Album Review: Dirty Streets, Rough and Tumble
The thing about Dirty Streets is they’re really, really good. This poses a peculiar kind of challenge when it comes to writing about the Memphis three-piece, because when it comes right down to it, what more do you really need? After some five studio albums, the heavy-blues-soul rockers present Rough and Tumble through Alive Naturalsound with 10 tracks and an unassuming sub-35-minute runtime, live-recorded for Ditty TV in Memphis, shot and recorded straight through as a set. And you know what? It’s really good. They’re a really good band. There you go.
One recalls being taken aback by the clearheaded professionalism of their second record, Movements (review here), in 2011, and the simple truth of the matter is they’ve never wavered from the standard they set there or even on 2009’s debut, Portrait of a Man. Founded by guitarist/vocalist Justin Toland and bassist Thomas Storz with Andrew Denham on drums before they even set about recording that first album — formative, grittier than they’d wind up, but still headed in the direction they went — the band seem to have always known their purpose in terms of writing classic heavy blues and soul songs, and Rough and Tumble highlights not just the chemistry that their maturity has wrought across the last decade-plus, but the effectiveness of the craft that’s driven them all along.
As players, there is not one single member of Dirty Streets — sometimes also The Dirty Streets — who, if you put them in another band, wouldn’t be very likely to be the best player in that band. Denham‘s strutting snare pops on “Take a Walk,” for example. The F-U-N-K funk in Storz‘s bassline on “Think Twice” from 2015’s White Horse (review here), and Toland‘s follow-the-guitar vocal melody at the outset on “Good Pills” from that same record, leading the shuffle and initial kick of energy to get things rolling — each one of them brings something special to what they do. Further, each one makes the band stronger. I won’t deny Toland is a significant presence here and throughout the band’s history — I said as much just the other day — but as Rough and Tumble plays out, it’s not just about him, or just about Storz, or Denham. It’s all three; how they communicate as players and how they convey the material that comprises this utter joy of a set.
Cuts come from as far back as the slide-infused “Itta Benna” off Portrait of a Man, and after “Good Pills,” the trio shift into two covers of ’70s Americana-ish singer-songwriter Joe South in “Tell the Truth” and the more twang-inflected “Walk a Mile in My Shoes,” the hooks of both tracks blending almost seamlessly with those of the original songs that follow as “Itta Benna” leads into “Can’t Go Back” from 2018’s Distractions, the band’s latest studio LP. That particular pairing highlights the point above — while Dirty Streets have certainly grown as a band and the sound of their records bears that out from one into the next, the underlying aesthetic mission has been steady all along. One way or the other, new material or old, originals or covers, Dirty Streets are locked in. That’s really all there is to it. They’ve never operated any other way. At this point, I don’t think they could if they wanted to.
Among their albums, Movements and 2013’s Blades of Grass (review here) — the latter of which was their first for Alive Naturalsound — are unrepresented, and the focus is rightly on Distractions as the most recent outing. “Can’t Go Back” leads into “Think Twice” smoothly, the start-stops of the latter’s verses opening into a fluid and memorable chorus, with Denham moving to the crash to drive a solo section ahead of a final runthrough of the hook later on. Structurally sound, perfectly paced, mellow but heavy, it’s nothing less than Dirty Streets at their best. By this point in the proceedings, the vibe is set and Toland, Storz and Denham are absolutely on a roll, which only makes the arrival of “Take a Walk” with its funky wah guitar and push of drums all the more welcome.
Understand, it’s not a flawless performance throughout Rough and Tumble in the sense of a live album that’s been overdubbed and worked on in the studio. But would you really want that? What Rough and Tumble presents instead is Dirty Streets as they are, and frankly, that’s plenty. I’m not sure either they or the record live up to moniker or title — they’re not particularly dirty and the songs are hardly rough — but there’s no question Dirty Streets are in their element performing live like this. It’s worth noting that the two longest tracks on Rough and Tumble are “Walk a Mile in My Shoes” (5:10) and “Itta Benna” (4:11). A cover and a song from their first LP. The rest of what surrounds is on either side of three minutes long.
That includes, tellingly, the closing salvo of “Trying to Remember,” “The Voices” and “On the Way.” The bookends come from Distractions, and “The Voices” from White Horse, but the meatier riff of “Trying to Remember” picks up from “Take a Walk” and carries that energy forward in more winding fashion in a transition to something of a comedown at the end of the set, as “The Voices” and “On the Way” are both acoustic. This was likely done with the video presentation in mind, but it works surprisingly well on the live album too, making it so that there’s not so much a big-rock-finish or blowout at the end, but a more pastoral feel in line with the country-soul they’ve shown elsewhere. Denham moves to a shaker rather than the full kit, and even though none of the final three tracks is over three minutes long, they still manage to make some of the most striking impressions of Rough and Tumble as a whole.
So you see the dilemma. It’s not that one would want to rag on Dirty Streets or offer some non-constructive critique of what they do. Far from it. However, “golly this band is good” doesn’t exactly cut it as hard analysis either. But they are, and what they do continues to defy the notion that stylistic achievement requires high-minded progressive genre blends — nothing against them — or anything more than an organic conversation between players. Dirty Streets have their roots and they know it, but they’re their own band and one can only be thankful for that.
Dirty Streets, “Walk a Mile in My Shoes” (Joe South cover)
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