Sheryl Crow is back with C’mon, C’mon

Sheryl Crow’s new album C’mon, C’mon took a long time coming. Her last studio set was released in 1998. That is nearly four years! For a while there, people were starting to say she has probably lost it. Now such situations are not at all uncommon and I am now wondering what has happened to Paula Cole. There are many great names whose talents burst like searing flames in an instant. We watch and enjoyed the fireworks but they themselves ended up getting burned.

So the possibility that Sheryl Crow had already spent all the grit, the spunk, the sensuality, all the talent she had in those three wonderful and very well-produced albums she recorded during the ’90s, Tuesday Night Music Club, Sheryl Crow and The Globe Sessions was not at all far-fetched.

But C’mon, C’mon finally came out and it can now be rightly said that Sheryl still has so much to give. She took a long time working on this one because she wanted to give only her best. She wanted to write every song and mean everything that their lyrics say. Aside from singing, she wanted to produce the entire album and also play the acoustic guitar, the electric guitar, bass, keyboards, organ, piano, accordion, the Moog, the Wurlitzer, maraccas, tamborine and almost everything else.

And then there are all her friends. It is so important to her so Sheryl wanted them to take part in the making of the album. They also wanted to take part in the album. So while the work certainly took longer than her usual, the result includes a line-up of names rarely seen together in a single album. Take a look at this list: Liz Phair, Lenny Kravitz, Stevie Nicks, Don Henley for whom she used to sing back-up vocals, Gwyneth Paltrow, Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks and Emmylou Harris.

This blend of great singers from the field of rock and county music mirror the kind of ambivalence I have always felt about Sheryl Crow. She is a master of crunchy, aggressive rock and roll but then there are also sweet and sentimental country overtones in everything she does. And that includes the kind of images she presents, blue-jeaned-sexy, gaudy, sequined and toting a guitar, she comes across as a country diva without the big hair and heavy make-up.

On the other hand, why should we try to peg something so enjoyable and so well-made into categories. Sheryl Crow has found a niche and it is her very own. Come to think of it, C’mon, C’mon even bucks current trends and sounds like nothing that we have in the hit charts these days. The girl is in total charge. This is her best album ever. She is in perfect stride. She has done it four times in a row and she can only get better. It would be wise for other rockers, and that means male and female to take stock of what she is doing right.

Steve McQueen a tribute to the legendary Hollywood star, which should be released as a single, opens the album and sets the rebel ’70s feel. This is followed by the infectious first single, Soak Up the Sun . The rest are You’re an Original; Safe and Sound; C’mon, C’mon; It’s So Easy; Over You; Lucky Kid; Diamond Road; It’s Only Love; Abilene; Hole in My Pocket; Weather Channel and Missing.

Billboard tabulations

Before I end this piece, here is a look at the latest hit tabulations from Billboard Magazine. The lovely Ashanti still holds the top slot in the Hot 100 singles list. Foolish by Ashanti, I Need a Girl (Part 1) by P. Diddy featuring Usher & Loon; What’s Luv by Fat Joe featuring Ashanti; U Don’t Have to Call by Usher; A Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton; All You Wanted by Michelle Branch; Blurry by Puddle of Mudd; The Middle by Jimmy Eat World; Without Me by Eminem; and Don’t Let Me Get Me by Pink.

The top 10 of the top 200 albums are the following: Juslisen (Just Listen) by Musiq; A New Day by Celine Dion; MTV Unplugged No. 2.0. by Lauryn Hill; Ashanti by Ashanti, No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems by Kenny Chesney; Spider-Man the soundtrack of the hit motion picture by various artists; C’mon, C’mon by Sheryl Crow; Hood Rich by Big Tymers, and Josh Groban the sensational debut album by the teenaged Canadian tenor.