Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Howl

The most audacious move of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's career, and the album that gave them a second wind when they needed it most. Released in August 2005, Howl took the San Francisco trio's fuzz-drenched wall of noise and discarded it entirely, replacing distortion pedals and squalling guitars with worshipful keyboards, wheezing harmonicas, acoustic guitars, and gospel-infused Americana rooted in the traditions of American blues, folk, and country. The reaction was polarizing. The legacy is indisputable.

Peter Hayes and Robert Levon Been had always dug deeper into American roots music than their psych-garage reputation suggested, and Howl, whose title is a direct reference to Allen Ginsberg's landmark poem, gave them the confidence and the space to follow those instincts fully for the first time. The album was made in large part without drummer Nick Jago, whose departure forced the two remaining members to strip back and find something they had not known they were capable of. What emerged across 13 tracks was a record full of conviction, unabashed in its performances and completely unbothered by what anyone expected from them. As Been has reflected, deep down BRMC were always the kind of band that, whenever someone tried to put them in a box, got really uncomfortable and tried to do the opposite.

"Ain't No Easy Way" and "Shuffle Your Feet" are among the most beloved songs of their entire career. "Weight of the World" carries its gospel weight with a quiet, devastating authority. Guy Garvey of Elbow later selected Howl as his favorite lost album in a special NME issue dedicated to underappreciated records, and the album's stature has only grown in the two decades since. BRMC have recently toured playing the record in its entirety for the first time, to enraptured audiences who understand now what some missed in 2005.

This 20th anniversary edition has been remastered at Abbey Road Studios and pressed across three sides of double vinyl, with the fourth side featuring an etched BRMC logo.