
Released a mere eighteen months after their excellent debut, it's easy to say in retrospect that Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's follow-up record came out a bit too soon. Very much in tune with its predecessor, 'Take Them On, On Your Own' initially seems like a poor relation, offering inferior versions of great songs and lacking the new ideas to take their sound forward. Certainly 'Six Barrel Shotgun' is in the same vein as 'Whatever Happened to My Rock And Roll' but after a few listens it's clear that despite its lack of immediacy there's an undercurrent of greatness in much of the material on show. 'Ha Ha High Babe' unearths an insiduous, unshakeable groove, there's the howling guitars of 'Generation', the dark grungy 'Suddenly' and the dreamy acosutic delights of 'And I'm Aching'. Whilst earlier songs recalled the shoegazing years of Ride and Swervedriver much of this record has deeper connections with 60s blues and psych rock. An underrated gem.