowd is met with a choir of voices, and a slow marching guitar melody. The armor of this knight is stuck, old, and ultimately feels like it's a part of them. They're so stuck in a cycle of needing connection, and not being able to forgive and open up in the ways needed to capture it. May Kershaw slowly builds up her voice through the exposition. You can visibly see and feel the pain that shrouds her; she's evolving with it, live.

Through the coming verses and the eventual conclusion, the knight slowly learns to let go in the face of adversity. As we move into the third verse, everything in the room falls into structure. The drum beats like a marching band, the saxophone beating with it. While the mandolin and piano hold down the main hook, the band moves with our character, and reacts to the challenges they face.

We progress, and the band slows down in verse four. May Kershaw's visuals become more reflective. The knight's hand and heart turn hard and rigid. The knight stands with ghosts trying to hold on to parts of their past in the face of change. The saxophone follows us there; it's low, it cries, it whines.

In the fifth verse, May Kershaw's story becomes bottlenecked. The knight has a moment of hardship, and finally understands that to overcome themselves they must move head-on. May sings alone on stage for a moment, then takes up a new melody. The saxophone joins in, then the bass, then the guitar, then the drums. They all reach up together, and the band explodes. Suddenly it's clear now, this is the moment they seemingly play for all night. All their individual paths have come together to bring us this excerpt of triumph. It feels right standing in the room with them. This sound and story are satisfying, it's moving, it's universal. Georgia constructs her character masterfully, with metaphors and a whole lot of imagery.

This is Black Country, New Road's strength: they act as a unit. They back every song with faith, understanding the strength of lyrics and instrumentals building in tandem. The more you hear it live, the more you hear it as a whole. They build universal stories, worlds, and sounds that are endlessly evolving from show to show. You just need to have the ears for it.