| Musical Style: Blues Rock | Produced By: Rex Carroll |
| Record Label: Retroactive | Country Of Origin: USA |
| Year Released: 2010 / 2025 | Artist Website: |
| Tracks: 10 / 12 | Rating: 85% |
| Running Time: 38:49 / 47:31 |
The Retroactive Records 2010 full-length debut That Was Then, This Is Now from The Rex Carroll Band packs a blues-rock feel in a heavier guitar integral package. The project of guitar virtuoso Rex Carroll (Whitecross, King James, Fierce Heart) delivers requisite goods in the form of shuffling bass, acoustic lacings and guitar ranging from earthy and grainy slide based to shred worthy soloing. Vocally, artist presents with a befitting mid-ranged style intrinsic to heartfelt soul and raw and raspy grit.
Carroll is no stranger to the blues, noting the blues-rock to his Star Song Records 1995 full-length release under the heading The Rex Carroll Sessions. Artist took a five-year break from music following The Rex Carroll Sessions to build his own studio with the goal of ‘(taking) a second shot at making my own album’ (quoting his press material). It took him three years to complete That Was Then, This Is Now ahead of sitting on the masters a couple of years and signing with Retroactive. Album title traces to how Carroll was thinking about the various and many changes in the music industry and his own life.
Many identify with Carroll for the five albums he recorded between the late eighties and early nineties with vocalist Scott Wenzel as part of melodic metal act Whitecross and sixth with new front man David Roberts in 2024. Keeping in mind That Was Then, This Is Now is not quite heavy as Whitecross, it nonetheless delivers the guitar driven incentive to draw comparison to heavier blues rock acts Stevie & The Saints and Glenn Kaiser Band. Yet, a traditional blues side to the album with applicable Southern and classic rock flavorings brings to mind Sign Of Jonah, Hard Road and Darrell Mansfield.
With the original 2010 release long out of print, That Was Then, This Is Now was reissued by Retroactive as a ‘15th Anniversary Edition’ in June of 2025 with two bonus tracks in the jewel case CD (500) and vinyl (200 copies) formats. Former includes a full-color cardboard O-ring and limited edition collector’s card and latter a 12X12 full-color insert. Re-mastering attributes to Rob Colwell (Bombworks Sound) and layout and design to feature a write up from Carroll to Scott Waters (No Life Til Metal Graphics).
I always felt the original version to That Was Then, This Is Now sounds fine, but the Retroactive re-mastering delivers the brighter and more succinct sound. A fuller and punchier presence accentuates rhythm guitar, while added clarity and impact fortifies drums. Guitar leads stand out cleaner as well.
“Find A Way” opens the album to a crescendo of snapping drums and searing feedback prior to gritting its way at an animated tempo. A daring flair manifests consequently, found in rhythm guitar combining equally parts blithe and catchy, carefree melodies and artists brazen soloing of a metal derivative nature- there is a reason Carroll is winner of multiple Heaven’s Metal Magazine guitar hero awards. One cannot help notice the lucid production allowing all instrumentation to radiate in the mix. Lyric snippet:
Wake up in the morning
Feel the sun shining down on me
I start with a simple prayer
Lord help me be the man I need to be
When something starts in on troubling you
Just let it slide
There are many days before you
And a long road to walk, so let it ride
“Circle Of Love” follows in similar form, starting to open air guitar only to slice its way at a jaunty clip as jovial harmonies and cascading hooks supplement the artist’s sandpapery vocal subtleties. Providing pivotal support is the expert rhythm section of Antonio Acevedo, contributing the sonorous bass presence, and Geoffrey McCormick, referencing his fleet-footed timekeeping. Lyric snippet:
Well thunder and lightning
Brought me down to my knees
So I asked the question
What was I thinking of?
The seventh circle
The one they all been dreaming of
Standing in the circle
In a Circle of Love
Bluesy guitar shred aficionados will delight in the subsequent four minutes. First attributes to open-air guitar solo “Foolsgold”, which finds Carroll unleashing his requisite show stopping licks and chops- in similar fashion as other such short instrumentals gracing each Whitecross album. “Working Man’s Blues” follows as a three-minute explosion of earthy slide guitar driven combustion in which Carroll again takes opportune to pull-out-all-the-stops from a soloing standpoint. In between, song shines with its certain never to go way sing along blues enriched refrain.
