Fifteen years is a long time between records. Soulive have spent that stretch doing other things, building other projects, living other musical lives, and ‘Flowers’ arrives with the relaxed confidence of a band that never doubted it had another album in it. Recorded at Flóki Studios in northern Iceland under executive producer Chad Pike, it’s the sound of Eric Krasno, Alan Evans, and Neal Evans picking up exactly where they left off, and then going somewhere new.
The album moves through jazz, funk, R&B, and blues with the ease of a group that has spent 25-plus years internalizing all of it. Opener “XI” sets the mood immediately, a deep, haunting groove with Krasno’s reverb-drenched guitar oozing swagger over the Evans brothers’ locked-in rhythm. “Baby Jupiter” gets the body moving, “3 Kings” pays tribute to B.B., Freddie, and Albert King with the kind of blues fluency that only Krasno can deliver, and “Basher”, a nod to Don Cheadle’s Ocean’s Eleven character, showcases the trio’s stop-start telepathy at its most playful.
The sole vocal appearance comes from Grammy-winning soul artist Van Hunt on “Flowers at Your Feet”, a Parliament-influenced centrepiece that broadens the album’s palette without disrupting its flow. The closing stretch, from “Pikes Place” through the symphonic warmth of “Window Weather”, lands like the payoff of a well-earned journey. This is an outfit still operating with borderline telepathy, and ‘Flowers’ captures that bond in full.
Soulive have two dates at Ardmore Music Hall outside Philadelphia on April 24 and 25. Limited opportunities to hear this material live, so the window is tight.
‘Flowers’ is out now.
Upcoming Dates:
April 24, Philadelphia Area, PA, Ardmore Music Hall
April 25, Philadelphia Area, PA, Ardmore Music Hall