Home Read Classic Album Review: Reverend Horton Heat | Lucky 7

Classic Album Review: Reverend Horton Heat | Lucky 7

The Reverend plays it safe and comes up a winner with this back-to-basics affair.

This came out in 2002 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):

 


Let’s face it: The ole Rev. hasn’t exactly been on a hot streak lately.

His last few albums — including 2000’s more laid-back and traditional Spend A Night in the Box — haven’t been raking in the chips. So, like many a high-stakes gambler in the hole, Reverend Horton Heat — aka Jim Heath — aims to turn his fortune around by betting it all on Lucky 7, a more reinvogorated, back-to-basics affair. And a fairly safe bet it is. Most of these 14 tracks are as predictable as a one-horse race, with the Rev. twanging up a storm on his old gee-tar and belting out familiar, 12-bar barnburners about fast cars, hard likker and evil wimmen over the solid standup-bass thump and two-beat bashing of his long-serving rhythm section. There are a couple of time-wasting instrumentals and a few too many carbon-copy cuts to make this his finest moment, but even so, for fans of the Rev.’s psychobilly freakout frenzy, it’s a sure winner.