Sam Morrow doesn't seem made for the 21st century, but that's only because he's constructed himself out of the sounds and styles of the 1970s. On his third album, 2018's
Concrete and Mud, he leaned heavily on
ZZ Top and
Tom Petty; on its 2020 sequel
Gettin' By on Gettin' Down, he swaps the
Heartbreaker for
Lowell George. The ghost of the onetime
Little Feat leader hangs heavy and happily over
Gettin' By on Gettin' Down, apparent in the album's thick, funky rhythms and
Morrow's mischievous rhymes. Where the
Feat often delved into dense, jazzy improvs,
Morrow rambles along a relatively straight-and-narrow path, keeping his focus on vibe and song. Sometimes, the songs seem to threaten to take their sweet time, losing themselves within a hazy groove, but this isn't a jam record, it's a Southern rock LP where the feel and the tunes reign supreme.
Morrow saves his lone ballad for the end, serving up "I Think I'll Just Die Here" as a bittersweet coda, spending the rest of the album playing boogies both sleek ("Rosarita") and fuzzy ("Gettin' By on Gettin' Down"), and settling into rhythms so drenched in electric pianos and cowbells, they feel as if they were excavated from the '70s ("Wicked Woman," "Make 'Em Miss Me"). While
Morrow makes no apology for trading upon the past,
Gettin' By on Gettin' Down doesn't feel like a revival so much as a continuation, as if he was the first Southern rocker to pick up the strands dangling from
Feats Don't Fail Me Now. Perhaps there's a limited audience who will notice these connections, but the good thing about
Gettin' By on Gettin' Down is that it isn't made for them; it's for anybody who happens to be on the same semi-baked, sunny wavelength as
Morrow. If you share his taste or sensibility,
Gettin' By on Gettin' Down is a good time. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine
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