“Walk A Mile” is another shorter piece at two and half minutes. It builds upon the traditional blues side to The Rex Carroll Band, not as unreserved as its predecessors with a shuffling mid-paced bearing nor quite heavy rocking in abutting classic rock territory. Manner in which the song fades at the end leaves the listener wishing it had been carried out an extra or two. Lyric snippet:
Lean, mean, the valvoline
Is rumbling inside
If you talk the talk, you gotta walk the walk
You know I got my pride
Take it out back and give it a whack
Is what I’d like to do
So would you like to stand around
Or walk a mile in my shoe
“Rock My World” also trends the mid-tempo in upholding the group’s Southern rock side. Guitar melodies, for instance, are awash in moving emotion and melody the felicitous with its perceptible embrace. Instrumental moments fittingly impress of softer guitar seasonings as opposed to the shred based. A borderline ballad feel rises to the surface in the process.
Albums best track in my opinion ensues in “Witch Doctor Bones”. Song represents one of its heaviest, substantiating Carroll’s borderline hard rock guitars and blues infused soloing, and expertly performed, specifying the dynamic timekeeping found in complementary rolls and fills, and cowbell to taste. However, it is the punchy hook filled attributes - the ‘you’re gonna need more than them witch doctor bones’ refrain is indelible - that puts things over the top. What we have is a song of the year contender for 2010. Lyric snippet:
The dog is seeking after fool’s gold
Blinded by his ambition all his greed jealousy
But there’s a curse that waits upon him
A consequence that he can’t see
When your heart is like a stone
And you need direction home
To me it’s plain to see
You’re gonna need more than them
Witch doctor bones…
Three minute “Delta Memories” returns to truncated territory. This one revisits traditional blues with its bounding rhythms and shambling bass, albeit not forsaking the forward thinking guitar mentality. Riffing and soloing drawing heavily from a ZZ Top influence finds the artist literally on fire. That said, lone constructive comment is that similar to “Walk A Mile” song ends a bit early when I would like to have seen it further extended.
The brilliant six minute “My Train” also ranks with albums best. Song sets a leisurely pace, acoustically concentrated its span to piece together a ballad like climate, but also enlivened with occasional outbursts of emotional rhythm guitar. Soulful Gospel style backing vocals allow refrain to be that much more memorable, while the organ at the end further rouses the classic rock nuances. Lyric snippet:
I see my train in the distance
Pulling round the bend
I ain’t sure where it’s going
I’m gonna ride it to the end
I’ve come this way before
But then you know where I been
I got countless miles of living
They’re just scattered in the wind
Back to elevated territory with “Throw Them Bonz”, another heavier cut pinpointed by rhythm guitar elevating to the point of borderline hard rock. A reserved side to the song, however, reveals in the decelerated instrumental interlude driven by relaxed feedback and heightened bass. Best part is the final minute and half in which Carroll cuts loose in shredding fashion and in the process hearkens back to Whitecross. Speaking of which, the gravelly ‘yeah-ow’ to start the song almost sounds like Scott Wenzel!
As for the bonus tracks, “Highway Roll” is a straightforward, no frills blues rocker with a stately demeanor and cool ‘me and Jesus on the highway’ faith declaration and “In For Some Trouble” a dragging plodder emitting of ambling bass and incandescent front to back soloing. Distinctive to the two are vocals on the gruff and lower register side. I find each more than album worthy as valuable ‘bonuses’ to the track listing.
If a fan of blues rock with a heavier edge then look no further than The Rex Carroll Band debut That Was Then, This Is Now. It allows Carroll to highlight an added dimension to his renowned abilities, as opposed to the melodic metal and hard rock of Whitecross- and not just from a guitar standpoint but also blues soaked vocals. Each of albums 12 songs (counting the bonus tracks) is worthy of merit, keeping in mind I take to some more than I do others. Additional value realizes in the top-notch production and the Antonio Acevedo and Geoffrey McCormick rhythm section. The upgraded Retroactive reissue to That Was Then, This Is Now comes highly recommended accordingly.
Review by Andrew Rockwell
Track Listing: “Find A Way” (4:35), “Circle Of Love” (3:18), “Foolsgold” (1:14), “Working Man’s Blues” (2:46), “Walk A Mile” (2:40), “Rock My World” (4:58), “Witch Dr. Bones” (5:02), “Delta Memories” (2:43), “My Train” (6:12), “Throw Them Bonz” (5:19), “Highway Roll” (4:04), “In For Some Trouble” (4:38)
Musicians
Rex Carroll - Lead Vocals, Guitars & Drums (track #10)
Antonio Acevedo - Bass
Geoffrey McCormick - Drums
