Alabama Shakes
I Must Be Dreaming
ISLAND
Given that Alabama Shakes have become a household name among even casual rock and roll fans, it’s striking that they only issued two studio records prior to this one during their early-2010s run. As the question “So, what do you think of Alabama Shakes?” naturally began to flow from every conversation about Led Zeppelin, Brittany Howard had instead decided to pursue solo endeavors after the massive commercial success of 2012’s Boys & Girls and its 2016’s follow-up, the multiple GRAMMY-nominated Sound & Color. A former postal worker whose adeptness at howls and whispers cemented her distinctly Southern vocal style, she told me in 2015 that it was her “passion to perform and write, but right now I really like the writing side of it. I’ve got a lot of ideas.”
In retrospect, that statement appears to have clearly presaged her decision to break away from the Shakes to see how far she could pursue her own musical vision. Now, two years after her second solo effort—2024’s What Now—that title seems prescient, and would’ve been even more so had she decided to add a question mark to the end of it. She must to have realized that pushing herself into new songwriting territory required, at least for the time being, reuniting with her old squad. As is to be expected after a decade-long break between studio records, bringing back the gang wasn’t so simple, though. Percussionist Steve Johnson—who was convicted of child abuse in 2020—obviously isn’t present on I Must Be Dreaming, nor was he formally replaced in the lineup. But Zac Cockrell and Heath Fogg picked up the slack, expanding their duties beyond bass and guitar, respectively, to encompass production, background vocals, and more.
Cockrell and Fogg also co-wrote each of the album’s 11 songs, reflecting that they had likely conjured some ideas of their own during the same length of time that it took Odysseus to trek from Troy back to Ithaca. With that epic span in mind, the fact that the Shakes reignited their chemistry as a blockbuster unit—and shook off any resentment that may have kindled, even in the form of embers, during Howard’s solo affairs—is not to be taken for granted. From the first low rumblings of opener “Tea Time” to the caressing closer “Tied to You,” there’s a strong case to be made that the album should’ve been titled with a plural pronoun, so successfully do they prove to be on the same cloud throughout. Was that easier to pull off with three members? Perhaps. But it’s a fact all the same.
Most impressive of all is that Alabama Shakes sound on their third record like no time has passed at all. Sure, Howard and her partners venture into new territory with the funk throwback “How Love’s Supposed to Go,” “American Dream”—the gritty spareness of which suggests that we’re all nibbling on the bones of what’s left of it—and “Another Life,” which is speckled with celesta, congas, glockenspiel, tambourine, and vibraphone. But the soul of the record is still the soulful rock brilliance with which the band made its name. And especially on “I Feel Hope Coming,” “Time,” and “Friends,” Alabama Shakes remind us that the hope that existed in 2015 can potentially be regained as adeptly as this special trio reignited the magic that made them one of America’s greatest modern rock acts.
