Spring Break
Around the Bend is solid country fare
Aaron Tessman
Issue date: 10/8/08 Section: Entertainment
10/08/08 - Standing tall and very lean, some might call Randy Travis "ruggedly handsome" despite his very rectangular head.
After dropping out of high school, drinking his way through much of his adolescence, and getting in trouble with the law, it is hard to believe that Travis (b. 1959 as Randy Bruce Traywick) has produced, at least 15 number one hit songs.
Yet, somehow, since 1986 Travis has been producing his style of the "love-we-could've-had," country music and, as his numbers show, has been quite successful in doing so. He has even helped to influence stars such as Garth Brooks.
Travis is definitely a country singer but, contrary to the popular belief that country music is all about ex-girlfriends and boyfriends, trucks, cheating, and booze (see: Carrie Underwood's "Before he Cheats") this CD is filled with "chicken-fry, hoedown, music."
For those that can't see it- visualize middle-to-older aged men and women in overalls, aprons and chef hats, shoveling down half of a fried chicken, cornbread, mashed potatoes' n' gravy, you name it- they eat it.
The first song on his newest album, which has already hit stores, is titled "Around the Bend" and shares the name with the record. In it Travis takes a one-syllable word ("go") and tacks on four extra syllables to make it "go-o-o-o-o." The repetition is a bit much.
Well, maybe I'm being overly-critical, the song isn't that bad- I guess. Let's see… some positives: the tune is catchy (for square dancing)... OK, maybe the song is "that bad."
His next track is called "You Didn't Have a Good Time" and is one of the mellower songs on the album has a cryptic finale, "So take a good hard look in the mirror, and drink that image down. I'm the truth that you can't run from, I'm the conscience you can't drown." Hmm… satanic force? Or, stalker?
As for "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right," Bob Dylan composed this little ditty and musically there is nothing wrong with it. The number has good verses and chorus and its even got a neat little bridge (fiddle solo?). Travis gives it a 1980s hole-in-the-wall saloon sound. Travis' version could use a little work, but that might just be my issues about repetition coming through.
The majority of the songs on this compilation are about love lost and found and lost again.
Personally, I'm not much of a country music fan. However, this CD is fairly upbeat and easy to listen to.
All said, it earns a solid "B."
After dropping out of high school, drinking his way through much of his adolescence, and getting in trouble with the law, it is hard to believe that Travis (b. 1959 as Randy Bruce Traywick) has produced, at least 15 number one hit songs.
Yet, somehow, since 1986 Travis has been producing his style of the "love-we-could've-had," country music and, as his numbers show, has been quite successful in doing so. He has even helped to influence stars such as Garth Brooks.
Travis is definitely a country singer but, contrary to the popular belief that country music is all about ex-girlfriends and boyfriends, trucks, cheating, and booze (see: Carrie Underwood's "Before he Cheats") this CD is filled with "chicken-fry, hoedown, music."
For those that can't see it- visualize middle-to-older aged men and women in overalls, aprons and chef hats, shoveling down half of a fried chicken, cornbread, mashed potatoes' n' gravy, you name it- they eat it.
The first song on his newest album, which has already hit stores, is titled "Around the Bend" and shares the name with the record. In it Travis takes a one-syllable word ("go") and tacks on four extra syllables to make it "go-o-o-o-o." The repetition is a bit much.
Well, maybe I'm being overly-critical, the song isn't that bad- I guess. Let's see… some positives: the tune is catchy (for square dancing)... OK, maybe the song is "that bad."
His next track is called "You Didn't Have a Good Time" and is one of the mellower songs on the album has a cryptic finale, "So take a good hard look in the mirror, and drink that image down. I'm the truth that you can't run from, I'm the conscience you can't drown." Hmm… satanic force? Or, stalker?
As for "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right," Bob Dylan composed this little ditty and musically there is nothing wrong with it. The number has good verses and chorus and its even got a neat little bridge (fiddle solo?). Travis gives it a 1980s hole-in-the-wall saloon sound. Travis' version could use a little work, but that might just be my issues about repetition coming through.
The majority of the songs on this compilation are about love lost and found and lost again.
Personally, I'm not much of a country music fan. However, this CD is fairly upbeat and easy to listen to.
All said, it earns a solid "B."
