It’s a surprise to see NOLA natives Drab cropping up on Italian metal label WormHoleDeath; Their classy take on timeless Southern rock n’roll usually turns up on ‘hip’ labels like Small Stone, but who am I to ponder on the shady machinations of the ‘industry’? Better to simply give praise that this beautiful album has seen the light of day at all than to yatter on about who is putting it out…

Stylistically this is a band that lazy ears might liken to Rival Sons; However I don’t like that band at all and anyone daring to mention the two in the same breath would be rapidly cancelled from the seething melting pot of opinion that is my ‘socials’… In reality, Drab take a smidge of everything that’s been worth a cuss in the last fifty years of American hard rock and compress it in to something very worthwhile indeed.

So, on the thunderous Dumpster Fire you get a feeling of Thunder‘s Danny Bowes fronting Humble Pie, whilst elsewhere you might find yourself forming sentences in your brain like ‘the happy go lucky funtime vision of the Dead Daisies anchored grimly by grungy notes of obscure grunge like Paw‘. That’s what happened to me, anyway…

Been Too Long sounds like one of Sammy Hagar‘s jam bands colouring the Cabo San Lucas sand in a Zeppelinish hue, and by now you’re probably getting the point. I really, really like this album and the compendium of moods and colours it effortlessly flits between. Drab – the band and the album – feels weighty, like it’s made of real substance, the sort of ‘substance’ you don’t really expect unknown bands to offer up at the first time of asking (by which I mean at my first contact with them); Guitarist/vocalist Steve Mignano has a very special voice indeed, a once-in-a-generation gift to the world that deserves to be heard on the biggest stages possible, and rhythm section Casey Freitas and Aaron Levy (bass and drums respectively) back him to the hilt on an album that’s got me very hot under the collar indeed. Drab are very special, and you need them in your life. Now.

Drab releases on June 6th.